We got an email the other day from Nik Shelton at the RSPB which we wanted to run in full because A) it’s river related and B) it made us smile. Love the idea that the RSPB sounds like the offices of the X-Files. Click the links and adopt a river – we here at CBTR wholeheartedly approve of the Our Rivers site.

Nik here from the RSPB. I just wanted to tell you about the small group of bearded, dishevelled individuals who are tucked away in an office somewhere in the depths of the RSPB headquarters here in sunny Bedfordshire and usually forgotten about. They are our Water Policy team and they live and breathe rivers. They care about little else (apart from Ultimate Frisbee, which for some reason they are mad about).

Anyway, they have become quite excited about your book and blog and are hoping that it will make rivers cool and that maybe they might finally get some female attention at the annual staff barbecue.

They have done a lot a lot of work on a campaign which we launched recently called Our Rivers, which is a joint campaign with us, WWF, the Angling Trust and the Association of Rivers Trusts. Anyway, it’s the biggest river action campaign ever launched in the UK and getting all those organisations to sign up to the same bit of paper is something of a minor miracle.

The idea is basically to get people to input into the campaign issues with their local river from pollution to over extraction and other problems created by humans gallivanting about the place without a care for the world around them. We will then take all that evidence and use it to put pressure on the Government to put more rigorous plans in place to protect our rivers waterways and wetlands.

The thing is, it would make our motley bunch of water policy chaps very happy indeed if you were to offer your support to the campaign. Maybe you’d like to mention it on the blog, or link to the campaign webpage where there is a snazzy interactive map of UK rivers.

I have also attached the press release which went out when we launched the campaign recently.

Thanks for reading this,

Yours,

Nik Shelton, RSPB