I agree with two children's authors, Sir Michael Morpurgo and Julia Donaldson, when they say that children should be encouraged to explore the natural world on their own and take risks. They should not be crowded out by regulations but exposed to the countryside. "People tell them to love the planet, but if you don't actually know what the planet is, and love things about it, why would you? You need to get dirty." - Julia Donaldson. They should get dirty. They should scratch their knees and talk to trees. They need to smell the earth and cut grass. They need to feel the wind in their face. Silently falling rain should please them. They should listen to the landscape, look up at the sky and admire the clouds. See them scuffling against a blue-grey backdrop and learn how to read the weather. They should love to watch squirrels and birds feeding. The sound of the fox at night should not disturb them but make them smile. All these things will give them an und

Because they are descended from the North African wildcat, a cat of similar proportions and appearance even after about 10,000 years of domestication. I suppose you might ask why was the North African (African-Asian) wildcat domesticated? Comparison domestic and wildcat ancestor. It is because the place where they were first domesticated - the Fertile Crescent (in the area of Syria) was suited to farming and it so happened that this wildcat was present in that landscape. The cat and farmer met to mutual benefit and the rest is history as they say.  The North African wildcat has a relatively nice temperament suited to domestication. They kept the rodents down and the farmer had a working cat and some company and fun. This happened around 9,500-12,000 years ago it is believed. There are other small wild cats who are also suited to domestication to various extents e.g. the margay, but it just happened that the North African wildcat got their first perhaps because 10,000 years ago t

A page which I wrote some time ago has suddenly gone viral (at 4th and 5th Dec. 2019) and I think it is because Netflix have made a documentary about him and it is going to be aired on television on 18 December 2019. Please click this link to go to the page I wrote about Magnotta a while ago. It has been regularly updated as more information has been revealed. Photo: Rex Features. The man that I am referring to is the Canadian Luka Magnotta. He is a classic psychopath and he is truly infamous. First he killed two kittens and made sure that he was videoed doing it and he uploaded the video to the Internet. It was subsequently deleted but screenshots were made of it. Then he met up with another gay person who he murdered and dismembered. He sent body parts to politicians and teachers. You can read about it on the page that I have referred to above. It's a classic case to of a psychopath moving from animal cruelty and torture to doing the same thing to people. You could write

This was perhaps the most notorious cases of cat abuse in 2019. In April it was reported on the internet. A man called Dougie Doug named Kenny Rowles as the person who feed food to stray cats with fish hooks. The cats took the food and were badly injured. They recovered and Mr Rowles was charged and tried in the criminal court. Elisa, a colleague of mine has reported on the sentence ( click this link to read her report ). At one time he was thought to be insane . It was an insane act but I don't think he is mad, just sad and bad. Comment : It takes an evil mind to dream up placing cat treats on fish hooks and feeding it to stray cats. It takes a particular sort of personality disorder to do it. You can't be normal. It is good to see Rowles successfully prosecuted and punished. You might think that it is entirely normal to punish this madman. But it isn't because most cat abusers are never caught and therefore never punished and when caught their punishment is often