Category: Farming
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223: Waters of Life with Tom Bowser
What happens when a farming family decides to become the first private landowner in Britain to legally relocate beavers onto their farm? How do you navigate the bureaucracy, the opposition from farming neighbours and the politics of wildlife management? And can beavers actually help a farm deal with the effects of climate change? To find answers to those questions I sat down with Tom Bowser, author of “Waters of Life: Fighting for Scotland’s Beavers”, a book that tells the story…
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219: Wild & Co on Venison, Native Woodland and Regenerative Farming
Can holistic grazing systems restore degraded hillsides and create profitable farms? How can local food systems and venison products revitalise struggling rural communities? Is it possible to farm with nature rather than against it and still make a living? These are the questions we explore in our conversation with John Duffy from Future Oak Farm, who returned to County Donegal after a career in oil and gas to transform his family’s traditional sheep farm into a model of regenerative agriculture.…
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206: The Real Yellowstone
Why is the farming community so opposed to the American Prairie Foundation’s rewilding vision? Can ranchers and conservationists find common ground when grizzly bears are eating cattle and wolves are reducing elk herds? What happens when well-meaning conservation efforts clash with rural communities who’ve worked the land for generations? To explore these contentious questions, I sit down with filmmaker Tom Opre and associate producer Tony Bynum to discuss their latest documentary, ‘The Real Yellowstone’. Tom returns to the podcast after…
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Let’s Talk About Europe’s Wolf Protection Laws
As you may have heard, the Standing Committee of the Berne Convention (an international legal instrument for nature conservation) decided to lower the protection status of wolves. This opens the way to lower their protection status across the EU through the Habitats Directive. The move had been on the cards for over a year, and I covered it extensively on my podcast in episode 163 last November. Back then, I spoke to five experts: scientists working in the fields of…
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192: EU Green Policy – The Science-Politics Divide with Faustine Bas-Defossez
How much influence do personal experiences of high-ranking officials have on EU environmental policies? What happens when science-based conservation collides with political interests? Can farmers and environmentalists find common ground in nature restoration? In this episode, I talk to Faustine Bas-Defossez, Director for Nature, Health and Environment at the European Environmental Bureau (EEB), who provides insights into the complex world of EU environmental policymaking. In our conversation, we discuss several pressing environmental issues, including the recent changes to the Common…
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Conservation Grazing: Balancing Food Production and Biodiversity
Conservation grazing is an increasingly popular approach to land management that’s catching on across the UK. It’s a method that uses livestock to meet conservation objectives, primarily by removing dominant vegetation to allow threatened species of plants, birds and insects to thrive. This technique is becoming more common on nature reserves throughout the country, with cattle, sheep, ponies and other animals being employed as four-legged conservationists. I recently had the pleasure of chatting with Elise Sutton, a conservationist and livestock…
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187: Soil, Dung Beetles, and Longhorn Beef with Elise Sutton
Can farming and conservation coexist harmoniously? How can farmers produce high-quality food while protecting biodiversity? Elise Sutton, a passionate conservationist and livestock manager at Cherry Lodge Farm, shares her experience in balancing food production with nature conservation. Elise talks about conservation grazing using English Longhorn cattle on a 650-acre farm that includes a Site of Special Scientific Interest. She explains how this method maintains biodiversity and produces top-quality, grass-fed beef. We talk about the intricacies of managing a nature-friendly farm,…
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186: Climate-Resilient Crops – Gene Editing with BetterSeeds and Ido Margalit
What are the latest advancements in gene editing for crops? How can genetic engineering help plants withstand climate change? Is genetically modified food safe for consumption? To answer these questions, I talk with Ido Margalit, a co-founder and the CEO of BetterSeeds, a plant genetics company focused exclusively on using genome editing/CRISPR technology for their breeding activities. Ido explains the differences between GMOs and gene editing, highlighting how CRISPR allows for precise modifications without introducing foreign genetic material. He discusses…
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185: Farmers’ Perspective on Carnivore Reintroductions with Jonny Hanson
Can large carnivore conservation coexist with livestock farming? In this episode, environmental social scientist Jonny Hanson and I discuss the complex issue of large carnivore reintroductions in Britain and Ireland. What are farmers’ perspectives on sharing landscapes with predators like wolves and lynx? How can we balance conservation goals with the realities of modern agriculture? We explore these pressing questions, drawing from Jonny’s extensive research and firsthand experience as both a researcher and small-scale farmer. In the episode, we discuss…
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183: Nature Restoration Law – an Irish Farmer’s Perspective with Bill O’Keeffe
Why was the farming community so opposed to the EU’s Nature Restoration Law? Doesn’t a healthy ecosystem benefit agriculture? Isn’t the availability of additional payments for alternative use of unproductive land a good thing? Aren’t the measures built into the law sufficient to protect the actively used agricultural land? To find answers to those and other questions related to farming and biodiversity I sat down (in his kitchen) with Bill O’Keeffe a dairy farmer from Co. Kilkenny. In case you…