Despite the heroic efforts of many volunteers on the conservation front line, and some striking successes, nature in Wales has not had a good ten years. As well as present disappointments, there is the shadow of an ever increasing human population, concludes Iolo Williams.

 

Flicking through the pages of Natur Cymru’s first edition it seems like yesterday. Time has flown. So many things have happened yet, sadly, so little has been achieved, lots of words but little action.

 

The article about Puffin Island, from that first edition back in 2001, tells the tale of CCW, RSPB and the landowner working together to remove the rats so the puffins and other seabirds could once more flourish. In the space of 90 years the population had crashed from ‘at least 2,000’ to ‘less than 20 pairs’ and the brown rats were thought to be the main cause for their demise. I remember how we laid down two and a half tonnes of warfarin and the population of an estimated 110,000 rats was eliminated.

 

Recently I returned with a camera crew expecting to land on a sea bird paradise, but unfortunately, the absence of rats had done little to increase the number of puffins. The first thing that struck me was the rank vegetation. The elder forest had expanded, brambles were everywhere, grasses literally up to your armpits and nettles thick and tall. The rats had certainly gone but, in their absence, the vegetation had become so tall that we would need to interfere again. There is now talk of introducing goats to keep down the vegetation. This, I think, is an excellent idea, provided we send a single sex population!

 

Whilst the overall picture on Puffin Island was disappointing, I was really pleased to find five eider duck nests within 10 minutes of landing on the island. This was a first for me – no longer can the north east of England boast of having the most southerly nesting eiders. We now have a small but flourishing population in Wales.

 

Greatest success

Looking back over the decade, to me the biggest success in conservation has to be the greater awareness and understanding of nature amongst children. In my schooldays the fact that I was interested in wildlife made me an oddity. Nowadays children are far more aware about the importance of not only wildlife, but also sustainability, recycling, green energy and the need to reduce our impact on the world. This is thanks to improved education. Ironically, however, at a time when our children are more aware of their environment, fewer are actually getting out into the countryside to enjoy its benefits, preferring instead to remain indoors playing computer games.

 

In broadcasting the major achievement has been getting Welsh wildlife onto ‘network TV’. In the past we might occasionally have seen a fleeting mention given to Skomer but otherwise it would be return visits to East Anglia and the Scottish islands. Now, Springwatch regularly visits Wales and Welsh items often feature on programmes such as The One Show. It’s as if the producers have suddenly awoken to the fact that Wales does exist and that it is, in fact, full to the brim with fantastic wildlife and landscapes.

 

Disappearing wildlife

My greatest disappointment over the past decade has been the continued ineffectiveness of politicians. By this I mean not only those at Westminster and Cardiff Bay but also the characterless individuals who sit in power at the head of many of our conservation organisations. They are forever developing strategies, action plans, frameworks, committees and sub-committees, but are we seeing more diversity in our hedgerows, more fish in our rivers, more hay meadows and more bums on eggs? No, we are watching our wildlife disappear in front of our eyes as they sit and talk about what should be done rather than getting on and doing it. There are wardens all over Wales who are champing at the bit to get the job done but constant bickering, petty politics and ridiculous regulations often prevent them from doing so.

 

There are a lot of heroes out there, many of them volunteers, working in the front lines of conservation. Knowledgeable, committed, hard-working individuals committed to the cause as opposed to the career ladder. There are superb examples of what can be achieved at various reserves around the country, places such as Ynys-hir, Malltraeth Marsh, New Grove Meadows and Cwm Idwal. It’s expensive to undertake such intensive work but it provides excellent examples for others to follow and far more has been achieved in this manner than by the futile attempts to influence government policy.

 

In the late 1980s, at a time of great wealth, conservation appeared to be high up the political agenda but since then it has virtually disappeared, not just in Wales but in Westminster and Europe too. Glastir, our latest attempt at an all-Wales agri-environment scheme, is a complete waste of time for wildlife and farmers alike, and the proposed amalgamation of our conservation agencies is nothing more than a cost-cutting exercise.

 

My biggest personal disappointment in the Welsh countryside has been the profusion of wind farms. I have campaigned and spoken out against them on many occasions, but to no effect. I am convinced that we have gone down a blind alley and that if we had spent the billions that have gone into wind farms on putting solar panels on every suitable roof in Wales, we would be a lot better off. I don’t mind the idea of a community wind turbine but these monstrous farms are commercial undertakings desecrating the few remaining wild spots of Wales. Last week a neighbour of mine told me ...’if we put more turbines here, next time we have a force 10 gale, Montgomeryshire will end up in Norfolk’. It goes without saying that we should all be using far less energy than we do.

 

Farmers are hugely important to us, both for food and the future of our wildlife, they own the land and we have to work together. They need to make a living just as we all do and we need to understand their point of view and speak their language. They come in for a lot of stick from conservationists but they are driven by farming policies. They are asked to feed an ever-expanding world population, a job they do very effectively, but wildlife invariably suffers. To make matters worse, just when we start to make progress with one set of policies, such as Tir Gofal, we move the goalposts with Glastir.

 

Relentless expansion of the human population

Looking to the future the single greatest threat is the relentless expansion of the human population. If I could wave a magic wand, I would halve it overnight and hold it at that level. There is increasingly less space for wildlife, and the finite essentials of life, such as clean air and water, are being stretched to the limits. Everyone seems to duck the issue but it’s the nettle we have to grasp, the situation is getting worse by the day. Britain is already amongst the most densely populated countries in Europe yet we seem to acquiesce in the predictions of adding an extra 10 million people to our population over the coming 40 years. Where are they all going to go? I’m afraid I don’t have the answer, but neither do the politicians.

 

No grizzlies nor gorillas but Wales is best

I’ve been lucky enough to be paid to travel and see some of the great wildlife spectacles of the world, such as grizzlies in Alaska feeding on salmon and the mountain gorillas in Uganda with their incredibly human-like behaviour. Yet every time I come back I realise that for all-round variety you can’t beat Wales. In the space of two hours I can walk from mountain top across moorland, along a stream, down through deciduous woodland, coniferous woodland, through farmland, by a river, through a marsh onto a dune, along an estuary and on to the sea. From a wildlife point of view we live in the best country in the world.

 

As for Natur Cymru, I think it’s a wonderful resource. It hits that middle ground between magazines such as BBC Willdife and the journals. Journals can be useful but heavy-going. In-depth analysis of the spatial distribution of a species in eastern Mongolia is not for me, whereas Natur Cymru has the right mix of wildlife, issues, habitats and it’s Welsh – it talks to me in my language about my land. To me it works well, so please keep going for the next ten years!

 

Iolo Williams is a well-known broadcaster and champion of nature in Wales.

 

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