A Quick Word On A Sunday

 

It appears people (some) have misconstrued what my aims are regarding wildlife. I have been called an "environmental conservationist" but not too keen on that. I was always embarrassed by "noted naturalist"!

I am a mammalogist specialising in wild canids and felids and some mustelids. The idea that I am keen to be seen as a fox expert is odd to say the least. I have studied foxes and other canids since 1976 and felids since 1980 and around the same time certain mustelids and I have written about all of these in articles and papers and two books, Red Paper 2022 Canids and Red Paper 2022 Felids. As an historian in general but especially a wildlife historian my work is aimed at educating people on wildlife and the extinctions of the past as well as looking at the current trend toward extinction of species in the UK. I have also studied (since 1976) the introduced species to be found in the UK.

My work on "exotics" as a police forces wildlife consultant could have netted me a good living as (even far more embarrassing thanks to UK newspapers and TV/radio not having much imagination) "Britain's Big Cat Detective" 😏. Being paid as an expert would have been quite lucrative but my problem is that the animals concerned are my biggest concern and not what I am going to eat tonight. At one point hunt groups were following me attempting to find where I was going for illegal "safari hunts" so I stopped the field work.

My motto has always been "Never by word or print jeopardise animal safety" and I have stood by that.

When it comes to foxes my intention was to publicise the species in the UK -the ones that were wiped out, ones introduced and wiped out again and so on. It has been an aim to have foxes taken seriously and to destroy the lies and myths surrounding them and my work still has a way to go with the public! My other aim has always been to also look at the health of foxes and it took a couple of years of daily arguing before a project was allowed to have certain foxes post mortem examined and from these we have found a great deal out. More than I had originally expected and the work is being noted.

We still need to do more and, yes, if I were a publicity hog then I could quite easily get myself featured and promoted more but I do not have that ego type. For me history can forget me so long as we learn and educate more and more about foxes and other wildlife. The wildlife are the important thing and not me and, yes, 1976-2024 unfunded I have achieved much but the idea, as someone suggested, that I ought to apply for some sort of grant...this is the UK and unless you are attached to a university or college (who are not interested) or have a "Dr" or "Professor" in front of your name you are simply running into brick walls.

What would I like to achieve? Above all to have people stop saying "Oh, just foxes" because they are worthy of far better description and better treatment.