Sarah Watkinson

Boater: A Life on England's Waterways A Life on England's Waterways

BOATER is doing tremendously well - check out the Amazon reviews if that is your style - and my goodness, what a GREAT CHRISTMAS PRESENT IT WOULD MAKE. It's both a personal history and a history of the canals, with some startling information about the marital relations of ducks along the way.

Hooray! A new book by the one and only Luke Kennard poet!

Thrilled to see these crimson wax caps in the school wildlife patch I’ve managed for nature since 2000:

Delighted to find this 1941 reprint of the 1910 first edition of The Oxford Book of Ballads ed Quiller Couch with these superb endpapers mapping the border terrain:

Im judging this years @cafewriters.bsky.social poetry competition - its now open so send me your best poems. www.cafewriters.co.uk/home/poetry-... #poetrycompetition

Just a reminder that the Cafe Writers International poetry competition is open. Our wonderful (sole) judge this year is Jessica Mookherjee. Top prize is £1000 www.cafewriters.co.uk/home/poetry-...

Hooray! Off to do poetry in Wytham Woods with Oxford Stanza and soil ecologist @jedsol.bsky.social

Exciting news for poetry readers and writers:

Call for Submissions: Norse and Icelandic Forms Submit your alliterative poems to Forgotten Ground Regained by October 1

Nine days to submit a poem to the Fall Issue of Forgotten Ground Regained.

alliteration.net/call-for-submissions/ #poetry #submissions #Norse #Viking #poetrysky #BlueSkyPoets #PoetsOnBluesky #skypoets #poetrycommunity #litmags #alliterativeverse

The Thomas Hardy Society is officially on Bluesky! Follow us to learn more about #ThomasHardy - we'll be posting events, news, and more.

European banks face significant vulnerability to ecosystem degradation and climate change - Communications Earth & Environment The economy and banks in the euro area contribute and are exposed to nature-related risks, according to an analysis of data on 2500 banks’ dependence and impact on biodiversity, ecosystem degradation, and climate change.

🌿 Banks at risk from nature loss

A new study finds 72% of euro-area companies rely on ecosystem services, and 100 banks drive 87% of the sector’s biodiversity footprint. Flood and climate risks compound exposure.

🔗 www.nature.com/articles/s43...

#SciComm 🧪

I think this is brilliant:

Ian Duhig recommends 'Singletary'. "I have followed Geraldine's work for decades and Singletary contains all her characteristic strengths of exuberant wit, intellectual depth, idiosyncratic learning, slant wit and real spiritual and deep human love expressed with great linguistic panache. If you don't know her, take this chance to get acquainted."

📚 It's August, which means the #SealeyChallenge is underway! To help you on your journey to read a book every day this month, The Poetry Society has gotten in touch with poets we've recently worked with for some recommendations.

Next up is Ian Duhig, who is on the judging panel for (...)

Small fuzzy orange native bee with large jade green eyes, feeding on a magenta flower.

Metallic green sweat bee feeding on a tight lipped dandelion like bloom

Small striped native bee with extremely full pollen basket, like a super thick sunshine yellow leg warmer

Yellow and black bumble bee feeding on a purple pincushion flower

Native bees! All photographed recently in the garden. At the moment I’m especially enamored with what I believe are male Western leafcutters: ginger and fuzzy with big green eyes!

📢 Job alert!

UKCEH are looking for a Senior Freshwater Ecologist to join their Aquatic Ecosystems Group, based at their Edinburgh site!

💦🧪 @ukceh.bsky.social #UKCEH_AquaEco

share.google/P4sSI2ulbXL9...

Bring back the ancient woodlands smothered beneath your timber plantations Ancient woodlands are vanishing – and with them, some of our most loved and endangered wildlife. Forestry England manages over 100,000 acres of land that used to be ancient woodland - that’s bigger th...

🌳 Dame Judi Dench is calling for the return of ancient woodlands. Will you sign the petition to help restore the Ghost Woods and protect our green spaces for future generations? you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/br...

Who remembers all those names for fishing flies? Greenwell’s Glory, Partridge and Orange, March Brown. Father setting out hoping there would be a summer evening hatch of mayfly to excite trout and grayling in the Wharfe.

Absolutely delighted to see this, and proud to be a (micro) shareholder. Loved staying at Bunloit and Tayvallich and learning about the nature recovery work in progress there.

I am starting a PhD and am looking for grassland restoration/rewilding sites in Northern Ireland! Please forward this flier to anyone who might be interested in having their land surveyed for fungi!

Pollinators: Vital for nature & human well-being, but increasingly threatened.🌍

@ipbes.net #PollinationAssessment highlights the critical roles of pollinators, the threats they face, and the severe consequences of their decline. 🧪

For #WorldBeeDay, swipe through to discover their crucial roles! 🦋

Job Opportunity: Lecturer in Ecology and Global Change at University of Leeds.
We welcome dynamic applicants from across the world to join our team of tropical ecology and global change scientists.
jobs.leeds.ac.uk/Vacancy.aspx...

Image of a Starling perched with wording alongside reading: Birds in Greenspaces survey. Can you help? www.bto.org/greenspaces-pilot. Image credit: Starling © Edmund Fellowes/BTO. BTO logo sits top right of image.

Calling all nature lovers in cities, towns and villages! 🐦🦆 Have you signed up to our Birds in Greenspaces pilot survey yet? ➡️ bit.ly/birds-greensp... #UKBirding #Birds

a small plant is growing out of a pile of moss in the woods . ALT: a small plant is growing out of a pile of moss in the woods .

I don't know who needs this but there is a gentle and inspiring documentary about moss on the BBC iplayer and when I watch it I sigh and feel better, you might like it too, moss is hardcore, adaptable, survivor of ice and fire, it is ancient, lives on air, the guardian of the trees, and that's you.

Happy World Poetry Day! To celebrate the occasion, we are making The Poetry Review modern archive freely available for the next 24 hours for everyone to enjoy the best in international poetry. Click here to take advantage of this offer! bit.ly/4irqvug 📚

I’m so grateful for your work. Will buy you coffees soon.

Poetry Magazines Submissions Spreadsheet Poets! Take the hard work out of submitting to poetry magazines What poetry magazines are there? What are their web addresses? How many poems can I send? Are they open for submissions now? You&#821…

Just updated my quarterly spreadsheet of (mostly UK and Irish) #poetry mags - when they're open, how to submit etc. Every link checked by a human (me!) - It's free, and you can sign up here robinhoughtonpoetry.co.uk/poetry-magaz...

(PDF) The role of wood decay fungi in the carbon and nitrogen dynamics of the forest floor PDF | Introduction The mycelium of woodland fungi can act both as a reservoir and as a distribution system for nutrients, owing to its physiological and... | Find, read and cite all the research you n...

This is nice - Research Gate tells me this paper on how fungi help woodland ecosystems to work has had 2500 reads.
www.researchgate.net/publication/...

Blenheim land at Bladon was blitzed with glyphosate ‘to eliminate blackgrass’ in 2013 but later a subsequent 3-year regenerative rotation eliminated it.

Thank goodness