Dear Shimmy,

I'm sitting here writing this to you with a copy of The Wildlife Trust's 'Chris Packham's Back Garden Nature Reserve' on my desk. I bought it when I worked for The National Trust, as it was one of the many books on nature which they sold. It's a brilliant book and one which I'm sure many people have bought.

Chris made Wildlife interesting for the masses, because he made it wild (literally) and whacky, fun and interesting.

I am in no being disparaging about your work here and I applaud you for all the hard and dedicated work you so obviously put in, which I'm sure, in its turn has gone on to help people such as Chris Packham help to not only gain their own picture of what is happening, but paint that picture for others to see.

I am not talking about *you* being disconnected, but millions of others out there. And if you get on board many children, get them planting trees, taking care of that tree, watching it grow because it is their *special* tree, then you begin to raise a whole new generation with a whole new outlook.

This morning I've watched some heartbreaking videos about what is happening around this planet, and I think most of us in here are intelligent enough to realise that something now has to change...and FAST. Indeed, that was the very message put out by Sir David Attenborough himself at the very start of the BBCs Wildlife Appeal the other day, with Chris and Kate on board.   Sir David talked about how the world is now a very different place to when he was young, but it wasn't all doom and gloom, but....we HAD to change, and that change has to happen NOW, not tomorrow, not next week or next year, but today, because, if it doesn't..........................

You and people like you who do such time consuming work are equally as important as the Chris Packham's and Sir David's, because all of you, in your own and different ways, are getting the message out...

So let our children, young people, old people, all plant as many trees as they want, fill them with bird boxes and bird feeders, worship them, love them, talk to them, whatever it takes..but let them get reconnected to the planet again, no matter what...