Silt Pits At Nosterfield Nature Reserve

When I went to track down the Thornborough Henges, I parked initially at the Nosterfield Nature Reserve.  Nosterfield was formerly a sand and gravel quarry for Tarmac that has been restored to open water and shallow pits.  It has become one of the best places in North Yorkshire for passage and wintering waders and the birds were making a jolly, happy racket while swimming around on the waters.  It is claimed that there are 150 species of birds, 25 butterflies and 297 plants that are to be found on the site.  Perhaps even more lovely is that fact that when I visited the other day it was basically empty of visitors – there were 3 others tootling about.  They were all garbed out in proper twitching clothing with huge, showy cameras and binoculars and (as always) proper sturdy walking boots, while I had my camera, a notebook and a cheap pair of trainers on from Sports Direct.

There are black-tailed godwits, avocets, moorhens and ruffs (note to self: get bigger zoom lens).  I was particularly taken by the butterflies and some awesome small bee orchids that I came across.  The photos I managed to get of the butterflies included mainly common species but they are still beautiful as there is still beauty in the commonplace, which is one of my main campaigns in life, i.e. for people to realise that life is good and to see the beauty on your doorstep in the seemingly and supposedly mundane.  I saw cuckoo spit, ringlets (with very feint ringlets), speckled wood butterflies, burnet moths (really gorgeous), green-veined whites and small skippers and many more that just would not stay still! 

I shall be back to look more closely as it is just on my doorstep by West Tanfield.

Pretty Pink Flower on Common Bindweed

Bee Orchid Flower At Nosterfield

Cuckoo Spit By Footpath

Small Skipper On Bramble Flower

Speckled Wood Butterfly

Green-Veined White Butterfly

Ringlet Butterfly

Two Burnet Moths

“Thanks for your email.  I have looked into the issues you have raised and have found Sainsburys did not directly compensate Fairtrade supliers [sic], or farmers during the Volcanic ash disruption period.

We did however try extremely hard to get the flowers into stores and we looked at every possible travel option to get products into stores.  At the beginning of the flight ban we had flowers flown into south Spain, as the ban didnt apply there and we then drove the produce by truck into the UK.

We thoroughly enquired into every possible supply route to get these items into store.  We are not aware of any products being destroyed due to the flight ban.”

Which conflicts with all the reports about the impact of the ash on Fairtrade flower farmers in Kenya where Benjamin Gatland of South African Fairtrade Network said “Kenyan Fairtrade rose growers alone lost approximately one million flowers a day” – see http://www.ipsnews.net/africa/nota.asp?idnews=51229.

Who’s correct? I think I know who…

So I say if you care about Fairtrade, start asking the major retailers what they are doing about it?  Ask them are they compensating the Fairtrade flower growers for trashed flowers?  Are they working with the flower growers to find a solution, eg flying into Spain and then road haul?  Will they pick up any incremental costs or will it be passed onto the consumer, ie the retailer never pays for anything really?

Or is Fairtrade just skin deep for them – we’ll (that’s Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Interflora, Waitrose, Interflora etc) love Fairtrade when its on message for our strategy but stuff it when events get in the way!  I’m asking so why not email, blog, Tweet or whatever you fancy to their PR departments and show you care and so should they.