As for bees and other essential pollinators, as reported previously here, their numbers are declining. This is a major cause of concern - a significant proportion of our food relies upon insect pollinators. No one is suggesting that the insecticides are solely responsible for this; other factors include habitat loss, parasitic mites, and fungal and viral infections. Even so the decline of bees has apparently mirrored the rise in use of the neonicitinoides, and effects caused by a variety of factors in combination are both rarely tested for and notoriously difficult to demonstrate.

With millions of people supporting a ban, many scientific studies providing plausible, if not always compelling, evidence of links between the use of the insecticides and problems with bees, and the Environmental Audit Committee of the House of Commons calling for action, the EU proposal for a two year ban seems to be no more than common sense. Not according to the Government. When the measure was voted on in Brussels on April 29 we voted against.

This despite supporters of the ban presenting a petition to the Government signed by 300,000 people, and MP Joan Whalley, Chair of the Environment Audit Committee saying, after a six month investigation, that Defra's approach to protecting bees is 'extraordinarily complacent' and that 'the weight of scientific evidence now warrants a ban'.

As with the debate about badgers, cattle and bovine TB, government scientists seem determined to reflect just one side of the argument. Their pronouncements are in line with, and supportive of, government policy and the views of companies with a commercial interest in the continuing use of the chemicals. The Government Chief Scientist Sir Mark Walport, writing in the Financial Times on 26 April, made many valid points, including the fact that neonicitinoides were introduced as safer alternatives to DDT, and that bumble bees seem to be more susceptible to them than honey bees. Even so he came out firmly against the (temporary) ban.

Two oft quoted principles of policy-making are the precautionary principle, and that policy should be evidence-based. In this case the first seems to have been ignored, whilst the second has been reversed: in Whitehall we have here what looks like policy-based evidence!

Deer may be moving the opposite way in the public's affections. Once only occasionally glimpsed disappearing into the depths of a forest they are now often encountered. And not only in the open countryside or places like Cannock Chase; as I have previously reported red deer turn up from time to time in the heart of the Black Country, in and around the Sandwell Valley and areas of Walsall.

People and deer meet more often now because deer numbers are increasing at the same time as there are more visits than ever before to places like Cannock Chase and other open spaces. Walking, cycling, jogging and horse-riding have never been more popular. This means that deer are spreading to new areas, becoming used to people and therefore less wary of them, and they are more frequently disturbed in their day time resting places.

Recently the annual count of deer on the Chase took place. Organised by the Forestry Commission and Staffordshire County Council, it revealed that the 26 square miles of the Chase is now home to record numbers of deer, probably, despite the cold winter a thousand or more. In the main part of the Chase they are mainly fallow deer, whilst the larger red deer are concentrated in the south east and are often seen around Burntwood and Brownhills. More widely, following their 2011 census, the British Deer Society reports that there may be nearly two million deer in Britain and says that in 'urban environments ... there is a serious problem developing with growing deer populations in areas where practical management is very difficult.' (Full details at http://www.bds.org.uk .)

'Practical management' includes culling. Generally between 20 and 30 per cent of the population may be culled each year, but recently there have been calls for this to be increased to 50 per cent. Other problems include illegal poaching, damage to crops, woodlands and gardens, and traffic accidents. Last year about 160 incidents involving deer and traffic were reported in Staffordshire. In a collision between a deer and a car both the deer and the car's occupants can come off very badly.

Deer may still have the 'aah....' factor, but for how much longer?

PS Don't forget to enjoy International Dawn Chorus Day on Sunday 5 May, devised by the local Wildlife Trust here in Birmingham. Details at http://www.idcd.info/

There are doubtless a number of factors which have led to this parlous situation. The increase in badger numbers may be one (badgers prey upon hedgehogs) loss of habitat, pesticides reducing their prey, declining earthworm numbers and weather may also be factors. With respect to habitat, on the face of it suburbia may not seem to have changed very much in ten years. Look more closely however and you soon realise that many large gardens have been lost to infill developments, and garden fashion has led to the construction of more decks and patios. Whilst these may provide resting and nesting places for hedgehogs they take up valuable foraging space, and that is likely to be more of a limiting factor.

As for the weather, the poor old hedgehogs are suffering in every respect. They naturally favour drier habitats and avoid very wet places. For the last few summers this has become increasingly difficult, with frequent floods and downpours occurring in many places. There may or may not be some compensation in the increased populations of slugs, one of their favourite foods. This spring will certainly not favour hedgehogs. They will extend their hibernation period through the very cold weather, but this means that they will be in a poorer condition than normal when they emerge. Any that are active will find it difficult to find worms in frozen ground. Smaller second generation hedgehogs, born in late summer each year, suffer more mortality during hibernation than their older siblings in a normal winter, this year that mortality will be increased.

Five years ago in this column I wrote about emerging evidence that hedgehog numbers were declining, but concluded that they were probably not in serious trouble. I have had to revise my opinion in the light of the latest evidence. As PTES Surveys Officer David Wembridge say 'Over the last twenty years or so, the world's tiger population is thought to have halved. Although they are very different animals and there are many fewer tigers left in the wild, the fact that we are losing hedgehogs in Britain as quickly, should ring alarm bells as loudly.'

If you want to know more, go to http://www.britishhedgehogs.org.uk where you will also find details of Hedgehog Awareness Week in May.

The proposals are a betrayal of years of 'Big Society' environmental education work done by many people, not least in the Wildlife Trusts. The Wildlife Trust for Birmingham and the Black Country built the first purpose-designed inner-city environmental education centre (the Centre of the Earth) in Winson Green 25 years ago. In the last year, all over the country, nearly 300,000 children have benefited from Trusts' activities such as Forest Schools. This helps to develop appreciation and understanding of the importance of the natural environment.

Now the underpinning of these activities is being weakened at a time when it should be strengthened. In the consultation it is proposed for instance that children aged 5 to 14 should no longer be taught, or debate, climate change as part of the geography curriculum. There is just a single mention of the subject in the chemistry guidelines. Climate change education is proposed for the 14 plus age group, by which time only a minority of pupils will be taking geography GCSEs. Professor Sir David King, once the Government's Science Advisor, describes this as 'major political interference with the geography syllabus'.

As for nature protection, the current guidelines say that children aged five to seven 'should be taught to care for the environment' and those aged eight to eleven should be taught 'ways in which living things and the environment need protection'. In the new proposals these requirements have gone. They are replaced by a watered-down one for 10 year olds to 'recognise that environments are constantly changing and that this can sometimes pose dangers to specific habitats'.

It appears that the Government is trying to distance the next generation from the causes of so many of the problems they will face. Being able to read about these problems, and interpret the data related to them, will not count for much if a culture of concern, and a basic grasp of the principles which may lead to solutions is not inculcated at an early age. Wildlife Trusts' President Simon King says 'A younger generation equipped to understand and tackle the massive environmental problems we have left them is our only hope for the future.'

You can respond to the consultation until 16 April by going to the link on: https://www.education.gov.uk/consultations/

In this country the most likely sources of insects in our food are the red colouring cochineal, made from the ground up bodies of close relatives of aphids called scale insects, and honey, a viscous liquid regurgitated by bees. Cochineal was first used as a dye for clothing many centuries ago, it is now used in a range of products including sausages, jams, fruit juices and sweets, as well as in lipsticks.

We also consume with relish a lot of prawns and shrimps, which, whilst not insects, are very closely related to them and have similar bodies. It is also possible to buy preparations of other insects such as ants, crickets and grasshoppers, although these are still novelty foods rather than everyday items in our supermarket trollies. I can remember as a child being told that chocolate-covered ants are popular in some parts of the world.

In a world short of food, and doused in chemicals to produce enough to keep pace with demand, insects are an environmentally sound choice. They are very rich in protein, produce very little methane (unlike larger livestock) and are abundant - someone has calculated that for every one of us there are 40 tonnes of insects. Having said that, it would take a lot of ants to make a burger; the solution in some places is to farm larger insects, such as mealworms, which are beetle grubs, and locusts, which are a type of grasshopper.

My natural history interest is plant galls; many of these contain insects, and produce sweet, honeydew like, exudations. Galls complete with their insect inhabitants have long been offered for sale alongside local fruits in street markets in Mexico and the Middle East, and a common gall found in this country on ground ivy is eaten in France and Sweden. Thanks to reality television programmes we are familiar with the term 'bushtucker'. In Australia this may include a gall, called a bush coconut, containing scale insects and found on a eucalyptus called the bloodwood tree.

If you are not convinced by taste, tradition and eco-friendliness, perhaps you should consider eating insects as payback. It is estimated that up to a quarter of all the food crops in the world are destroyed by insects, about 10% whilst growing and about 15% in storage and transport.

Nuthatches are woodland birds, but they are often attracted to our leafy suburbs. They feed on nuts, seeds and, particularly when raising young, insects. When I worked in Edgbaston (a typical leafy suburb) very close to Five Ways, nuthatches used to visit the peanut feeder hanging by my office window. With my back to the window I could tell whether a nuthatch or a blue tit was feeding just from the sound: the blue tits with their tiny bills made gentle clicking noises as they pecked the nuts, the nuthatches with their more powerful bill made a much louder noise.

Nuthatches have very short but strong legs, they can hang upside down beneath branches, and are the only birds that can walk, indeed run, headfirst down tree trunks. Their behaviour of wedging large nuts and seeds in cracks in bark and hammering away at them with their bill led to them being called 'nut-hacks'; hence the name 'nuthatch'. A foreign species of nuthatch is one of the few birds known to use a tool: it will carry a piece of bark from tree to tree and use it to lever up loose bark to get at the insects beneath.

The nest is made from such things as grasses, mosses and feathers at the bottom of a hole, usually in a tree, but sometimes in cavities in walls and buildings. Although nuthatches are hole nesters they are not hole makers: they take possession of natural holes or those vacated by other birds such as woodpeckers. They make the entrance hole smaller with mud to prevent larger birds like starlings taking over. Nuthatches pair for life. They lay five to eight eggs which take between two and three weeks to hatch and between three and four weeks to fledge.

Nuthatches are mainly found in southern Britain, only occasionally being seen in Scotland and absent from Ireland. The increase in their numbers is unlikely to be a result of all the tree planting that has taken place because nuthatches prefer large, old trees (they are the ones most likely to have holes in them).

We recently had National Nestbox Week (details at www.bto.org/nnbw/index.htm) so if you want to attract nuthatches to your garden you could do worse than put up a nestbox or two - they are known to use them.

So how did this tiny shrimp get to, amongst other places, the River Severn and the Grand Union Canal from its native waters around the Caspian Sea? Two factors are implicated. The first is a canal opened in 1992 connecting two of Europe's great rivers, the Main (a tributary of the Rhine) and the Danube. This enabled the shrimp to spread into Western Europe apparently faster and more successfully than its natural enemies. It is a prime example of unintended consequences arising from a major transport infrastructure project.

The second is the practice of discharging ballast water in ships' tanks from one part of the world in another, thus providing free and easy transport for potentially harmful plants and animals. The Angling Trust is calling for the Government to immediately ratify an existing international convention designed to prevent this happening. I have referred several times in this column to David Cameron's desire to head the 'greenest Government ever' - well this is an easy thing to do that will contribute to that. No doubt vested interests in the shipping industry will persuade him otherwise, businesses do not like environmental regulations affecting trade.

In the meantime it is up to boaters and anglers to fight a rear-guard action to limit the shrimp's spread by cleaning and drying their equipment and clothing after visiting rivers and canals. Environment Agency Central Region Fisheries and Biodiversity Head Dr Ian Hirst, quoted in Total Coarse Fishing News, said: "It (the shrimp) can cling to wet nets and waders and, in cool damp conditions, still be alive a week later. We are asking everyone to follow our Check-Clean-Dry code: checking their equipment for strange organisms, wherever they've fished, cleaning them off, and DRYING the kit thoroughly. (See www.nonnativespecies.org/checkcleandry for more information.)

Demon shrimps are tiny, and may or may not be demonic, but they demonstrate why proper environmental impact studies are needed for major civil engineering work like the canal mentioned above. They are not red tape, they are a necessary precaution.

The often forgotten factor in these stories is that plants and animals have evolved over millions of years to cope with good times and bad. Their presence demonstrates their success. In the very long term many species will successfully evolve before declining and becoming extinct. During this natural process the weather from year to year, or even decade to decade, should not be an issue. The real problem is the ways and the speed at which the human species has changed the world and continues to do so. An example of this year's difficulties is that many puffin burrows have been washed out, preventing young being raised. This is less threatening to puffins than the shortage of the small fish they eat, like sand eels, which appear to have been almost fished to extinction themselves for use in fish meal products.

Closer to home the rise of intensive farming in the 20th Century, air and water pollution, and habitat loss and damage have affected wildlife populations far more profoundly than any extreme weather will ever do. Populations of, if not individual, animals and plants are programmed to survive heat, cold, drought and flood; they cannot survive the loss of their food sources or the places needed to complete their life-cycles. Where populations have become smaller and more isolated, recovery from bad years is much more difficult than it would otherwise be.

What the natural world is really in danger from therefore is the lack of political will to care for it and to take it into account when making major decisions. The Coalition Government wanted to be the greenest Government ever, an aspiration no one thinks it has come anywhere near to achieving. In any case the proponents of this were thinking more about energy, transport and resource consumption than about nature conservation. In this country and others almost every reform proposed to improve the environment or help nature is fiercely opposed by the business and growth lobbies.

No wonder then that we shelter behind a bit of bad weather instead of tackling the real issues. Rain is the problem now; back in May the Guardian was saying that the end of the drought was really good for wildlife, with a headline on 4 May 'Wet Weather helps ailing wildlife in England and Wales'. No doubt whatever weather 2013 brings we will continue to use it to mask the very real long-term damage inflicted on the natural world by our modern lifestyles.

In Birmingham and the Black Country the five local authorities, with the help of many partners, not least the Wildlife Trust for Birmingham and the Black Country and the Groundwork organisation, have been developing their networks of green spaces for many years. From the National Nature Reserve of Sutton Park to Barr Beacon, Moseley Bog to Fens Pools, and Saltwells Wood to Tipton Cemetery (why Tipton Cemetery? - see below) there are hidden landscapes, wintering wildlife and bracing walks through woodlands and heathlands, and alongside rivers and lakes, waiting to be enjoyed.

In this context a special mention and congratulations must go to Sandwell Council for its success in a nationwide poll for the most popular green spaces. The poll is organised every year by Keep Britain Tidy's Green Flag Awards Partnership. This year more than 1400 places were entered for the awards and three of the top ten sites are in Sandwell: Warley Woods which came second (for the second time), Tipton Cemetery which came seventh, and Sandwell Valley Country Park which came ninth.

Warley Woods is managed by the Warley Woods Community Trust, and they said 'Thank you to everyone who voted for Warley Woods in the national vote for Britain's favourite park'. Sandwell Valley Country Park is one of the biggest visitor attractions in the West Midlands region, only beaten by Alton Towers and Warwick Castle. Despite all the visitor pressure it retains important wildlife areas and provides a home for many species of birds and animals, from cormorants and herons to deer and water voles, as well as the remains of an 19th Century deer park and a mediaeval priory.

Green Flag Awards were introduced in 1996 and a number of other local sites have earned the accolade. Amongst the criteria are how welcoming a place is, how safe and clean, how well managed and how involved local people are with the site.

So, as this is a time for good news and goodwill, how about raising a glass especially to Sandwell Council and the Warley Woods Community Trust, but also to the small army of people, paid and voluntary whose work provides this wonderful resource for all of us?

The birds, often described as dumpy, are about the size of starlings, and have a distinctive crest. They are buffish-brown with a black bib, black and yellow tail feathers and yellow, black, white and red wing feathers. As well as the crest another distinctive feature is the mascara-like extension of the black bib around their eyes. The name 'waxwing' comes from the red tips to the wing feathers which resembles old-fashioned sealing wax. Another name is 'silktail', presumably because of the bright colours on their tails.

Waxwings travel around in flocks varying from about a dozen to a hundred or more birds. They are voracious berry eaters, being particularly fond of red berries such as rowan, hawthorn and cotoneaster. This means that they are often seen in parks and gardens, and around landscaped areas like supermarket car parks and the grounds of large buildings. A few years ago a flock of about 40 settled in a hawthorn tree outside a fish and chip shop and a busy road junction in deepest West Bromwich. Like robins they do not seem to mind people at all (in North America they are sometimes called Canada robins) and they have been known to feed from the hand, apple apparently being good 'bait'.

No one is quite sure what triggers these intermittent southern migrations. German folklore has it that they occur every seven years, but they are not as regular as that. They may be caused by the failure of the berry crop in their breeding grounds in the northern forests, or it may be because of very cold weather moving in, or a combination of the two. The movements may also be linked to breeding success - a very good year immediately followed by a poor berry crop may force the birds to move south.

Scott Petrek, of the Staffordshire WildlifeTrust, describing the birds as 'Viking invaders' says that: 'Bird lovers can help attract waxwings to their garden by not only keeping feeders topped up, but by leaving out old apples instead of adding them into the compost heap. Make sure birdbaths are ice-free in winter too'.

It's certainly worth keeping an eye out for these colourful, friendly, birds which may come to a park or garden near to you soon.

The presence of the geese indicates just how adaptable some species are. In their natural state Canada geese belong in North America, and many spend at least some of the year in the Arctic. People brought them here in the 17th Century as ornamental birds; the first record being of some in Charles II's collection in St. James's Park London in 1665. The first breeding record in Birmingham may be that of a pair of geese in Edgbaston Park in 1885.

Introductions continued into the first half of the last century by which time they were found all over the country. In addition, as flocks grew in numbers, landowners gave some of their geese to their friends on other estates. From the 1960s on their numbers seemed to explode, rising from about 50,000 to just about 190.000 now. Canada geese are now very familiar everywhere, in lakes, park ponds, canals and reservoirs. Even without deliberate introductions the Canada goose could still have become a resident British bird as individuals from wild populations across the Atlantic frequently turn up on our shores.

The geese are now considered a nuisance by many people. They despoil and foul the edges of ponds and pools, cropping the grass and leaving their droppings in picnic areas and on golf courses. This is hardly their fault - Canada geese are big birds and eat only grass and herbage. This diet is not very nutritious so they have to eat and process their own body weight every four days! They can live for more than 20 years, and share the care of goslings in the flock, making control difficult. In central Birmingham they have found the canal system to their liking. During the breeding season there are stretches where there is one nest every 100 metres or so.

Attitudes towards Canada geese vary: they have been described as 'the most loathsome bird in Britain', but there is a Canada Goose Conservation Society. I suggest that we should marvel at their resilience and adaptability rather than condemn them for their depredations. As the diarist John Evelyn wrote in the 17th Century (their presence) '.... is a singular and diverting thing'.

I am indebted to Christopher Lever's 'The Naturalized Animals of the British Isles' for information used in this article.

Briefly the situation is that trial culls are being licenced to test whether or not it is possible to control badger numbers by shooting. The intention is that populations will be reduced by 70% in cull areas. Unfortunately no one knows how many badgers are present to start with, so it will be impossible to say if and when 70% have been shot. In addition, disturbance of badgers' social groups means that infected badgers are likely to move away, perhaps spreading the infection over a wider area.

The Wildlife Trusts, amongst others, have long argued for the development of vaccines, for cattle and badgers, and methods of administering them. They recognise that bTB is a huge problem for farmers and want to work with them to find a solution. They do not though think that culling badgers is the answer, and therefore some Trusts, including Staffordshire Wildlife Trust, are now undertaking vaccination trials to show there is an effective alternative. Results of the first UK badger vaccination trial, run by Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust, were published in October, and demonstrated vaccination to be an affordable and viable alternative to culling.

The Staffordshire Wildlife Trust's Head of Conservation, Dr Sue Lawley, said:

"Bovine TB is a dreadful disease that is the common enemy of nature conservationists and livestock owners, a disease that we all want to see gone from the British countryside. Staffordshire Wildlife Trust believes that the future eradication of bTB lies both in the development of a digestible vaccination for badgers and the approval by the EU of a vaccine for cattle, but as neither are available today, the next best step is to run a trial of the injectable vaccine in badgers at carefully selected nature reserves in the county.

"Learning from experiences gained by other Wildlife Trusts, Staffordshire Wildlife Trust will build up its own knowledge of operating a successful vaccination programme and will be developing the expertise necessary to extend the vaccination programme to other nature reserves in the county, should that prove necessary in the future."

The trial programme will focus on two of the Trust's nature reserves which are most likely to be within any future-designated badger cull area, but they will be undertaken regardless of whether or not that is the case. It is hoped that badgers, cattle, farmers and conservationists will all benefit from this pioneering work.

Good news then that over the last few years a new species of bumblebee has made its way to Britain and seems to be thriving here. It first appeared here in 2001 and is now found in most parts of England and Wales. It seems to be at home in suburban gardens so might well be in yours. Locally its presence has been highlighted following a string of enquiries to the Staffordshire Wildlife Trust. It seems that the tree bumblebee, as its name implies, likes to nest higher up than most other species. It looks for dry cavities in which to nest, and has found nest boxes to be ideal, hence the calls to the Trust from people who have seen bees where they expected blue tits.

These bees are easy to identify. They are thickset, furry, about 10 - 16mm long, and have a distinctive colour pattern: bright orange behind their head, then a broad black body with a white tail. No other bees have this pattern.

Ecological Records Coordinator Craig Slawson, who is responsible for maintaining a database of all wildlife recorded in Staffordshire, said: "The tree bumblebee reached Staffordshire in 2009, and we've had reports of it all over the county now, from Newcastle in the north down to Wombourne in the south, Burton and Uttoxeter in the west and Stafford and Stone in mid-Staffordshire. If you discover a tree bumblebee nest in your nest box, don't worry as it shouldn't pose any problems. The bees are quite docile and are unlikely to sting unless provoked or accidentally trapped. The best thing to do is leave them alone and enjoy them as they pollinate your garden flowers!"

More good news about this bee is that, unlike some other newly arrived species such as the harlequin ladybird, it does not seem to be having any harmful effects on other bees or other parts of the ecosystem. It is a very effective pollinator and is therefore just what we need to help to compensate for the decline in other species.

The Trust is asking anyone who has a tree bumblebee nest to report it, preferably accompanied by a photo, to info@staffs-ecology.org.uk in order to help map the distribution of the species. For more information on tree bumblebees, also see www.tinyurl.com/ck4f4o7 .

This is a good time to address this issue. The wildlife of our stream, rivers and ponds is at its busiest. Frogs, toads and newts have returned to the water to spawn and young tadpoles are emerging to feed. Waterside birds, such as ducks, moorhens and kingfishers, are laying eggs and raising chicks, fish are spawning and dragonfly larvae are approaching the time of their emergence. The last thing all these creatures need is a dose of dirty water.

Another factor is the summer. Even though the drought has been averted problems always increase in the summer because lower levels and warmer water magnify the effects of pollution. This is because the ratio of polluted water to clean water is much higher - there is less dilution. Warmer weather and low oxygen levels, plus pollution, equals dirty smelly water in our nature reserves and open spaces making them much less amenable to people as well as to wildlife. In addition to the unpleasantness there may be risks to health as well.

The Trust campaign is based on its work with many schools in Birmingham and the Black Country. They have been checking the schools' plumbing. This has the added advantage that the children are being made aware of the problems so that hopefully they can avoid them when they become householders.

There is a website to help you to understand and address the problem. It is www.connectright.org.uk run by The Connect Right Campaign. The partners in this campaign include the water companies through Water UK, the Environment Agency, the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health and CIPHE (the professional body for plumbing and heating engineers).

The Environment Agency and local councils have the power to prosecute those responsible for pollution. No matter who did the work you may be responsible if your property is misconnected. How much better for you and for your local environment if you know everything is in order, and can proudly display a Yellow Fish.