BEASTLY paperback day. “If you are interested in the animal kingdom; if you are interested in the past, present, and future of planet Earth; if you are interested in anything at all - then this gorgeous, joyous, sobering book is for you.” IRISH TIMES

The Epstein saga is starting to look less like a scandal and more like a classic KGB asset play. Coincidence? Please. When there’s this much smoke, you usually find the Kremlin holding the matches. This goes way deeper than we thought. Andrew Marr: "Let me begin tonight with

Just so deeply depressing. If Ministers can’t support something as simple as swift bricks, which can have an amazing impact for swifts, then what hope is there for more complex measures? They just don’t care

It’s almost crunch time. Next week Peers will vote for or against swift bricks. To help swifts, please email steve.reed.mp@parliament.uk & james.cleverly.mp@parliament.uk who are crucial to the decision. Ask them to SAVE OUR SWIFTS ‼️put SWIFT BRICKS in the subject line 🙏

Apparently swift bricks are just too costly. Sorry guys, swifts& their 50 million year old existence& the category of most accessible urban birds, just isn’t worth the cost. Bye bye birdies. If you disagree tell steve.reed.mp@parliament.uk

Absolutely HUGE: Poland has just voted to ban #FurFarming! This will end the suffering like you see here for millions of animals who are bred for their #fur. 🥹 Congrats to @otwarteklatki for their years of advocacy. This is a massive victory for animals. 🧡

Every farmed animal deserves a life worth living, free from cruelty, cages, confinement and suffering #EndTheCageAge #EndFactoryFarming #RespectAllLife

Met them at dinner in the early days of their odyssey. They’d just been GIVEN a house with 18 acres of land! I remember her faux naive all-in-a-daze response to their good fortune. Conversation was 1-way & hard work. I was asked to interview RW abt her 2nd book & declined.

Watch @_OliviaBlake's brutal takedown of driven grouse shooting in just 90 seconds from last weeks debate in Parliament. @wildjustice_org

@helenscales

I am talking to the great marine biologist and wonderful writer Helen Scales about What The Wild Seas Can Be tomorrow, Salisbury Cathedral, 7.30pm. She is fascinating about the most important thing on the planet, the sea. https://t.co/ZTED5zEpOP

#Birds As humans mindlessly kill and trash the planet, nature gets on with affirming life. We are lucky to have filmmakers like Robert Fuller to remind us of the wonder and the beauty. Kingfisher dad teaches his chicks to fly:

With excellent illustrations on how to conservation lay a hedge, build a beaver dam, make bat roosts, etc!

Watch this rescued hen take her FIRST steps on grass and in sunlight. 🥲

HOW TO REWILD: A Practical Manual from Underhill Wood Nature Reserve for One to Fifty Acres by Jonathan Thomson. It’s brilliant, incredibly practical with great colour photographs & some excellent & very clear illustrations by myself! Available from FOLDE Dorset.

Well this is what I think about the government voting against swift bricks: Labour blocks proposal for ‘swift bricks’ in all new homes | Birds | The Guardian

There are simply no good reasons not to return lynx to Britain. Important study published today in Scotland. https://t.co/iJpRACmeeD

WTF? If Govt can’t even agree to this, which costs them zero & with no down-sides, what hope that it will step up to the bigger nature challenges we face? This is a *popular* policy, for heavens sake. Obstinate tin-eared stupidity doesn’t come close https://t.co/gh0wavpcm5

‘The tropics lost a record-shattering 6.7 million hectares of primary rainforest in 2024, an area nearly the size of Panama…. More than any other year in at least the last two decades.’ We must be mad.

The brutal reality of the zoo business A troop of eight gorillas have remained living at Bristol Zoo Gardens since it closed to the public in September 2022, with intruders breaking in to their enclosure @BornFreeFDN @willtravers

Opinion | Volodymyr Zelenskyy has courage. Pope Francis had it too. Why are there so many cowards? - The Guardian