Looking after the countryside......and the responses he got

[Box Brownie]

I thought this article was interesting and none too surprisingly, it seems those entitled few objected to his actions

Why I kick down Peak District stone stacks - BBC News

Stuart Cox says he wants to raise awareness of the damage the stacks can do to the environment.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[Sky]

Good on him. There are far too many bloody halfwits in our society, we should all carry sticks to beat them with . . .

 

[swanseamale47]

Only seen the one on the hills, but I see a LOT on the beach. Maybe slightly off topic but the new trend seems to be go camping and leave all your gear behind (and mess) I'm found three dumped tents this year.

 

[Mr Bump]

I find it petty to be honest kicking the stones down like mr willis the fun police, i walk a lot and they are just part of the modern landscape, mainly kids love making them, he says the wall is being destroyed to make them, utter crap the wall is knackered and has been for decades thats what happens to walls in the middle of nowhere, i think he needs kicking down the hill to be fair.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

...i think he needs kicking down the hill to be fair.

I wouldn't go quite that far but I think you're right when you imply that the stone piles are just a modern recycling of the broken walls.

My opinion is that andscapes are not to be kept in aspic but rather allowed to change as man and nature changes. A few thousand years ago (mere seconds in geological time) most if not all of the moorland hills were heavily forested. Then humans came along and cleared the hills for agriculture. With the trees gone, the farmland eventually retreated, to be replaced by the scrubland we see now.

Changing a few abandoned stones from walls to piles is just one more minor step along a very long road.

 

[Pound Coin]

In most wild hilly areas it is not walls that provide the stones, it is habitats for local animals and insects.

Piling up stones is a peculiarly selfish thing to do.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

In most wild hilly areas it is not walls that provide the stones, it is habitats for local animals and insects.

Piling up stones is a peculiarly selfish thing to do.

In that case, shouldn't we have a major campaign to reforest all these moorlands?

That would provide habitat for many millions of creatures in all shapes and sizes. In my opinion, forests are much more attractive than empty scrubland...

 

[Pound Coin]

In that case, shouldn't we have a major campaign to reforest all these moorlands?

That would provide habitat for many millions of creatures in all shapes and sizes. In my opinion, forests are much more attractive than empty scrubland...

View attachment 457616

Don’t get your logic.

“Because somewhere has been damaged we should damage everything else.”

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

Don’t get your logic.

“Because somewhere has been damaged we should damage everything else.”

That does appear to be a rather peculiar response to my comment.

To recap: humans took a lush biodiverse environment, destroyed that and replaced it with a largely agricultural environment, destroyed that and replaced it with scrubland and you are now complaining that moving a few stones around is destroying what biodiversity still persists.

I suggest that the proper next step is to restore the lush woodland and you claim that will be damaging everything?

 

[Pound Coin]

That does appear to be a rather peculiar response to my comment.

To recap: humans took a lush biodiverse environment, destroyed that and replaced it with a largely agricultural environment, destroyed that and replaced it with scrubland and you are now complaining that moving a few stones around is destroying what biodiversity still persists.

I suggest that the proper next step is to restore the lush woodland and you claim that will be damaging everything?

No more peculiar than your response about growing scrub to my comment about piling up stones.

 

[Graham W]

I wonder if he destroys the cairns as well...you know, the piles of rocks built to waymark paths in bad weather / visibility.

 

[BethAtTheHug]

Looks like he is kicking over single balanced stacks of rocks, not the rather more hefty cairns to mark paths. Although the stacks haven't appeared en-mass in my part of the Highlands, yet, I'd kick them over too. I have come across occasional stacks in boulder fields, at a distance mistaking them marking a 'least worst' way through only to find it worse than the line I would otherwise have been on. Leaving stacks intact encourages others and suggests it okay to build them. Taking stones from walls or paths is vandalism.

 

[ancient_mariner]

This is another great example of acting from good intentions but failing to do so collaboratively. He's a lone hero rather than movement leader, and more likely to create opposition (see this thread) than win hearts and save nature.

Why is it so hard for someone to try to draw others with them to make the world a better place?

 

[F1.2]

Only seen the one on the hills, but I see a LOT on the beach. Maybe slightly off topic but the new trend seems to be go camping and leave all your gear behind (and mess) I'm found three dumped tents this year.

Try looking at Glastonbury , They use a bulldozer to clear 1000's of tents and sleeping gear every year.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

Why is it so hard for someone to try to draw others with them to make the world a better place?

I imagine that's because there is seldom agreement as to what is "better".

We are all guilty of thinking that we are right and that our "right" is the only "right".

 

[ancient_mariner]

I imagine that's because there is seldom agreement as to what is "better".

We are all guilty of thinking that we are right and that our "right" is the only "right".

Then we have to do better than that, identify what better means and work towards it. There will be some who will disagree.

 

[AndrewFlannigan]

Then we have to do better than that, identify what better means and work towards it. There will be some who will disagree.

So: where there cannot be absolutes, where there must always be opinion, is it ever possible to do more than than just pick the current majority decision and proceed from there? In which case, how do we decide on which majority? In this case, is it the local population or the people who sit on a London committee or just some current minister?

I worry that it will always be the people with the loudest voice and that the people with the loudest voice may not have the ability to make the best decision.

 

[lindsay]

In summer and especially weekends, I see lots of family "seaside kits" (spades, buckets, towels, barbecues, etc abandoned rather than taken away, I've seen lots of items of clothing, super dry sandals, sunglasses, you name it. Usually within feet of an industrial bin. And quite a few little piles of pebbles off the beach - not so worried about those, but they are ecologically important. More worrying is the smouldering embers of camp fires not far from the dry grass covered dunes.

 

[ancient_mariner]

So: where there cannot be absolutes, where there must always be opinion, is it ever possible to do more than than just pick the current majority decision and proceed from there? In which case, how do we decide on which majority? In this case, is it the local population or the people who sit on a London committee or just some current minister?

I worry that it will always be the people with the loudest voice and that the people with the loudest voice may not have the ability to make the best decision.

It's especially problematic if one chooses to reject the general trends data is indicating because there are no absolutes.

 

[Pound Coin]

So: where there cannot be absolutes, where there must always be opinion, is it ever possible to do more than than just pick the current majority decision and proceed from there? In which case, how do we decide on which majority? In this case, is it the local population or the people who sit on a London committee or just some current minister?

I worry that it will always be the people with the loudest voice and that the people with the loudest voice may not have the ability to make the best decision.

That's just your opinion.

 

[LCPete]

In most wild hilly areas it is not walls that provide the stones, it is habitats for local animals and insects.

Piling up stones is a peculiarly selfish thing to do.

This exactly, stones and stone walls provide habitat for many small creatures and there is no reason or excuse to vandalise them