North Wyke - a Piece of Cake!

Untitled, a photo by Soil & Water Science on Flickr.

Just back from a terrific launch of the North Wyke farm platform. The approach taken in Devon is to instrument the entire grassland farm in 3 contrasting long term experimental systems - the ultimate systems biology of the landscape. Really impressed with the way the have done this - akin to the approach adopted in the UK DTC projects and complimentary to the EVO pilot framework. Well done North Wyke - live long and prosper (and jolly good cake art too!). If you click on the picture you will get a link to more pictures taken on the day.

Cool new video on the River Eden

The Eden Rivers Trust just made a funky new film to help raise awareness of the Eden River and its potential plight....

Exploring opportunities for knowledge exchange

, a photo by Soil & Water Science on Flickr.

Today I have been with colleagues from the Defra DTC programme at Lancaster University exploring opportunities for knowledge exchange for catchment science. We identified that the immediate need was to produce a policy guidance note for helping Defra communicate issues of diffuse pollution to wider stakeholders. A longer term opportunity, needing more funding, is to make a short film to help communicate the issues. More on that later......

A meeting of minds

Untitled, a photo by Soil & Water Science on Flickr.

I have just spent the day with colleagues from Lancaster University, Liverpool University, POL and CEH in a workshop thinking about new opportunities in water science. What was so exciting was that this particular grouping seemed to have the whole water cycle covered - from the soil pore through to the deep ocean (the only glaring 'hole' we identified was a lack of expertise on estuaries). I cannot remember a grouping of people that has ever had so much potential. We need to find a way to turn it into something.....

The polluter pays principle: But who is the polluter?

Untitled
Originally uploaded by Soil & Water Science

Currently sat in a workshop with Defra, EA and other colleagues discussing measures for diffuse pollution control. The debate focussed on the polluter pays principle. All well and good but who IS the polluter? Is it right to lump that blame on the farmer? I'm not convinced, we all have a role to play up the food chain, we all consume the food and the agricultural products. Maybe this highlights the importance of identifying the role of the food chain for understanding the complexities of diffuse pollution.....