When will this fog / smog go.

The weather is truly dull, this part of the country seems to have been shrouded in fog for weeks, admittedly it's probably only 5 days but it feels longer and the spring mornings were so lovely and peaceful. We have local talk of a crane (could be stork) but bearing in mind the spotter is in the midst of lambing it could just be an illusion caused by tiredness!

This edition carries the first update on the latest additions to the Citizen Science, Wildlife Surveys and Fieldwork page. This is something we are going to include in the first issue of each month.

Over the years we have published many articles about the varying forms of voluntary surveys in CJS Focuses.  Here are a few more recent ones of interest.

In June 2013 OPAL wrote an article about the value of Citizen Science, read it here.

Nature's Calendar wrote about the value of being involved in a long running citizen science project in February 2013, read this one here. 
A more organised approach can be found in BioBlitz, read more about this scheme here.

Taking part in any of these surveys will give you useful experience and also help to extend the scientific knowledge of a species, so vital for appropriate conservation management. Some of the larger, more organised fieldwork based surveys include training in survey techniques and a few may even pay expenses.

There are hundreds of different surveys taking place across the country, we have details of the main ones plus quite a few of the smaller ones.  See all the surveys and citizen science projects listed here: http://www.countryside-jobs.com/Jobs/Surveys.htm   

With this extra info included the postal copies are now being printed, and emails have been sent. The badger issue has again raised it's head so the news contains a bit about this, 44 adverts for paid posts and another 19 for volunteers.