Putting Eyes in the Field
Protect the Wild aims to 'empower people to protect British wildlife'. Here's how in five steps.
Step One: Protectors
Protect the Wild has developed an information resource we’ve called Protectors of the Wild.
The central idea of ‘Protectors’ is that it helps us all become ‘eyes in the field’ by learning how to recognise, record, and report wildlife crime and wildlife persecution.
We’ve written thirty-five Protectors pages already, covering everything from the Hunting Act 2004, the CRoW Act 2000, and the Animal Welfare Act 2006 to legislation on snares and cage traps, and laws protecting foxes, badgers, and birds of prey.
And we’ve arranged the information as FAQs – more than 400 of them!
- Information is just the start though, which takes us to…
Step Two: Providing equipment
People need equipment to go and out record wildlife crime and wildlife persecution.
Things like body and trail cams, video equipment, and night-vision goggles.
We’re proud that Protect the Wild has been supplying individuals and groups with kit just like that since we launched.
We intend to not only keep doing so, but to step up the amount of equipment we give out…
- Equipment is not cheap though. Which takes us to step three.
Step three. Substack
Protect the Wild runs on donations. But it’s tough out there. Our supporters (and our staff!) need to know that every penny counts.
Putting ‘eyes in the field’ will make a huge difference to wildlife – and knowing that it does will help us keep the funding coming in.
So we need to put the two things together.
We’ve come up with an idea we’re calling the ‘virtuous circle’.
Protect the Wild has launched a Substack. Substack is an online platform that provides publishing, payment, analytics, and design infrastructure.
Written by our team of experienced campaigners and journalists, all our news and opinion posts will be going onto Substack from now on.
Nothing is going behind a paywall though. Our content is free.
- But there is an option for paid subscriptions…which is where the ‘virtuous circle’ comes in.
Step four: The 'virtuous circle'
“We would like to give a big shout out to Protect the Wild for their donation of four body cameras to our group.
Having these has enabled us to gather more damning evidence on the Cheshire Hunt.
We would urge any independent groups to contact Protect the Wild if you need a helping hand.”
Cheshire Against Blood Sports
When we’ve given out equipment we’ve never asked for anything in return.
We need to change that approach slightly.
We will continue to fund individuals or groups of course but we’d like something back.
In return for our support we will ask that they in effect offer support to other groups by helping us to build paid subscriber numbers on Substack – the very subscribers who help us fund our equipment grants.
They can do that simply by providing us with material for us to post and share.
Footage they’ve captured with cameras we’ve given them, perhaps, or in the field reports.
The more we can demonstrate the impact our equipment has on putting ‘eyes in the field’ and ‘empowering people to protect British wildlife’ – the more that readers and supporters will want to join in.
- That’s the virtuous circle…
Step five: Protecting the Wild Equipment Fund
To make all of this a reality, we’ve launched the ‘Protecting the Wild Equipment Fund’.
Now we need to tell you how to access it!
All you have to do is go to our ‘Protecting the Wild Equipment Fund’ page and read through the terms and conditions.
If you agree with them – and can commit to helping us and fellow ‘eyes in the field’ by sending us footage, photos, and/or text – fill in the form at the bottom of the page and we will get back to you as soon as we can.
- Bear in mind that available funding is limited, so we will prioritise indviduals or groups who aren’t being funded anywhere else and who will be part of the ‘virtuous circle’ we outlined above.
That's it! Putting 'eyes in the field' and 'empowering people to protect British wildlife' in five steps.
We're looking forward to working with you, so do please get in touch.
