Thread by @ImmigrSchorschi

@UNBiodiversity @IPBES certainly made the headlines in Germany yesterday. Here in Bavaria, the successful petition nicknamed "Save the Bees" is due to become law in a few months. Yesterday evening on dog walk near Ottobeuren saw more evidence of why we need it urgently.

This isn't the local golf course!
I guess the meadows were mown & slurried last week as we have had snow over the weekend & for the most part the weather has been cold & wet since Easter. The major dandelion flower period is not yet over & yet the first silage cut has been made.

Last year, this part of Bavaria was lucky with the drought as we had quite a number of nightly thunderstorms & many of the silage feeding farms managed a bumper crop of between 7 & 8 cuts plus a bumper maize/corn silage harvest.
7x cuts means at least 8x slurry trips.

Never mind worms & soil compaction, what chance do insects, birds, amphibian & animals have? The bugs & crawlies, a few km away, on the Allgäu Golf Club course would, from these drone shots, have a much better chance.
golfclub-ottobeuren.de/golf/golf-deta…

The Allgäu has invested hugely in it's "natural" image to attract tourism & scenes are full of cows with bells on blooming meadows, local cheeses. Yet my county, Unterallgäu, with highest number of cows in all Bavaria has the lowest number of wildflowers

It's not all bad & many are doing great work. My 2,500 pop parish has a massive spring amphibian-crossing action supported by all, incl farmers. Just 10m from my original photos, a local organisation has a massive, cultured, re-naturalisation programme guenztal.de/guenztal/web.n…

Yet from the very point I took the photos, the meadow is alongside the River Günz being fed by numerous drainage streams. Here you see the farmer even kindly put slurry on the path & probably a bit in the ditch - OK at least on this section he used a "modern" slurry technique

Slurry is usually put out just before rain is forecast as was the case last week. It is only thanks to the incredible results of 2018 drought that even here the water table at Easter was equivalent to that in a normal July & the rain & slurry was absorbed rather than running off.

It is very common in "normal" times to see large collections of slurry scum in the river. But again the majority have been "educated" esp by EU regulations. Lake Constance about 80km away is now so clean, the fishermen are campaigning cos the fish are dying out with no food.

I am a strong supporter of responsible farmers, even those who don't yet or can't yet adopt organic principles. The fault lies primarily with us consumers. We simply aren't prepared to pay the price for healthy food or make the effort to change our habits - & I count myself.

After the walk, I drove 500m in my 17 y.o. diesel SUV -sold to me new as the best thing for the environment & which I nowadays can't use to drive to my capital Munich - to the supermarket for emergency supplies. It was 10mins before closing at 8 pm!

All of it packaged non-organic cheap national discounter food - but then no choice as the local shops close at 6:00 pm. But isn't it wonderful to at least be able with help from EU labelling that you know where it comes from? I exclude the "Cornwall Tea", sugar & jar of coffee!

The s-market is very basic & only gets deliveries 2x week. So my two litres of milk were the last on the shelves, the own-brand butter was of Irish milk, pkg'd in Germany (Kerrygold biggest German butter brand), the Parmesan came from Italy, the Gouda at least from close to NL!

The milk, cream, bread & plastic meat was at least all from Bavaria or the neighbouring (20km) State of Baden-Württemberg. While that gives me a less-bad feeling, €0.70c for milk when I pay less for a litre of beer, is a joke. 250g Irish butter with 5 litres milk for €1.79c !!!

How can we expect farmers not to "optimise" production? Can we blame those destroying traditional old fruit plantations right now to ensure they aren't included in new Bavarian Bio-Diversity law? br.de/mediathek/vide…

Heartbreaking to see this & not just because it is based on false information. It's not the only revenge some farmers have reverted to following the petition. They have in some cases stopped centuries-old traditions being carried out on their land. We must ALL work together.

This is a short promo of the work of Günztal Stiftung charity that works together with farmers, parishes, business & communities to re-naturalise yet use sensibly the longest watercourse (92km) in Bavaria from the base of Alps to the Danube near Ulm.

@threadreaderapp please unroll