It's on now! 24 July - 1 August 2010. Butterfly Conservation's Big Butterfly Count website offers downloadable butterfly charts, and online sightings logs... if you like butterflies, have a go! Find out more with this video featuring Sir David Attenborough:

We particularly like the interactive map - go and see who's been joining in near you, and what they spotted!

Way back in the 1980s a young ranger, still wet behind the ears, joined the Association of Countryside Rangers. The ACR was a national organisation that gave him an opportunity to go off to meet like-minded colleagues from his area, and beyond, learn about his trade, and swap stories and experiences. It was a good time, and many friends were made along the way. At some point, the ACR became the Countryside Management Association, and as the young chap worked his way up the management tree and the years went by, employers became less inclined to pay for rangers to go off to networking and training events, and - like others - he became less involved with the organisation. You've probably guessed who that young ranger was.

Now the end of this venerable institution may be at hand - or possibly a new beginning. It seems as though my involvement in CMA has not been atypical. Despite a fairly lively magazine and website, the association hasn't had many active members for a long time, although there have been a few regions (step forward, the south-west) where it's been more active than others (yes, Wales, I mean you). Now the CMA is at a crossroads, and decisions are required. I realise this is a bit of a specialist article, so if you've no interest in the Countryside Management Association and its future, feel free to move along as you won't really want to read the rest of this. Otherwise, and should you also want to know my personal stance in this debate, read on.

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Folk-lore about spiders suggests that one way to keep them from the house is to leave conkers around the place. Some swear by it, others refute it. Nobody really seems to know, although you can buy chestnut-based anti-spider spray on Amazon, so somebody thinks it works enough to shell out £6.53 for it!

Last year the Royal Society of Chemistry had a cunning idea to promote its new website for chemists called ChemSpider, described enticingly as "a free access service providing a structure centric community for chemists". Lord knows that could do with some promotion, so RSC chose to invite the public to test the hypothesis that conkers repel spiders, and win £300 for their trouble. This wheeze caught the media's attention spectacularly - entirely eclipsing poor old ChemSpider but nonetheless getting a good bit of attention for RSC and scientific methodology.

Well, now they've announced the results. RSC spokesman Jon Edwards said Year 5 and 6 pupils at independent Roselyon School, in Par, Cornwall had finally disproved the age-old theory that conkers can keep spiders out of the house.

He said: "When we consulted a spider expert at the Natural History Museum he was highly sceptical about the spider theory. We even tried it ourselves but couldn't reach a scientific conclusion. The Roselyon entry stood out from the crowd because of the balanced, scientific methods and well designed experiments. They should be proud of their fair mindedness, scientific rigour and logical thinking."

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We heard you wanted to see a video of a man arguing with an ibex. So (as it's Friday) here it is:

You'll want the speakers on to enjoy it fully. If it helps - and it probably doesn't - the blue text which reads 'Subvención del gobierno? Qué es eso?' means "Government subsidy? What's that?"

If any Spanish speakers can shed any light on the rest of it, feel free. But frankly, I get the idea that this one might be best left as it is.

There's some surprising advice in the RSPB's latest press release, "Water your wildlife". In an otherwise unremarkable bit of seasonal filler they exhort us to put out water for the birds this summer - a good idea, if you like birds.

But for some reason this particular press release goes further than the usually canonical advice on 'birds and water', and 'lawns and wildlife' on the RSPB's own website, despite appearing to be at least partly based upon it.

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By Ruth D'Alessandro, The Wildlife Gardener

The Wildlife Gardener agreed to water a friend’s roses while she went to Glastonbury. Little did I know that, a fortnight later, my neighbourliness would result in a covetable prize for nature anoraks like myself: a real-time peek into the life cycle of a moth: the Vapourer moth (Orgyia antiqua) to be more specific. I vaguely remembered my countryman Dad telling me that Vapourer moths were particularly interesting: they have feathery antennae and the females send out powerful sex pheromones that have males from miles around flocking to be her gentlemen callers.

Caroline’s roses were covered in these groovy psychedelic Vapourer caterpillars that would not have looked out of place in the mosh pit at Glastonbury:

It has been years since I’ve kept caterpillars in a jar and hatched moths. I figured Caroline wouldn’t miss a few punk rose-destroyers, and it would be educational for the Junior Wildlife Gardeners to do some captive breeding. So, I put five itchy-looking caterpillars in a big glass vase with damp compost and rose branches from the Wildlife Garden, some perforated clingfilm on top and placed them on the kitchen windowsill where I could watch them as I washed up.

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In a previous post (Government pro-chips website batters National Parks, Naturenet 30 June 2010) I pointed out the list of government websites controlled by DEFRA which are to close, which was announced via a parliamentary question from Tom Watson MP.

Now it appears that there's some internal government dispute about this, with somebody from within Natural England taking issue with the list announced in parliament.

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