The latest edition of CJS Professional is now online, and you can read it in full here. CJS says that the big news stories this month include:
- badger disease control methods are back in the news [more to read here]
- a chance to brush up on your identification and field survey skills in September [more to read here]
Its featured charity is Plantlife which wants you to join in with the Great British Wildflower Hunt. Plantlife says:
In June, Plantlife launched the first-ever Great British Wild Flower Hunt, designed to encourage all ages to enjoy and learn about their local wild flowers. The Hunt is part of Plantlife’s Forget-me-not campaign to reconnect people with our wild flora, which was born from the decision to drop 26 common plant names from the Oxford Junior Dictionary. The words in the OJD simply reflect a modern child’s life. But while many of us have read the headlines that kids today don’t know their wildlife and spend more time indoors than any generation before, there is something stark about children simply not needing to know words like ‘bluebell’ or ‘blackberry’. .. they have become irrelevant to their lives. What was even more arresting is that so many of these words are synonymous with childhood; – what are conker and buttercup if not for competitive whacking and looking under chins with? We know Plantlife’s members value wild plants and want to protect and conserve them. This is probably because you know a little something about them – perhaps their place in the world supporting pollinators, perhaps as old friends on well-trodden walks or growing in your garden. Perhaps they are inextricably linked to your childhood? If we want our wild plants to carry on being protected and conserved, we need to make sure there are people who want to do this – who value their beauty, intricacy, cultural value and, yes, their ecosystem services. This is where you come in… The Great British Wildflower Hunt is a way of encouraging that connection, that relationship with wild flowers. It comes with two online guides: Around town and A country stroll and we are launching a third next spring; Down to the woods. Between them, they cover the names, facts and folklore of nearly 70 wild flowers.
There’s much more detail here.
