The machine struck back

I feel like I lost a friend today. The sound of silence on my road is deafening today.

Up until now the I thought I was doing OK working from home, walking in thee morning was good and everything going ok trapped in my little bubbling filling in my time.

And then I saw it.

The photo above is a small sample image of the chopping down of a widlife corridor thanks to network rail, who in their wisdom while everyone is under lock down are going around and butchering 100’s of meters of wildlife and on the same day disposing of the evidence so that the damage that they have done has been taken away. With no evidence left they might not be able to be prosecuted. The only small wild birds I saw today are the sweet little fellers that flew out from the one remaining bush that the railway works had left standing with some tape around it. The rest of the shrubs have probably been carted off to an incinerator to destroy the evidence. This feels like a potential environmental crime scene. Over the last month the birds have been singing, dancing in the air, breeding and feeding and now one of their biggest homes right on my doorstep in the middle of a city is gone.

Action is futile

But never the less attempting to act is what I have done. First I emailed the local Green council and the local Devon Wildlife Trust explaining what had happened and asking them what to do. This was about 08:00am so before work I started work it then got to 15:00pm and I had been working hard myself on a project for Devon Communities Together and I had still not heard anything so thought I had better check on what there response would be. The Green councillor answered her phone and was keen to encourage me to act myself and gave me some neat hints and tips about what to do and who to which I took on board.

The Devon Wildlife Trust Website advised me to phone Royal Society for Prevention of Crualty to Animals which is what I did. They then advised me to contact Natural England to check if the work by Network Rail was authorised and legal to do. So I have now done that and am waitng to here back. The councillor also advised me to contact the local wildlife police officer, which is what I have now also done so I fowarded the two photos I took this morning to the Police. The left side of the photo below is where they cut everything down and the right is a small patch of how it all looked for 100’s of meters along the track.

I have no idea if they have broken the law or what if any the sanctions will be. Even if they get caught out and it is proved that they butchered wildlife while the rest of us are under lockdown and unable to witness the butchering of the bird nests. It will be a hollow and somewhat meaningless victory. I am very sad for the loss of the bird’s home in Exeter on what feels like my door step.

I had bought a wildlife bird table and food which is still traveling to me in the post I do hope my area of Exeter will have some birds around to come to it.

I am still really sad about all this and feel that only when we do nothing do bad men make decisions that impact on the good but by doing nothing we let them win without even trying to stop or prevent it from happening again. I can’t bring the nests back but I can make sure I never forget the type of men that do this and work to counter the wrong’s they do from my little bubble.

So armed with just a digital camera, a contacts list to network and a custom built PC in my lounges I now have to wait to see what happens next and hope the birds in my neighbourhood learn to sing again and that some good might come of this wicked acts and deeds.