Teen Backchat

The April edition of Birdwatching Magazine had a full page article called "Backchat with Mya-Rose Craig" with some quick fire fun question and answers.

This is the online full version Birdwatching Magazine Article

Hope you enjoy it!

About the Author

 Young environmentalist and birder Mya-Rose Birdgirl Craig

Copyright Mya-Rose Birdgirl Craig 

Mya-Rose Craig is a 17-year-old young British Bangladeshi birder, naturalist, conservationist, environmentalist, activist, writer and speaker. She is based near Bristol and writes posts about birding, conservation and environmental issues from around the world. 

She has been involved in the UK organisation of the Youth Strikes encouraging young people from around the world to not go to school once a month and protest instead demanding immediate action to prevent climate breakdown. This is an interview in New Statesman.

She was a Bristol European Green Capital Ambassador along with Kevin McCloud, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Tony Juniper, Simon King, Miranda Krestovnikoff and Shaun the Sheep! See the full list of Bristol Ambassadors. She has also been listed with the singer-songwriter George Ezra and actress Maisie Williams from Game of Thrones as one of Bristol's most influential young people. 

She organised four nature is helping to run four more in 2019. She also organised a conference, Race Equality in Nature, in June 2016 aiming to increase the ethnic diversity in nature and plans two more in 2019. She has also set up Black2Nature with the aim of working with organisations to increase the access to nature of Visible Minority Ethnic people and is President. Please connect with her on LinkedIn (Mya-Rose Birdgirl Craig) so that she can invite you to join the Race Equality in Nature LinkedIn Group and be part of the change. 

She has given over 50 talks, speaking at conferences such as being on a panel with George Monbiot and Caroline Lucas on Sustainability and the Future of Cities. She is a Minister in Chris Packham's Manifesto for Nature in 2018 and spoke in front of 10,000 people at the Walk for Nature. She has also appeared on TV and radio and is particularly proud of being in Silent Roars, a short film which was part of Listen to Britain 2017 https://player.bfi.org.uk/free/film/watch-the-silent-roars-2017-online. 

She has been awarded the Bath and West Show Environmental Youth Award 2017 for Bristol for her Black2Nature work EYA 2017. She was also listed as one of Bristol's BME top 100 powerlist.

She loved seeing Mountain Gorillas in East Africa and Penguins in Antarctica over Christmas 2015, her 7th continent. She became the youngest person to see 5000 birds in 2019 age 16 and is looking forward to visiting Brazil birding in 2019 and hopes to see half the birds in the world there. Please also like her Birdgirl Facebook Page and follow her on Birdgirl Twitter. If you would like to contact Mya-Rose about her work, please e-mail helenabcraig@hotmail.co.uk.

Camp Avalon - Hamza

Camp Avalon 2015 had 5 ethnic minority boys attend from central Bristol.  This is about one of them.

Hamza was 16 years old and had just finished his GCSE's when he came to Camp Avalon 2015.

He had never camped before and never attended anything that was related to nature or the outdoors.  He is from central Bristol and does not know any ethnic minority people into nature.

He enjoyed the weekend and event said that he might attend again in 2017.  It was challenging for him at times, as it was hard to know how to find nature interesting. However, over the weekend the people helping on the camp did manage to capture his imagination.  

Hamza one from the right

Hamza

Hamza

Hamza on the far left

Hamza on the far right

The weekend was not easy for Hamza, but he did get involved in nature and could see how it could be interesting. He was really interested in the flight speed of a Peregrine, particularly when it was compared to a Formula One racing car.  He particularly enjoyed the ringing (banding), wildlife photography and bird sketching.

About the writer

Camp Avalon is the idea of Mya-Rose Craig, who also organised the event in 2015.  She is organising the 2016 camp and hopes to attract more young birders and inner city teenagers.

Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig on Scilly
Photograph taken by and copyright Chris Craig

Mya-Rose Craig is a 13 year old young birder, naturalist, conservationist, environmentalist, activist, writer and speaker. She is based near Bristol and writes the successful Birdgirl Blog, with posts about birding and conservation from around the world. She loved seeing Mountain Gorillas in East Africa and Penguins in Antarctica over Christmas 2015, her 7th continent. 

Mya-Rose is a Bristol European Green Capital Ambassador along with Kevin McCloud, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Tony Juniper, Simon King, Miranda Krestovnikoff and Shaun the Sheep! See the full list of Bristol Ambassadors. She has also been listed with the singer songwriter George Ezra and actress Maisie Williams from Game of Thrones as one of Bristol's most influential young people. Please like her Birdgirl Facebook Page and follow her on Birdgirl Twitter

The Wildlife Trust - Guest blog for "Every Child Wild" Campaign

Camp Avalon 2016
Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig

At the beginning of November, The Wildlife Trust launched their 'Every Child Wild’ Campaign. 

This is a campaign designed to demonstrate their work with children.  Every year, the trusts interact with 350,000 children with school visits, Forest Schools, Beach Schools, Nature Tots, Wildlife Watch groups, junior membership and family events.  They think that this is probably a gross underestimate, and we suspect that the figure could be as high as half a million.

Camp Avalon
Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig

Through the Every Child Wild campaign, The Wildlife Trusts wanted to show:  

1)      Why it is so important for children to connect with nature

2)      The work that TWT do to achieve this

3)      Why TWT need support from the general public to carry it out

November was to be a ‘soft launch’, with a much wider national campaign delivered by TWT in 2016, involving the policy change from Government or a comprehensive schools programme. 

As part of its national communications strategy, TWT ran a series of guest blogs answering the question “What do you think would be the most important, and effective, change that could be made to ensure that future generations love wildlife?”

My guest blog was teenagers and ethnic minority teenagers being engaged in nature:

"The most important change has got to be the targeting of secondary school age children; successfully engaging this age group with nature, conservation and the environment is the single most crucial step, in order to ensure future generations love wildlife."

My guest blog can be found at http://www.wildlifetrusts.org/blog/everychildwild/2015/12/01/mya-rose-craig-every-child-wild

Camp Avalon
Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig

Camp Avalon
Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig

Camp Avalon
Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig

About the Writer

Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig on Scilly

Photograph taken by and copyright Chris Craig

Mya-Rose Craig is a 13 year old young birder, naturalist, conservationist, environmentalist, writer and speaker. She is based near Bristol and writes the successful Birdgirl Blog, with posts about birding and conservation from around the world. She loved seeing Mountain Gorillas in East Africa and is looking forward to watching Penguins in Antarctica in December 2015, which will be her 7th continent. 

Mya-Rose is a Bristol European Green Capital 2015 Ambassador along with Kevin McCloud, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Tony Juniper, Simon King, Miranda Krestovnikoff and Shaun the Sheep! See the full list of Bristol 2015 Ambassadors. She has also been listed with the singer songwriter George Ezra and actress Maisie Williams from Game of Thrones as one of Bristol's most influential young people. Please like her Birdgirl Facebook Page and follow her on Birdgirl Twitter

Camp Avalon - Sun 21 Jun 15, Bird ID Workshop

Camp Avalon, Bird ID workshop
Photographs taken by and copyright Helena Craig

Camp Avalon, Bird ID workshop
Photographs taken by and copyright Helena Craig

Camp Avalon - A camp for young birders and inner city teenagers

After lunch, I gave a short talk before we had a quick review of the weekend before going out on a bird ID session on Shapwick Heath with Keith Vinicombe. There were no waders to look at but Keith was full of ID information and bird stories.

Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig and Camp Avalon Attendees, Shapwick Heath, Somerset
Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig

Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig, Keith Vinicombe and Camp Avalon Attendees, Shapwick Heath, Somerset
Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig

Camp Avalon Attendees, Shapwick Heath, Somerset
Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig

Camp Avalon, Bird ID workshop
Photographs taken by and copyright Helena Craig

Camp Avalon, Bird ID workshop
Photographs taken by and copyright Helena Craig

It had been the best weekend ever, making lots of friends my own age, but I was exhausted.

Next year, Camp Avalon is on 8/9/10 July 2016 and I hope to make it bigger and better.  Next Generation Birders have said they would like to get involved and I hope other organisations will get involved too.  If you would like to come, whether you are already into birds or not, e-mail me at campavalonuk@gmail.co.uk.

About the Writer

Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig on Scilly

Photograph taken by and copyright Chris Craig 

Mya-Rose Craig is a 13 year old young birder, conservationist, writer and speaker. She is based near Bristol and writes the successful Birdgirl Blog, with posts about birding and conservation from around the world. She is looking forward to going Mountain Gorilla Trekking in East Africa in the summer and watching Penguins in Antarctica in December 2015, which will be her 7th continent. She has recently been listed with the singer songwriter George Ezra and actress Maisie Williams from Game of Thrones as one of Bristol's most influential young people. Please like her Birdgirl Facebook Page and follow her on Birdgirl Twitter

Camp Avalon - 21 Jun 15, Birdgirl's Born to Bird Talk

Camp Avalon - A camp for young birders and inner city teenagers

First we had a morning of ringing demonstrations and then a talk from Mike Bailey about ringing and the BTO.

After lunch, I gave a talk about world birding, saving the Spoon-billed Sandpiper and World Shorebirds Day as their Ambassador.  

Camp Avalon, Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig's Born to Bird talk

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

Camp Avalon, Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig's Born to Bird talk

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

Camp Avalon, Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig's Born to Bird talk

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

About the Writer

Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig on Scilly

Photograph taken by and copyright Chris Craig 

Mya-Rose Craig is a 12 year old young birder, conservationist, writer and speaker. She is based near Bristol and writes the successful Birdgirl Blog, with posts about birding and conservation from around the world. She is looking forward to going Mountain Gorilla Trekking in East Africa in the summer and watching Penguins in Antarctica in December 2015, which will be her 7th continent. She has recently been listed with the singer songwriter George Ezra and actress Maisie Williams from Game of Thrones as one of Bristol's most influential young people. Please like her Birdgirl Facebook Page and follow her on Birdgirl Twitter

Camp Avalon - 21 Jun 15, Ringing

Camp Avalon - A camp for young birders and inner city teenagers

Everyone took down their tents and headed to the Avalon Marshes Centre for breakfast and a ringing demonstration given by me, my dad Chris Craig and my trainer Mike Bailey from Chew Valley Ringing Centre.  Everyone seemed interested, although one of the loudest boys from Bristol was afraid of holding a bird but did overcome his fear and have a go at holding a few in the end.

Mike then gave us all a talk about ringing and the BTO.

A Camp Avalon attendee holding a Goldfinch, Avalon Marshes Centre, Somerset

Photograph taken by and copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig 

Camp Avalon, ringing workshop

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

Camp Avalon, ringing workshop

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

Camp Avalon, ringing workshop

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

Camp Avalon, ringing workshop

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

Camp Avalon, ringing workshop

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

Camp Avalon, ringing workshop

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

Camp Avalon, ringing workshop

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

Camp Avalon, ringing workshop

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

Camp Avalon, ringing workshop

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

Camp Avalon, ringing workshop

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

Camp Avalon, ringing workshop

Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig 

I had put my camera trap up the night before, we there seemed to be tracks on the grass.  I had put lots of food down to attract birds and animals.  So in the morning, we got everyone together and played the recording and it was really exciting to see four badgers feeding on the peanuts. We were all buzzing after watching that and it was a real highlight of the weekend.

About the Writer

Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig on Scilly

Photograph taken by and copyright Chris Craig 

Mya-Rose Craig is a 13 year old young birder, conservationist, writer and speaker. She is based near Bristol and writes the successful Birdgirl Blog, with posts about birding and conservation from around the world. She is looking forward to going Mountain Gorilla Trekking in East Africa in the summer and watching Penguins in Antarctica in December 2015, which will be her 7th continent. She has recently been listed with the singer songwriter George Ezra and actress Maisie Williams from Game of Thrones as one of Bristol's most influential young people. Please like her Birdgirl Facebook Page and follow her on Birdgirl Twitter