Campaigns and Conservationists

Podcasts with campaigners on a wide range of conservation/environmental issues. From campaigns to ban trophy hunting and clean up ghost gear to protesting about destructive developments and halting insect decline, campaigners and conservationists discuss the issues facing the world’s wildlife and offer solutions to tackle them.

Getting the most from being outside with Elaine Rainey, Project Officer Scottish Badgers (May 2020)

Forty Years of Dolphin Conservation with Dr Mike Bossley (May 2020)

Philippa Brakes and Carl Safina discussing animal culture and their work (May 2020)

Animal Culture and Conservation with Philippa Brakes (April 2020)

Working to save Curlews with Mary Colwell (January 2020)
In the years that have followed, Mary has written a book about her travels (Curlew Moon), won the WWT Marsh Award for Wetland Conservation, launched a charity (Curlew Action), and launched a Crowdfunder to help her create a Curlew Fieldworker Toolkit which met its target just days before Charlie Moores went across to Bristol to talk with Mary for this interview. As he discovered, her passion for Curlews is burning as brightly as ever!

Natural History GCSE with Mary Colwell (January 2020)
Many of us have known for years that basic natural history knowledge is draining away, but few of us have done anything about it. But then,
few of us are Mary Colwell.
A Bristol-based naturalist and broadcaster, Mary has a remarkable can-do attitude. As she says in this interview, “If I see a problem I
want to try and solve it. I may not get it right, but I’m going to try,
and until we try we won’t know, will we…”

Eco-anxiety at work with Dr Cathleen Thomas, Suzy Hill, and Rae Stanton-Smithson (December 2019)
My name is Charlie Moores, and as well as creating podcasts for Lush I coordinate our War on Wildlife Project, working to help tackle what we see as humanity’s war on wildlife. For part of a mental health awareness campaign at Lush I was privileged to help bring together two other Lush employees, Suzy Hill and Rae Stanton-Smithson, and the RSPB’s Dr Cathleen Thomas, who works in the RSPB’s Hen Harrier Life Project for a conversation about eco-anxiety, our own feelings of guilt, and how important it is that employers recognise the signs of eco-anxiety in their staff.

Pesticide Action Network with Nick Mole (November 2019)
In this podcast Charlie Moores and Nick talked about the rise of pesticide use, the ‘cocktail effect’, supporting farmers with information on alternatives, and the role that cheap food plays in pesticide use, but Charlie began by suggesting to Nick that the pesticide industry perhaps epitomises the War On Wildlife more clearly than almost anything else…

The Complex Issue of Trophy Hunting with Professor Adam Hart (October 2019)
Adam suggested that Charlie come up to the University to record a podcast with him. They focussed on the content of the letter and a more general overview of conservation where trophy hunting takes place in Africa.

Campaign to Ban Trophy Hunting with Eduardo Goncalves (July 2019)
How is the slaughter of wild animals from Elephants and Lions to Bears and Oryx simply to collect them as trophies allowed in the 21st century, when we know that biodiversity loss is rampant and populations of wild animals everywhere are falling, that climate change is threatening to collapse ecosystems worldwide, and that animals are sentient, form family bonds and feel fear and pain?
Charlie Moores went to speak with Eduardo Goncalves, the founder of the Campaign to Ban Trophy Hunting to find out.

The Shark Trust with managing director Paul Cox (June 2109)
The truth, like most things in nature, is far more interesting of course.
There are around 500 extant species, with new species being discovered almost every year – in fact, roughly a fifth of current living sharks and the closely-related rays have been described since 2002. The smallest shark is less than 20 cm long – the largest, the Whale Shark, can grow to around 12 metres, weigh 19000kg, and feeds almost exclusively on plankton. They are one of the planet’s most beautifully evolved but most threatened predators: over 100 million sharks are caught and killed each year and many species are in sharp decline.
Charlie Moores went to meet Paul Cox, managing director of UK-based charity Shark Trust, to find out more about protecting and promoting these fascinating fish…

Birdgirl with Mya-Rose Craig (June 2019)
But while Mya’s perhaps best known as a birdwatcher, she’s also a courageous advocate for human rights, talks about the need to get VME or Visible Minority Ethnic people access to the countryside, is President of Black2Nature which she set up when she was fourteen, and has organised nature camps for children and teenagers since 2015. She’s also blunt about the failure of conservation NGOs to accurately represent the diversity of people in the UK.
Charlie Moores talked with a slightly weary Mya-Rose the day after she’d got back home after spending the weekend in London as part of the Extinction Rebellion protests – but we began – and how could we not – with birds…

Lions, Bones, and Bullets with author and filmmaker Richard Peirce (June 2019)
Charlie Moores met up with conservationist, activist, author and filmmaker Richard Peirce to discuss the impact of ‘Blood Lions’ and his own excellent 2018 book ‘Cuddle Me, Kill Me‘, a scathing and in-depth investigation of South Africa’s large-scale captive lion breeding industry, from, as the book puts it, bottle to bullet. Richard is now deep into the making of an investigative documentary, ‘Lions, Bones, and Bullets‘.

Sizewell C and the Suffolk Coast and Heaths AONB with Tom Langton, Rachel Fulcher, Joan Girling, and Adam Rowlands (June 2019)
Charlie Moores went to Suffolk to talk with ecologist Tom Langton, Rachel Fulcher, coordinator of the Suffolk Coastal Group of Friends of the Earth, former local councillor Joan Girling, and Adam Rowlands, Senior Site Manager at RSPB Minsmere to get their take on what Sizewell C would mean to the local environment and to local communities.
(Photo of the shingle beach at the Sandlings with Sizewell A and B by Charlie Moores)

Biotope (Environmental Architecture) with Tormod Amundsen
Charlie Moores met up with Tormod in April 2019 at WWT Slimbridge to discuss that move north, Tormod’s disillusionment with the way he was taught architecture, Gullfest – the birding event he set up, a raft of 10,000 King Eider – and watching Steller’s Eider from the office window!

Pont Valley | Coal mining, Newts, and Climate Change with Don Kent and Tom Langton (May 2019)
Protest, climate change, fossil fuels vs renewables, development vs biodiversity loss, resources vs a fragile natural world, opencast coal mining, a County Wildlife Site, and the Great Crested Newt – all, remarkably, encapsulated in the story of the campaign to Protect the Pont Valley in County Durham. There is no doubt that what is happening in the Pont Valley is hugely important – not just at the local level but in the way it fits into larger, big picture conversations and actions that are taking place all over the planet at the moment.
Charlie Moores talks with local campaigner Don Kent (Campaign to Protect the Pont Valley) and Tom Langton (a highly-experienced ecologist who – literally – wrote the book on conserving the Great Crested Newt).

Road Verges Campaign with Dr Trevor Dines, Plantlife Botanical Specialist (May 2019)
Most of us are aware now that biodiversity is in decline. Plant biodiversity here in the UK has especially suffered: wildflowers have been lost from huge areas of Britain, and so have the pollinators and other invertebrates that depend on them. Conservationists are having to look to protect what’s left of our wildlife in areas that may not be optimal, but that nevertheless holds a surprisingly important range of flora and fauna. Along with our gardens, one of those areas is our rural road verges, those largely county council-owned strips of land next to our roads which, according to the UK charity Plantlife, make up a network that is equal to half of the country’s remaining flower-rich grasslands and meadows.
Charlie Moores spoke with Dr Trevor Dines, Plantlife’s exuberant Botanical Specialist, about the charity’s excellent Road Verge Campaign, which has been having positive and hugely encouraging results. Road verges may have the potential to literally re-seed our denuded countryside and looking after them sounds like such a simple solution to plant biodiversity loss, but do we actually have the data to quantify just how important our road verges really are?

Badgers, BSE, and wild animal welfare with Alick Simmons, former Deputy Chief Vet at Defra (May 2019)
Charlie Moores met up with Alick at his home in rural Somerset. The following conversation looks at his early life, his career, BSE and the badger cull, his love of wildlife, his current views on animal welfare and disease control, and how a scientist used to working with data and statistics deals with ethical considerations involving sentience and the ‘value’ we put on wild animals.
(Photo Alick Simmons in Morocco, March 2019)

Grey Squirrels and the Invasive Alien Species Order 2019 with Pauline Kidner, founder of Secret World Wildlife Rescue (April 2019)
Charlie Moores went to Secret World Wildlife Rescue to talk with its founder, Pauline Kidner, about how she thinks the new Order will impact squirrels, the staff at Secret World, and how it reflects a wider disconnect with wild animals and their welfare.

Wild Animal Welfare Committee Conference 2019 with Libby Anderson, WAWC Secretary and OneKind Policy Advisor (April 2019)
Charlie Moores was invited to the conference by Libby Anderson, WAWC Secretary and animal charity OneKind’s Policy Advisor, and they recorded the following conversation the next day which looks at the origins of WAWC and why so many wild animals (as separate from farmed, research, or companion animals) are not – at the moment anyway – protected by welfare legislation.
(Photo Dr Angus Nurse presenting to the conference by Charlie Moores).
Cairngorm Conservation with conservationist Alan Bantick OBE (April 2019)

Charlie Moores went to visit Allan in March and recorded the following interview in the Strathspey Badger Hide, which looks one way onto a huge hillock that’s been assiduously mined by badgers for decades and the other towards the River Spey and the mountains and pine forests that make this part of the world such a wonderful place to visit.

Campaigning at IFAW UK with David Cowdrey, Head of Policy and Campaigns (March 2019)
Charlie Moores went to meet David in London and found both to be true – and a man who is absolutely, genuinely in conservation because he absolutely, genuinely loves conservation and wildlife! The conversation begins with David talking about one of his great loves – elephants – and explaining how he helped pilot one of the toughest bans on ivory sales in the world through the UK Parliament: the Ivory Act 2018.

Climate Change Campaigner with Caroline Rance, Friends of the Earth Scotland (Feb 2019)
Caroline Rance joined Friends of the Earth Scotland (FoES) in 2017 after a year working as Campaigns Manager with Stop Climate Chaos Scotland. As a Climate and Energy Campaigner her focus has been primarily on Scotland’s Climate Change Bill. FoES want to see that law ramping up action to cut Scotland’s climate emissions over the next decade, driving cleaner transport, more renewable energy and energy-efficient homes, and delivering a just transition to a zero-carbon future.
Charlie Moores talked with Caroline in the FoES offices, covering a range of climate issues and a new coalition, Revive, which is looking at reform of Scotland’s intensively-managed grouse moors (which cover almost a fifth of Scotland).

Saving the Gwent Levels with Ian Rappel, Chief-exec Gwent Wildlife Trust (Jan 2019)
The protest was organised by CALM – the Campaign against the Levels Motorway, a coalition of mainly local groups.
One of the people Charlie spoke with outside the Senedd that day was Ian Rappel, chief-executive of Gwent Wildlife Trust (GWT). Ian suggested Charlie visit the Trusts’ Magor Marsh Reserve, to see for himself how the reserve might be damaged by the new road. In the following January Charlie spent a fascinating day looking at the Gwent Levels and then at Magor Marsh with Ian and GWT’s deputy CEO Gemma Bode.
Photo copyright Gwent Wildlife Trust

Sharkwater Extinction with Sandy Stewart, Sharkwater (Dec 2018)
In December 2018 Sandy Stewart was in London for a private screening of ‘Sharkwater: Extinction’ and Charlie Moores spoke with her just hours before that screening. They talked about the film and about Rob and the almost incalculable impact he has had on the public perception of sharks – but Charlie began by asking a mother how proud she was of her son…

Campaign Against the Levels Motorway with various speakers at the Welsh Senned (Dec 2018)
Charlie Moores joined the event and recorded some of the speeches as well as interviewing representatives from CALM, the Green Party, RSPB Cymru, and Gwent Wildlife Trust.

Ghost Gear with Peter Kemple Hardy, World Animal Protection (Sept 2018)
Charlie Moores met with Peter Kemple Hardy, Campaigns Manager at the charity World Animal Protection, to discuss the problems of ‘ghost gear’ and the solutions being put in place to tackle a threat that could spell catastrophe for marine ecosystems.
Photo copyright John Moncrieff (used with permission)

Tawai – a connection with nature with Bruce Parry (Aug 2018)
Tawai went on general release in September 2017, and ahead of its launch Bruce sat down with Charlie Moores and Lush’s Matt Shaw to discuss the film and how making it has deeply affected and changed him.

The Black Bee Project with Phil Chandler (The Barefoot Beekeeper) (July 2018)
Expert beekeeper and conservationist Phil Chandler, ‘The Barefoot Beekeeper‘, is working on a project to restore populations of the UK’s native wild honeybee, the Northen European Dark or Black Bee Apis mellifera mellifera.
Charlie Moores met up with Phil near to the project’s core area on Dartmoor in south-west England to discuss honeybees, the changing countryside, the Asian Hornet (Vespa velutina, an invasive non-native species from Asia and a highly effective predator of insects, including honey bees), and an extraordinary work ethic.
For more information please go to Friends of the Bees.
Stuart Housden OBE with Stuart Housden, former Director of RSPB Scotland (June 2018)

Charlie Moores met up with Stuart at the RSPB’s offices in Edinburgh in May this year, where they talked about his work, persecution of birds of prey, his work with Regua Brazil (whose mission is the long-term conservation of the Atlantic Forest and its biodiversity in the Guapiaçu watershed in the state of Rio de Janeiro), and ‘what comes next’.

Spring Bees with environmentalist Brigit Strawbridge Howard (April 2018)
How many bee species do we have here in Britain? Perhaps surprisingly, there are more than two hundred and seventy and just one of those makes the honey that bees are famous for!
Charlie Moores met up with renowned naturalist and writer Brigit Strawbridge Howard, to discuss ‘spring bees’ at Brigit’s allotment in Shaftesbury, Dorset, to a backdrop of Jackdaws, Blackbirds, Robins, Wrens and the occasional Buzzard mewing overhead…

Protecting Animals in Parliament with Kerry McCarthy MP (March 2018)
In March 2018 Charlie Moores talked with Bristol East Labour MP Kerry McCarthy, the first vegan elected to the British Parliament and a passionate animal advocate, about her work and her role on the Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs (Efra) Committee in the House of Commons.

Different Roads Same Destination with Charlie Moores and Dr Nial Moores, founders Birds Korea (Feb 2018)
Andrew Paine talks with Charlie Moores, now a podcaster and audio producer with Lush, and Dr Nial Moores, a conservationist who’s been living and working in East Asia for more than twenty years. (Image: Yellowhammer [creative commons] and Spoon-billed Sandpiper [by Nial Moores])

Turkey’s Indigenous Production Landscapes with Guven Eken, Doga Denergi (BirdLife Turkey) (Feb 2018)
Charlie Moores attended a mesmerising talk at the Lush Summit 2018 by one of Doga’s co-founders Guven Eken, and then sat down with Guven later that day to learn more.

World Wetlands Day 2018 with Andy Graham, Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust (Jan 2018)
More than you might think…Charlie Moores went to Slimbridge, the UK headquarters of the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust (WWT) to ask Andy Graham to explain exactly why.

Not Whale Food: Marine Pollution with Whale and Dolphin Conservation’s chief-exec Chris Butler-Stroud and Policy Officer Pine Eisfeld-Pierantonio (Dec 2017)
Marine pollution – plastic especially – is everywhere. Charlie Moores talks with Whale and Dolphin Conservation’s chief-exec Chris Butler-Stroud and Policy Officer Pine Eisfeld-Pierantonio about the impact pollution has on whales and dolphins – and ultimately, perhaps, on us. Image credit Whale and Dolphin Conservation (from the notwhalefood.com website)

Saving Sumatra’s Orangutans with Helen Buckland, Director Sumatran Orangutan Society (Nov 2017)
Charlie Moores meets the Director of the Sumatran Orangutan Society – aka SOS Orangutan – Helen Buckland to discuss Orangutans, the Leuser Ecosystem, working partnerships, and the possible conservation implications for SOS Orangutan of the recent announcement of the Tapanuli Orangutan, a new species confined to forest in Northern Sumatra. Photo credit Gita Defoe. Used with permission

The Windscreen Phenomenon (Insect Decline) with Matt Shardlow, chief exec Buglife (Oct 2017)
Charlie Moores talks with Matt Shardlow, chief executive of the charity Buglife, about changing perceptions about ‘bugs’ and why invertebrates matter, pesticide overuse, and remaining optimistic in the face of reports like the recently published German study which showed a massive decline in flying insects over a twenty-seven year period.

The Lush Charity Pot with Becca Lush (July 2017)
Charlie Moores talks with Becca Lush, one of the key figures in the development of Charity Pot, about her role and how proud she is of everything it has already achieved.

Fingers in the Sparkle Jar with Chris Packham (Feb 2017)

Ecotricity, alternative energy, and veganism with Dale Vince, founder Ecotricity (Nov 2016)
In this conversation with Charlie Moores, Dale talks about his life over the last twenty-five years, buying a football club and introducing vegan food to the terraces, and turning grass into gas as a sustainable and wildlife-friendly alternative to fracking.

Wildlife. Not Entertainers with Alyx Elliot, World Animal Protection (Oct 2016)
Fresh from the success of the campaign, Alyx Elliott, the organisation’s Head of Programmes and Campaigns, joins Charlie Moores to talk about that potentially game-changing decision and what the next steps in the campaign will be. (Image copyright World Animal Protection)

Working for Whales and Dolphins with Margaux Dodds, Marine Connection (July 2016)
Charlie Moores talks to the charity’s co-founder Margaux Dodds about the anti-captivity movement, non-human rights and the need for more education on cetaceans.

Eco-spooks with Gem, Director Tracks Investigations Ltd (May 2016)
Cofounder and director Gem talks to Charlie Moores about the practicalities of covering such sensitive and controversial topics on projects with organisations such as Greenpeace, Dogs Trust and Friends of the Earth.