“Local” is the Word to Halt the Decline of Wildlife in the UK – BUT only with National Coordination

In order to stop wildlife loss we need to:

1. Protect and extend existing sites of importance to wildlife
2. Identify and protect new sites, which are seen as important components of the ecological network.
3. Coordinate and increase wildlife recording, to create more distribution and trend data for species and so provide the evidence, which identifies the root causes of decline in biodiversity.
4. Engage, educate and involve the 95% of the population that, at present, have no direct interest in wildlife and conservation.

At a time of cuts in staff and funding across the nation, it really is going to be a challenge to meet our 2020 biodiversity targets, but answers do lie within….

With this in mind, now lets explore the “local” principle in more detail.

Local Communities

I have started here, because this is the engine room that will drive us forward towards saving our wildlife.

Inside our Schools, Places of Worship and local neighbourhoods, there is a force which, if tapped into will really propel us swiftly towards our goals. The fuel is there, we just need it igniting.

A “Your Country Need You” style campaign, which goes into all schools, highlighting the state of nature and what can be done to help, if supported by TV broadcasts, would provide the torch in the engine room, to make it fire up into action.

Amazing organisations like “Natural Connections” in the South-west exist to support wildlife education outdoors, but still the vast majority of our children aren’t being led out as part of their early-years and Science time-tables.

Local Green Spaces (LGS’s)

Introduced under the 2011 Localism Act, and although not solely selected for wildlife value, LGS’s can be a point of first contact for the potential new converts to the love of nature.

A single notice board at the main entrance to an LGS can sign-post people of all ages to their local wildlife clubs and nature reserves, where they can learn more.

Links between LGS’s and local schools are easy to establish, and similar notices at local places of worship would also encourage participation, which would be echoed through the network of incredible Local Parish Groups that exists across the country.

Local Wildlife Sites (LWS’s)

I was amazed to discover that under the National Planning Policy Framework, there are 40,000 LWS’s tagged across England alone.

Nature Improvement Area funding may seem to be significant, but it is inevitable that embracing another 700,000 hectares of country will put new pressures on ranger services and biodiversity management, whilst already trying to improve biodiversity on their LNR’s and parks.

There is an army of volunteers just waiting in society to be encouraged to help, but we must engage and educate them first.

Local Reserves

With over 200 RSPB reserves and 2,300 Wildlife Trusts sites as an example, we are so lucky in the UK to have such a wide network of glorious places tailor-made to convert those with a basic interest, into avid wildlife enthusiasts, with the encouragement of wardens and their staff.

However funding is always stretched, since these sites rely on donations, entrance fees and memberships from the 5% of the population that are switched on to nature.

Just imagine if we just doubled the number of wildlife enthusiasts in the UK through engagement and participation? Imagine the impact that this would have on the levels of visitors, memberships and donations, and how this could be used to start new projects and acquisitions. Positive feedback – more producing more!!

Local Patches and Local Ecological Networks

I have placed these two together, purely because the “patch” watchers and wildlife “bloggers” spend so much time and energy recording nature in “wild Britain”, where there is no protection given to the “patch”, as a reserve or by designation.

So many “patchers” that cover parks or reserves report declines in species, within these protected areas because of what is happening in the surrounding countryside. It is the “guardians” of our unprotected land that will probably hold the key to solving the riddle, of what has caused such a dramatic decline in wildlife over the last 40 years

These volunteers do so much to help us see what is happening across these vital sites, within the local ecological network.

Local Wildlife Clubs and Societies

When I was 10, it was the West Midlands Bird Club that provided all that I needed, to understand and explore birding. Local reports, trips, details of reserves, keys to hides at sites that just grabbed you and dragged you into a magical world of nature through their splendour, and trips that brought people with similar interests together to share, have fun and learn.

I wish I had had greater access to dragonfly, mini-beast, botany and other wildlife groups to make me a rounder naturalist. They are more accessible now and we really need to promote them to our children at a local level. The State of Nature report has taught us that we must not focus just on the trendy areas of wildlife (Birds, Butterflies….). We desperately need more data to help understand what is happening in other areas of our ecosystems. Lets give every beast a chance, be they giant or mini!!

Local wildlife groups are the gateways that draw on the energy of youth and nurture our future recorders, experts and scientists.

Lets link these wonderful clubs and associations into school websites and on display boards within our green spaces. Every convert will be spreading the word, through their local communities - more positive feedback.

Local Experts, Local Recorders and Local Records Centres (LRC’s)

It’s great to have systems, where anyone can access a website and feed information into the wildlife records system, but it must be a nightmare to verify!!

By sign-posting school children and green space users to local wildlife clubs and societies, they are already heading towards their local recorders. The local recorders then have close relationships with local experts and the LRC’s, so that the quality of information is maintained as the volume of data expands.

Verification work is so much easier and faster, if it flows through the local network first on its way to the National Biodiversity Network. This allows local data platforms to serve local areas and meet their unique requirements (in terms of species, habitat, funding requirements etc..). LRC’s should be supported and properly funded as part of the nation’s commitment to biodiversity. To my mind they are a cornerstone of the UK’s biodiversity plans, simply because they are close to source records, and have a good knowledge of their part of the ecological network, working closely with the data providers.

David Attenborough didn’t spend this many years educating us all, only for us to create a cold monster that swallows up data from unknown individuals, clogging up the network with potentially duff data, and jamming the verification system in the process. We need high quality data and coordinated surveys to find answers. Nothing less will do.

If our existing system of verification, validation and data sharing is fine, then why are so many of our “patch” watchers reporting that internet based data platforms are producing lists for their sites that include species, which do not occur and in some cases, have never occurred there!!!…and these were mammals, not bryophytes!!!

The beauty of having the local recording network is that it forms a foundation that can efficiently support Local Nature Partnerships.

Local Nature Partnerships (LNP’s) and Local Wildlife Partnerships

This is the “glue” that will stick everything together. It will link the schools, places of worship, councils, neighbourhoods, local groups, clubs and associations, recorders, experts and LRC’s.

Local wildlife partnerships will have a massive role in supporting unprotected “patches” that contribute to the Local Ecological Network, and which potentially hold the key as to why our wildlife is vanishing. This would give massive support to our army of “patchers” and “bloggers”.

Setting up LNP’s was one of the commitments made in the Natural Environment White Paper 2011 and there are 48 across England. This is to be commended, but most people see local partnerships as covering a smaller area and there are many “wildlife partnerships” being set up on a more local level, to tackle local issues. This will go a long way towards supporting the national initiative, whilst providing accurate information and sign-posting to local communities.

Local Partnerships have a better understanding of local businesses, clubs, groups and recorders that could not so easily be achieved at County level. There are many shining examples of these partnerships already out there, and it will be great when every “patcher” and every school is connected to one for support and sharing. One major benefit that would arise from this is that sites would have coverage of more areas of wildlife, as enthusiasts from different areas of wildlife meet. More and more “blogs” will contain information about all aspects of nature, and with better site information, it will be easier to protect them.

Local Councils and Authorities

Nobody is better able to engage the public, than those that serve the public. This last two months has brought me closer to the officers that manage our green spaces and it has only served to reinforce the feeling that I have developed, whilst working with the council that control my local patch. I see commitment, passion and endeavour.

With LNR’s (1,500 of them), Country Parks and now responsibility for developing 40,000 LWS’s, our biodiversity officers and ranger services need help. Budgets are tight, staff have been lost and yet targets remain high. Failure will let Mother Nature down! No pressure there then!!

One answer lies within reach. Volunteers – thousands of them waiting to be engaged across the country, if only we can reach them and explain, at a local level the economic and social value of nature, in the ways explained above?

The second major aid is the coordination of surveys and recording, so that officers can evaluate their performance on biodiversity easily and accurately. As we engage the public, our experts will be needed to perform greater volumes of verification work. If every dataset can be used to create trend data, no resources will have been wasted. A quick review of old datasets may allow life to be breathed into them too.

Whilst local is the way to enhance records and embrace the nation, we also need national coordination and support, including:

-          Campaigns through schools that highlight the importance of wildlife and lead children of all ages  outdoors to explore and engage with wildlife.

-          Campaigns from central funding that provide information points in LNR’s LWS’s, LGS’s and  Country Parks that sign-post the public towards their local wildlife clubs and associations.

-          Coordination of surveys across the country, which are repeated to allow more trend data and  provide better evaluation tools at all levels.

-          Media coverage which will make the nation aware of the state of wildlife and explain the economic  and social value of nature to our country and its communities. This would compliment the school and  parks campaigns.

-          Removal of the “red tape” from the volunteering system, so that a new, vast army can rise and add  force and resource to the movements. They should be promoted as saviours, by their communities.

MMNN will help towards these goals.

MMNN will also help “patch” watchers raise the profile of their sites, and will give them more support by helping to establish local wildlife partnerships. “Patch” issues have already been taken up on behalf of MMNN members, and this power will increase as soon as we gain official recognition.

Declining species can be protected by sharing your information with those that can help to save them. All the effort and intimate knowledge gained by dedicated “guardians” on their patches will be used to help protect both the site and wildlife in general. It may well lead to future designations being given to your sites.

MMNN has a unique role in being able to influence both recording programs and public participation.

MMNN will help link sites of importance to wildlife with their local communities and local wildlife networks to create a caring protective force around them.

When MMNN has 500 members, we shall gain official recognition and commence fund-raising and educational activities. We now have 164 member sites, with a substantial uptake from councils – an amazing feet, given the network was only launched six weeks ago.

In any event data sharing and coordinated surveying is due to commence early in 2014.

Join the Moving Mountains Nature Network today.

Together, we really can make a difference. 

MMNN - Contributing to Science OR Encouraging Participation ?

I have had it put to me this week that MMNN has to decide which side of the fence it is on.

My vision for MMNN is quite clear: It is so easy to tick both boxes and make a scientific contribution AND engage the public.

I can illustrate this fairly simply:

1. Members such as Council's and wardened reserves, that have the knowledge and experience of data collection, will continue to use a platform such as Living Record, or send data into local recorders and LRC's. They already do an excellent job contributing to Science. My aim here is simply to get as many members as possible onto a common platform, because it will help everyone along the chain in terms of quality and resources. Coordination, repeated surveying and "think-tanks" will help member council's in their tireless pursuit of biodiversity targets and allow them to monitor their performance more easily.

2. Next. The interesting one. What I call "The Second Element": the army of wildlife enthusiasts that hold intimate knowledge of their patches. 

To increase the quality and volume of the information hitting the LRC's and NBN, we need expansion of Local Wildlife Partnerships (LWP). This allows a patch of the British countryside to act as a structured "reserve". My life has taught me NEVER to have barriers or say something cannot be done. A central role of MMNN will be to assist in the creation of local partnerships and to identify new sites that require protection and designation, through our army of "bloggers" and "patch" watchers. 

It may well be the LWP's that provide the answers, as to why wildlife has vanished in such a short period of time, simply because they venture away from the managed reserves and into our more typical countryside and "wild Britain". The "patch" watchers may prove to be biodiversity's knights in shining armour!!!

3. Now for the worm and what I call the "Third Element". I had a biodiversity officer comment last week that 95% of the population have no intention at all in engaging with wildlife. 

Furthermore, my friend's son was asked at school a few weeks ago about his hobbies in front of the class. When he replied that he was a birdwatcher, his supply teacher laughed. Needless to say, after my involvement, her agency have been informed that she is no longer welcome at that school!!

To meet our 2020 biodiversity targets, this attitude has to change. MMNN  can embrace participation and education, WITHOUT compromising Science and Conservation. I'm not being funny, but if you ask a School to identify Worms, you will get misleading information!!! It probably would bore most of the kids to death too!!! 

If "Citizen Science" goes wrong, you cannot blame those making the records  for down-grading the quality of data. Surveys have to be designed carefully from the outset , in order to maximise accuracy of results and the positive influence that it has on the participants.

Is it right that we have more than 80,000 species of wildlife in the U.K? The vast majority of BAP species, don't even appear in the best selling field guides. These have to be recorded only by those with the necessary ability. But I will not accept that MMNN has to be on one side or the other, when the answer is so simple.

Schools can be provided with surveys, which cover easy to identify species. Don't ask them to survey Small White Butterflies, because some kids or even teachers may confuse them with worms, if you see what I mean?

But if every school in Britain performed a survey of male Orange Tip Butterflies, would you disregard the data as useless because it was produced by the 95% of the population that we need on board to save our wildlife? How many future naturalists would this approach produce? How many kids might be influenced by the hunting Kestrel that they see, whilst out on a warm Spring day with their school mates, counting butterflies on their local green space?

We are so lucky to have so many safe LNR's, Wildlife Trusts sites and other reserves and parks in close proximity to schools. We are also blessed to have our State of Nature partner organisations, and I am sure that they can produce a short-list of say 200 species, which are unmistakable and that can be surveyed annually by schools. If I were a science teacher and I had these species on Power Point, the first thing I would be doing with them, on the first week of the academic year, is showing them to my class and allowing them to pick their favourites to study during the year, so that they would already be attached to the project. (I think this area is actually part of the U.K's commitment to biodiversity?). There are a good number of easily identifiable "indicator" species, that if widely surveyed repeatedly, would tell scientists a lot about the strength of ecosystems, locally and nationally, and high-light where they are breaking down fast so that local factors can be identified.

If we make barriers, we shall have barriers!!! Kingfishers are still seen on the section of the River Cole in Birmingham where I first fell in love with nature. I will not allow them to vanish because we failed to rise individually and collectively to the challenges facing the U.K's unique range of wildlife and habitats, by placing obstacles in the way that aren't even there.

Join MMNN today. Together WE REALLY CAN make a difference.

Cheshire, Berkshire and Leicestershire Lead the Way

Just a brief update to say THANK YOU!!!!!!!

Our membership now stands at 125 sites.

For everyone out there who has followed and shared this initiative so far, THANK YOU.

For those that have, or are in the process of joining - together, we really can move mountains for nature.

Special mention has to go to the "bloggers" and "birders" of Cheshire who are banging the drum for this network. These committed volunteers have an intimate knowledge of the State of Wildlife on their local patches, and this can now be utilised through MMNN to halt the decline of species and help the U.K meet it's biodiversity targets.

Special mention, also to council officers in Berkshire and Leicestershire, who have seen MMNN as a way to help meet targets for the protection of biodiversity in their local communities.

Coordinated surveying that breathes life into old data sets and creates new trend data for assessing performance will add to the efficient use of council resources, but will also provide more status and distribution data to the national wildlife organisations that are working so hard to protect and halt the decline in the U.K's wildlife.

Contact from Canada raises hope for sister sites to rise in other countries, so that we can join hands in a peaceful and protective way.

I have started work on local initiatives, involving raising awareness of our cause, through schools.

MMNN has risen and now lets see where this exciting journey takes us all.

Month 1: Progress Report

New Dawn Rising: Sunrise over Smestow Valley LNR

A month has passed and time to reflect and plan for the next stage of the MMNN initiative.

The green area between Oxley and Wightwick, in Wolverhampton has been made famous to conservationists across the UK thanks to the ground-breaking treatise "The Endless Village", which in the 1970's had used it as an example of how a linear park could survive and flourish within a conurbation (the study led to the formation of the first Urban Wildlife Group and helped create the other "green corridor" nature reserves up and down the country). (Reference to Angus Dickie's "Smestow Valley Bird Group 1988-2013")

It is quite fitting, therefore, that the members of the former Smestow Valley Bird Group have served to reignite my passion for wildlife, and put the valley back on the map, as providing the launchpad for MMNN.

After months of planning, the launch of the network on 13th August 2013 filled me with mixed feelings. On the one hand, there was the prospect of a dream coming true. My father's prophecy, that I may be able to change the world for the better, felt like it may actually become a reality. On the other hand, despite my appetite and enthusiasm, there lay negative thoughts that the network would fail to attract support or interest from the outset.

As I write this update, my heart is filled with hope. So many people have taken time to understand this initiative, and respond in a positive manner, because of their open-mindedness, commitment and passion for wildlife.

Customer service staff provided vital support in sign-posting and redirecting mail to those actively involved with biodiversity management. Thank you.

"Patch" watchers have joined the network and promoted it so that their intimate knowledge of their local wildlife sites, is shared in order to discover just why wildlife has vanished at such an alarming rate. Thank you.

Council biodiversity officers have provided in-depth information, constructive comment and support for the network. Any fears that MMNN would be just another data collector have been allayed, as it has become seen that the network will serve to coordinate and repeat surveys so as to breathe life into old data sets and promote the creation of trend data for status and distribution that allows evaluation of whether biodiversity  targets are being met at both site and national level. Thank you.

The other concern: that MMNN is repeating the work carried out by the national wildlife organisations, has been removed. The network will actually support these organisations by increasing the uptake of their surveys, and by working towards more coordinated data work in the future that provides them with more trend information to assist future assessments of the State of Nature. Also by working with the "Third Element" through education and media coverage, MMNN will inevitably lead to an increase in the membership for all wildlife organisations.

MMNN: It's role in the U.K. (click to enlarge)

Indeed the national organisations are now showing interest and support for the network. In particular the forward thinking and caring approach of Plant Life and the Woodland Trust has led to the sharing of information, which has been initiated as this progress report is issued. Thank you to their officers for taking the time to follow and understand my cause.

My last thank you will go to the great man himself. As a child I was limited to the greenbelt and old mining works around Norton Canes in Staffordshire, but it was Sir David Attenborough that inflamed the desire for conservation and the protection of this beautiful world's wildlife.

With the commencement of surveys for The State of Nature partners, scheduled to start at member sites from 1st January 2014, my focus is now on membership so that we can obtain official recognition.

You really can make a difference and help discover why the nation's wildlife is vanishing, by sharing your knowledge of your "patches", reserves, parks and other sites of importance to wildlife.

The Great Briton: An impression in concrete at Brandon Marsh Wildlife Trust Reserve
 in Coventry, to add to the millions of impressions he has made in our hearts.

If you support the cause, then please join today and thank you as always for your interest in the MMNN initiative.

Nagoya: Dreams to Reality - The Third Element

In Nagoya, Japan in October 2010, 192 Governments and the European Union met to set out goals and targets to ensure that our natural environment was "resilient" by 2020, so that it can continue to provide the ecosystem services that ARE ESSENTIAL FOR LIFE.

The strategic goals were basically aimed at:

1. Mainstreaming - making people and businesses aware of the values of biodiversity, and to make them aware of how they can conserve it.
2. Pressures - reducing direct pressures on biodiversity and promoting sustainable use.
3. Safeguarding - improving the status of biodiversity by safeguarding ecosystems, species and genetic diversity.
4. Benefits - enhance the benefits to all from biodiversity and ecosystems ( e.g. climate change mitigation and services from ecosystems like water and contribution to health)
5. Knowledge and Capacity - "By 2020, knowledge, the science base and technologies relating to biodiversity, its values, functioning, status and trends, and the consequence of its loss, are improved, widely shared and transferred, and applied"

For these goals and their attached targets to me met, I feel that we have 3 key "elements" that together can create the formula for success:

The First Element: The Scientists, Defra, Wildlife Organisations and Biodiversity Managers and officers.

The Second Element: The amateur naturalists and wildlife enthusiasts and caring land managers.

The Third Element: The wider population.

So our formula is:

1st element + 2nd element + 3rd element = targets met under "Biodiversity 2020 Strategy"

The world failed to meet it's targets for 2010, we are now in 2013. The U.K has to, along with every other convention member, submit progress reports by 31st March 2014.

My review, research and feelings gathered whilst creating and launching the Moving Mountains Nature Network (MMNN) are that:

1. The First Element, in isolation is extremely potent in both it's knowledge base and it's enthusiasm to meet biodiversity requirements. In particular, I applaud and gain so much hope from the quality and character of our nation's Biodiversity, Conservation and Parks managers. These people, really are our "generals" in the fight to halt species and habitat decline. Together they are head guardians over our 1500 Local Nature Reserves and also our Country Parks and other green spaces. Around them we should be proud to have Natural England and Defra above and all of the "STATE OF NATURE" partner Wildlife organisations along side them.

2. The Second Element, our amateur naturalists and wildlife enthusiasts? Well we have only to read the latest STATE OF BIRDS report to establish the power of this group who work with the heart and the policeman's notebook. The datasets used in the STATE OF NATURE report covering Bird Species, Mammal road deaths and Butterfly and Moth counts, would have been impossible without the army of amateur enthusiasts.

3. Our Third Element: the wider business and social community in the U.K? Here lies my fear. The importance of the Third Element is easy to understand. On numbers, this element is overwhelming, but more importantly so many of the negative factors that have led to the decline in the U.K, arise from the Third Element. Bank Voles in Smestow Valley LNR are only just recovering from the polution that someone spilled into the Smestow Brook a few years ago, and that is just one tiny example.

For our formula to work we require two things:

1. Unity and co-ordination between The First Element and The Second Element, so that there is great strength from their combining and hence a forward reaction that in the short term may compensate for the weakness or even negative influence from the presence of The Third Element.

2. Regardless, to meet our 2020 and 2050 Biodiversity targets WE HAVE TO MAKE The Third Element a positive and not a negative agent in this reaction, or we shall all fail.

I have three small personal experiences that provide light:

The community spirit and support that came from my charity walk in memory of my son, illustrated that if people understand the cause, they will rise in a strong, positive manner.

As part of my work on the MMNN, I have learned exceptional schemes, where the First Element, combines potently with The Third Element. For example, the council, that works closely with 40 Parishes to encourage participation and understanding in biodiversity work. The officers that set up 24 hour species counts competitions in their community.

Thirdly, on my own patch, by talking to and sharing with the users of my Local Nature Reserve over the last three years, we now have a new group of dog-walkers and health enthusiasts that carry binoculars and display a genuine thirst for wildlife knowledge.

The STATE OF NATURE report CLEARLY tells us we have little time, and a mountain to climb to halt decline and loss.

The following is my own submission and attempt to provoke, thought, comment and reaction, and so, at best, it forms a discussion document, although my heart wants it to be the basis for a plan of action. They are single comments, aimed as spearheads, or if you like catalysts that we may like to add to The Three Elements to allow The Third Element to become a positive agent, and to accelerate the overall rate of reaction, so that the U.K proudly reports in 2019 that it has BEATEN, not met it's biodiversity targets as a nation:

1. There are gaping holes in our datasets. The First Element and the Second Element combined well to monitor fashionable and easy to identify Birds, Butterflies and Moths, but where is our status and distribution trend data for fungi or mini-beasts? I thought that these groups were critical to holding up our ecosystems.

2. I look at the species included on the datasets used in the STATE OF NATURE report and compare them with our JNCC BAP priority species lists. They are worlds apart!!!!!!

3. I got out all of the best selling field guides for wildlife and then laid them alongside the BAP priority species lists (species in heavy decline). With the exception of our ever popular birds, the vast majority of BAP species were absent from the field-guides and reference books. So while thousands of keen nature lovers walk around their patch, there is not one book that they could possibly put in his back-pack that covers all of the species under threat on their site. The RSPB have shown exceptional publishing skills, but it would be so exciting if the JNCC could team up with The STATE OF NATURE partners to create a guide, updated every five years, that concentrates on the accurate identification of say 1200 species that are most under threat in the U.K. A section at the back could include web-links to participate in status and distribution surveys, via the Partners's websites. How strong would our Second Element be if they were armed with this best-seller, created by the teamwork that brings our wildlife organisations together. How strong would our First Element be with the whole nation contributing to surveys that cover the whole food-web and also focus on areas of ecosystems that are breaking down fastest??

4. How can we change our Third Element so that the strange person in green jacket with binoculars is seen as the gallant guardian rather than the gormless geek!!!! Simple!!!

Nature documentaries have an amazing influence and it's no secret that David Attenborough is responsible for my writing this article today. But you need the heart to choose to watch the programme in the first place, and this is the filter that continually converts members of the Third Element into those that form the Second Element.

Repeated addresses to the nation  by Defra (or even the leaders of ALL our political parties in union!!), attached to news reports when the whole nation is watching, and even after stand-up comedy shows and late night 18 rated films to explain the alarming decline in our "Natural Capital", and it's impact on business, the economy and human life itself. Can you imagine the effect that this would have on the membership and funding for our nature organisations and local councils?? (GOAL E in the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020)

5. Millions of children could come home to their parents and echo the broadcasts, through learning at school as part of the national curriculum. Science teachers can lead their children from an early age into their local green-spaces to explore the beauty and miracles of nature. Older students can conduct surveys as part of GCSE and A level studies that add to the pool of coordinated studies already being performed by the First and Second Elements.

6. A heavy penal system for those that break the law and damage nature, together with a naming and shaming campaign. Lets alienate those that disrespect our beautiful planet and add the funds derived from penalties to schemes to protect BAP habitats?

Our doubt over the impact of The Third Element has been brought on by ourselves, because The First Element and The Second Element have the power to awaken a force within our nation that will beat all targets and set a fine example to the world.

The Moving Mountains Nature Network initiative is designed to streamline the First Element and the Second Element, whilst influencing the First Element to embrace the Third Element by 31st March 2014.

As soon as the MMNN holds 500 members, it will form catalysts to bring The Third Element into action directly, through education, fund-raising and lobbying: A peoples network but linking all 3 Elements and where the nation becomes the foot-soldiers.

Act now and join the network. Over the coming months, (with their consent) I will be highlighting those that are having the greatest impact on driving this initiative forward.