Meeting our visiting Exmoor Ponies at Cuckoo Tors ecology research site near Buxton! We are managing this land to benefit nature and natural processes and the ponies are all part of the plan – provided through the Wild Peak Grazing Network with Derbyshire Wildlife Trust . Who would have thought …
I’m back from the IUCN UK Peatland Programme in Derry with Moors for the Future Partnership, connecting with people and organisations involved in caring for peatlands and restoring these special places. Peatlands need restoring because they have been damaged through land management choices (e.g. draining), air pollution (e.g. industrial revolution …
Out at Allestree Park Community Rewilding project with Field Biology students of University of Derby – performing habitat condition surveys with Eleanor Atkins and soil carbon flux measurements with Cyril Mbachu. The global mean CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is currently about 420 ppm – and the pre-industrial value was …
Visit the University of Derby blog for this article I wrote about the new UK budget in March 2020. It’s just over a week since the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak unleashed his ambitious ’spending spree’ budget, marking an end to austerity as a UK economic policy. Instead there …
I visited a Derbyshire primary school to contribute to a lesson on soil for 7 year olds. It was great fun doing experiments on permeability with the children and I also took the opportunity to break down stereotypes of who can be a scientist. I brought in an auger and …
Here is a video we made to showcase our Biology degree programme! I’m the programme leader – if you are interested then please get in touch directly with me or via the university.
This is a gallery about Australian biocrusts and contains 13 images.
For Manchester Science Festival I have been demonstrating an exploration of using 3D printing (additive manufacturing) to support environmental and ecology research and teaching. Apart from the practical benefits I think 3D printing is an important development for open research because it allows us to share hardware more easily than ever before, simply by sharing …
The Tour de France this week traversed the peak of Holme Moss at 524 m as Stage 2 passed through the peatlands of the Southern Pennines from Yorkshire and into Derbyshire. As Blel Kadri led the other riders over the summit the quality of the soil could not have been further from their minds. …
This week I am attending the 33rd New Phytologist symposium (Networks of Power and Influence) with Robin Sen and Francis Brearley from MMU. I will present a poster of work supported by MMU and Moors for the Future. The poster shows a preliminary network analysis of bacterial and fungal microbial …