All posts by Monica Frisch

Events, Talks

Peatbogs

Thursday 24th February 2022

Our next talk will be given by Brian Eversham, Chief Executive of the Wildlife Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire & Northamptonshire

In the talk, which will start punctually at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday 24th February, Brian will start with the battle to save Britain’s largest lowland peatbogs, Thorne and Hatfield Moors. He will cover the range of peatland wildlife, from birds to insects to flowers to fungi, their habitats, and the progress in restoring peatlands across Britain in the last 20 years.

Thorne Moors bog pool (with cottongrass) © Brian Eversham

The talk will be ONLINE via Zoom.

Members will be emailed login details nearer the time.

To be added the mailing list for events: email webmaster [at] cnhs.org.uk To become a member: see details on the website membership page.

Events, Talks

Insect photography

Thursday 10th February 2022

Ann Miles, who trained as a biologist, will talk about photographing insects, a lifelong passion. She will demonstrate their beauty, their sometimes bizarre appearances and their fascinating behaviours.

White Dead Nettle beetles (c) Ann Miles

ONLINE via Zoom. Members will be emailed login details nearer the time. To be added the mailing list for events: email webmaster [at] cnhs.org.uk To become a member: see details on the website membership page.

Events, News, Talks

SPRING TALKS START 27th

The Cambridge Natural History Society programme of talks starts on Thursday 27th January, at 7:30 p.m.

Jonathan Shanklin, astronomer, meteorologist, naturalist and past president of Cambridge Natural History Society, will offer a choice of talks. The audience will choose at the start of the meeting. The options are

“The Natural History of Comets” (pretty much what it says in the title, but with brief excursions into the ozone hole and climate change)

“Marvel at the Moon” (a tour of some of the things seen in the night sky with simple equipment, bringing in some links with natural history, with a brief excursion again) OR

“An astronomer in Antarctica” (mostly ozone hole and climate change, with a bit of natural history and atmospheric phenomena). 

The talk will be presented online via Zoom, and CNHS members and those on the mailing list have been sent the Zoom link, which is specific to this meeting.

You will join the meeting in a waiting room and will be let in at 7:30 p.m.  Your video and audio will be off when you join.  You will be able to use chat to ask questions at the end of the talk, or you can raise a virtual hand from “reactions”. 

The event will be recorded and Society members who cannot join the event on Thursday will then be sent a link to allow them to hear it at their leisure.  If you are not a member this is a good reason to join.  Details of how to join the Society are at https://www.cnhs.org.uk/membership/

Resources & information, Uncategorized

More on reforestation

Following April Bagwill’s talk about the Trillion Trees project I had a look at their website, which has lots of information. You can download their Impact Report 2016-2020 which says “Since 2016, Trillion Trees partners have been supporting the protection of more than 18.3 billion trees, and the restoration of over 1.8 billion.” This shows all of the countries where the three partners are working in forests, but the website only shows a select few that the partners want to focus on for fundraising in the next year.

April has also provided links to some more resources:

Report and interactive map on the Deforestation Fronts

Other interesting forest maps on their website.

For successful restoration of natural forests Trillion Trees recommends organisations follow the IUCN’s principles for Forest Landscape Restoration, or similarly the 10 Golden Rules of Forest Restoration.

She notes that what Trillion Trees find is that many tree-planting organisations are just concerned with getting trees in the ground, but might not make sure they survive to grow to have biodiversity and climate impacts they claim. They will be publishing an online tool in January to help people/investors decide which tree planting and forest restoration bodies to support. April describes this as a “sort of a walk-through scoring tool to provide questions to ask of an organisation or to consider to determine if their projects are just about getting trees in the ground, or if they are trying to improve biodiversity, climate and social opportunities in the long term”. Sounds useful, given how many organisations are happy to plant trees if you pay them.

Events, Talks

25th November NatHistFest

The 2nd Online NatHistFest will be opened on Thursday 25th November 2021 at 7:30 p.m. with talks from some of the exhibitors. These will include:

  • Matt Hayes, University Museum of Zoology, “Butterflies Through Time: engaging audiences with wildlife of the past”
  • Chantel Carr, Froglife  “The Importance of educating young people on herpetology”
  • Steve Allain, Cambridge & Peterborough Amphibian and Reptile Group “A county atlas for amphibians and reptiles“

The event will be by Zoom. Members and those on the CNHS mailing list will be sent the link for the meeting. To be added the mailing list, email webmaster [at] cnhs.org.uk . To become a member, which brings further benefits, see our membership page.

The 2nd online NatHistFest replaces our usual Conversazione, which it was not possible to hold in the spring. It includes exhibits from CNHS members and local organisations on a wide range of topics.

The 17 exhibits from the 2020 online NatHistFest can still be viewed here.

News

Iberian Lynx

If you enjoyed Harriet Allen’s talk on “Restoring habitat for the Iberian lynx“, or if you missed it and would like some information about Iberian lynx, you might find the following article informative.

“Conservation actions see Iberian lynx claw back from brink of extinction“

I found it while browsing online and it is quite recent (March 2021) but Harriet thinks it’s well worth adding to our website for anyone who wants to read more. The article says that in the Iberian peninsula (Spain and Portugal) the wild population today is around 1,000 animals, compared with just 94 in 2002. Harriet says that she is hopeful that the project to ‘re-wild’ the Iberian lynx will continue to be a success, which is very encouraging.

Events

Wandlebury visit

On Sunday August 1 Cambridge Natural History Society will be visiting visit Wandlebury Country Park. The aim of this visit is to record in two new meadows that have been acquired by Cambridge Past, Present & Future. The main focus will be on botanical recording, but we will also record other flora and fauna that we encounter. The meeting is suitable for beginners as there will be help with identification.

All welcome, but if possible let Jonathan Shanklin (jdsh [AT] bas.ac.uk) know that you plan to come. Meet at the cycle stands at the Wandlebury car-park (TL492532) at 2 pm. There is a good cycle route from Cambridge, though there is a hill to climb! That’s because Wandlebury is 74 m above sea level (243 ft) compared to 6 m (20 ft) for Cambridge.

For cycle routes see https://www.cyclestreets.net – this shows that the route from the City Centre (junction Sidney Street and Petty Cury) to Wandlebury is 4 1/4 miles (almost 7 km) in an almost straight line and would take 40 minutes.

Events, News

NatHistFest open

This year, 2020, we had hoped to organise the 101st Annual Conversazione but instead the first ever online NatHistFest is now open for viewing!

Four local organisations and ten individuals have produced exhibits covering a wide variety of topics but mostly with a local angle. Find out about the rare hoverfly found this year, some interesting facts about seasonal plants, the floras of road verges and urban streets and what local organisations have done despite lockdown, among other things.

Unfortunately, technology does not permit any hands-on displays, nor does the event offer the usual opportunities to chat with the exhibitors but we hope you will enjoy the online exhibits.

We hope it will be possible for the 102nd Annual Conversazione to revert to the traditional format with exhibits that can be handled and exhibitors to talk to, but at the moment it is too soon to know what will be possible or when.

The online NatHistFest will remain open into 2021 and late entries can be submitted until the end of December 2020.

Events, Talks

Give Bees a Chance! How can we help bees and feed the world?

Thursday 10th December 2020 18.30 GMT  ONLINE

A free on-line event organised by the University of Cambridge. 
Register for tickets here.

We need bees and bees need our help. The decline in pollinating insects is one of the most worrying symptoms of climate breakdown because much of our food production relies on them.  

So, what can we do? Does it help if we make our gardens more welcoming to pollinators? Can scientists breed more bee-friendly plants? What role can farmers and the food industry play? What about the government’s new Office for Environmental Protection? 

Our panel will address these questions and others from the audience, to set out the steps we can all take to give bees a better chance.

Dave Goulson is the author of several popular books about bees, including the Garden Jungle.
Lynn Dicks is a conservation scientist focused on insect conservation and biodiversity in agricultural landscapes.
Hamish Symington researches pollination and plant-pollinator interactions at the University of Cambridge.
Howard Griffiths, Co-Chair of Cambridge Global Food Security IRC, Professor of Plant Ecology, Department of Plant Sciences, University of Cambridge. 

An #AnnualFoodAgenda event, organised by the University of Cambridge, Cambridge Global Food Security IRC and CambPlants Hub, powered by EIT Food, supported by the EIT, a body of the European Union. 

Image by Sven Lachmann from Pixabay. 

Events, News

Seasonal NatHistFest

As we were not able to hold its annual Conversazione and NatHistFest in April we are planning a small online Seasonal NatHistFest at 7:30 pm on 10th December 2020. This will take the form of short, 5 minute, talks, and a quiz. It will also launch the online NatHistFest on the new CNHS website.

Please email events@cnhs.org.uk if you would like to give a short talk – there will only be time for three or or four talks (by Zoom).

NatHistFest exhibits can be a set of up to six photos with captions or a poster in the form of a pdf. The subject of your display should relate to natural history but does not have to be seasonal or specifically Cambridgeshire. Each exhibit will have its own page on the website with the title of the exhibit, name of exhibitor and any other details you wish to make public. Photos and pdfs should be sent as files smaller than 5MB.

The NatHistFest will be ‘opened’ on 10th December and then remain accessible. As NatHistFest will remain open until at least the end of 2020, exhibits will continue to be added during December. Please send them to website@cnhs.org.uk as soon as they are ready so they can be added to the website, but they will not be made public until 10th December.

We look forward to seeing a great variety of displays!