Many of you have already heard, but my darling husband, @malcolmtait.bsky.social died suddenly on 3 June while on holiday in Greece. His death leaves a huge void in my life. We were inseparable: he was my partner, but also my best friend, colleague and coauthor.

NEW REPORT: Today we publish Unprotected Nature, a report revealing Natural England's failure to designate any new protected sites. Read about it in the Guardian here: www.theguardian.com/environment/...

England wildlife watchdog ‘has stopped designating special sites for protection’

Exclusive: Report finds Natural England has created no new SSSIs, which protect areas from development, since 2023

theguardian.com

This is why I haven't been on social media much! I've been horrified by what we found about Natural England pausing designation to SSSIs - and the consequent loss of nationally important sites for nature to development: wildjustice.org.uk/unprotected-...

Malcolm Tait@malcolmtait.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Natural England failing to protect valuable sites. Our report for @wildjustice.bsky.social shows that nearly 2/3 of sites waiting to be designated as SSSIs were under threat from development. One site in Thurrock will be directly destroyed. www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Hope not hate! 🐝💚

Don't want to boast or anything, but my garden is already mulched (no that is not a euphemism).

Saw more goldcrests than I've ever seen before in Sherwood Forest today. There are hundreds of them! One of my favourite birds. They seem to live in a time that runs faster than our clocks.

Natural England are dragging their heels on certifying the Middlewick Ranges as a SSSI, protecting it from development. The community need to fund a judicial review to protect this place. Please chip in - even just a couple of quid helps. www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/full-prote...

Nooooooo... when did figure skaters stop wearing sequins? What is the point of being able to twizzle madly on ice if you don't look like you came straight out of a gay disco? Winter Olympics ruined.

I don't think there has been a single day in 2026 when it hasn't rained in Sheffield, and the vast majority of days it has done nothing but rain. It is like living in a literally benighted atmosphere of murk. 😠☔🌧️💧

This is an author pairing I didn't see coming. Apparently anarchist planner Colin Ward and crime writer Ruth Rendell were great mates and lived close to each other in Suffolk. And they produced this together.

I'm hoping some of you will enjoy this beautiful and very short film - about development, harms to nature and OTTER-DETECTING DOGS! www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rg6...

The Detectorists - A short film about otters and detection dogs in conservation.

YouTube video by Natalie Clements

youtube.com

Read a letter from one of Noam Chomsky's coauthors and it literally says "He was wrong to hang out with Epstein and he was wrong to say the women who were his victims were hysterics, but it's probably his wife's fault." Seriously.

I'm on my way to Cardiff to give a talk and it's SUNNY! ☀️ Wales is looking stunning. JOY!!

The thing that worries me about mockups like this is that there is always a politics to the aesthetic. We talk a lot about the destructive economic form of AI art, and its appalling environmental resources consumption, but we don't always link that to content.

Gareth Dennis@garethdennis.uk · 6mo ago

Top tip: to avoid having the British Union of Fascists logo on the side of your mock-up train, don't use horrible text-to-image AI slop instead of actual designers and artists. www.scotsman.com/news/transpo...

After I had a hysterectomy I had to stop watching Schitt's Creek because Catherine O'Hara made me laugh so hard that I was in danger of having some kind of medical incident. She was a genius. 💔

Merriam-Webster@merriam-webster.com · 6mo ago

❤️

Women! Do you understand that some ways of designing urban areas can make spaces less safe for women? Yes? Then you understand more about planning than the government ministry responsible. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

England planning proposals fail to mention safety of women and girls, say critics

Draft proposals likely to ‘embed risk and inequality’, campaigners and urban planners say

theguardian.com

Rare butterflies bounce back after landowners in Wales cut back on flailing hedges

Rare butterflies bounce back after landowners in Wales cut back on flailing hedges

More than 300 brown hairstreak butterfly eggs discovered near Llandeilo this winter after decade of decline Record numbers of eggs of the rare brown hairstreak butterfly have been found in south-west Wales after landowners stopped flailing hedges every year. The butterfly lays its eggs on blackthorn every summer. But when land managers and farmers mechanically cut hedges every autumn, thousands of the eggs are unknowingly destroyed. Continue reading...

theguardian.com

Today I'm in Oxford for a workshop with the IPBES on transformative change for nature recovery. Hoping we can get beyond uncritical takes on "nature finance" and "market-based solutions". 🌱🌿🍀🌳

England: "There is no way we can mandate swift bricks in every new build because errrrr ummmm <checks notes> developers will complain?" Scotland: "Hold my beer". www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Swift bricks to be installed on all new buildings in Scotland as MSPs back law

Rest of UK has resisted calls to make builders install bricks that provide nesting for swifts and other endangered birds

theguardian.com

Just had a meeting about our exhibition, Plain Things Wonders, which will be at the Weston in Oxford in the autumn, and I have decided to stuff a case with straw things 🍞 The history of wheat is a fascinating one.

a picture of a field of wheat with the sun shining through it

ALT: a picture of a field of wheat with the sun shining through it

media.tenor.com

I am squeeing with delight at the cover for our new book! It's SO SHINY! Out in August.

So @dennispatton.bsky.social asked yesterday: why are the Greens (and other environmentalists) supporting the Local Plan in Sheffield? The answer to this goes to the heart of everything that's wrong with the current planning system and its relationship to nature.

the sun is shining through the trees and a fern is in the foreground

ALT: the sun is shining through the trees and a fern is in the foreground

media.tenor.com

First up - let me tell you about this event tomorrow night with @thelrm.bsky.social I'm like the Ancient Mariner about this book - grasping people by the arm, and telling them with a glittering, paranoid, neurotic eye that THEY MUST READ IT!

I'm so sorry - I've been absent for way longer than I ever intended. I needed a break from social media to process everything that's happened in the last year. And I'm feeling much better and more positive now! I've got so much to tell you guys too!

Just want to share my joy in this incredible book. Morag is the person I know with the most sensitive and critical antennae for place. And she writes with power and beauty.

Jessie Newbery (186-.1948), Scottish artist and embroiderer and one of the artists known as the Glasgow Girls. She created the Department of Embroidery at the Glasgow School of Art where she was able to establish needlework as a form of unique artistic design. #womensart

@davewragg.com are you the person currently talking to me on a thread about authorship on The Independent's Facebook?

Israel bombed a hospital. Rescue workers and reporters rushed to recover the dead and the wounded. Israel bombed the hospital again. Live on TV. Read that again. Our government’s legacy will be its complicity in crimes against humanity. End all arms sales to Israel, now.

When you walk into a bar, and the landlady looks you up and down and says "I got you, I'm pouring a big one". This is what a day of sorting out footnotes does. Good news: it's nearly ready to go off to Granta. Bad news: I'm going to have the worst hangover tomorrow.

Check out my state of the art greywater recycling system! Cost: £3 from Screwfix. Now I can reuse the water from my washing machine and kitchen sink in the garden during the hosepipe ban. (Obviously I'll be using ecofriendly detergents to try to protect the soil and plants as much as I can).