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Rachel Baker

@bakersunday.bsky.social
119 followers 296 following 46 posts

Substrate for communication:Voice Speech and Language. Agroecology as activism. Forest as clinic. Land and health commons.

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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Brian McHugh @brianmchugh.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
Revealed: the ‘black box’ wastewater trade that rakes in millions for UK utility companies Firms made more than £340m last year from processing industrial and commercial wastewater at sewage works that are unable to remove many chemical pollutants www.theguardian.com/environment/...
theguardian.com
Revealed: the ‘black box’ wastewater trade that rakes in millions for UK utility companies
Exclusive: Firms made more than £340m last year from processing industrial and commercial wastewater at sewage works that are unable to remove many chemical pollutants
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
The Ecologist @theecologist.org · 07/10/2026
Developers have been planting trees without a plan - and then abandoning them
theecologist.org
Give trees a chance
Development-planted trees have consistently shown to be faring poorly, according to recent surveys.
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
In contrast to Poland, intensive crop growers in the UK over-rely on fungicide/herbicide/pesticide/ecocide inputs which then accelerates selection for resistant strains of pathogens. www.fwi.co.uk/arable/sdhi-...
fwi.co.uk
SDHI fungicide-resistant phoma discovered in OSR - Farmers Weekly
SDHI resistance has been discovered for the first time in the world in one of the key pathogens that cause phoma in oilseed rape. The discovery raises
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
How feasible is it to dig up and dismantle the underground pipes in these instances?
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
Perfect analogy - it’s an invisible, embedded dependency loop of ecological disaster. Which is the slave, machine or driver?
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
‪The farmer drama queen responses to nature recovery are interesting - paranoid overreaction, centering themselves, wilful misinterpretation of terms like “rewilding”. Some repressed hereditary guilt over catastrophic land management maybe...? New entrants are less like this.‬
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 22/08/2026
Among the average media consumer the right wing smear campaign has done its job very effectively. If we can’t have media regulation then we need higher media literacy. Which is best done in H.E. Which has been hollowed out by neoliberal marketisation.
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
lithub.com/can-plants-f...
lithub.com
Can Plants Feel Pain? On the Dynamic Sensitivity of the Vegetal World
“Plants are the young of the world, vessels of health and vigor; but they grope ever upward toward consciousness…” –Ralph Waldo Emerson * In the last century or so, we have made considerable …
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Craig Bennett @craigbennett3.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
So, against my better judgement, I'm going to be doing the #GreatNorthRun in wonderful #Newcastle in September to raise money for our #Rothbury appeal. Please do support me if you can! Thanks ajbellgreatnorthrun2026.enthuse.com/pf/craig-ben...
ajbellgreatnorthrun2026.enthuse.com
Craig's page
Why I'm running for The Rothbury Estate appeal I’m Craig Bennett, CEO of The Wildlife Trusts, and I’m taking on the Great North Run to help secure The Rothbury Estate. This is a once-in-a-generation o
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Caught by the River @caughtbytheriver.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
The Ecological Listening Project, an initiative of River Margin, is looking for audio submissions of recordings from around the world capturing how the natural environment sounds where you are www.caughtbytheriver.net/2026/08/the-...
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
Hmmm, so that £9k a year, shall we talk about that…?
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
James Bullock @jmbecologist.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
Great to see our detailed study* of grassland loss discussed over several pages in this valuable book on British grasslands *A full and well-evidenced analysis of rates of loss of different habitats, using historical data & maps - see link.springer.com/article/10.1...
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
A human being was reduced to weaponised narrative instrument in a culture war against diversity and inclusion by the eugenicist right. The real story is corporate neoliberal capture of academia.
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Margot Finn @eicathomefinn.bsky.social · 27/06/2026
'What is perhaps remarkable about the Exeter cuts is that they are targeted at some of the university’s most successful departments, many of which turn over a profit even after they have made enormous and increasing contributions to the central university budget.' Read, rage and weep.
johnheathershaw.substack.com
The Crisis in Britain’s Universities
The cuts that have been proposed at the University of Exeter demonstrates the crisis of purpose in Britain’s universities. Should not universities also be places to prepare for "eternal dwellings"?
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Ed Poole @edpoole1975.bsky.social · 24/06/2026
"£13bn of investment under PFI led to around £80bn in long-term repayment obligations for the NHS"
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 06/05/2026
Dear @greenparty.org.uk and @zackpolanski.bsky.social the answer to the question why “Palestine is on the ballot” in council elections is that, apart from its immorality, the M.E conflict has an inflationary effect on the UK economy and its ability to borrow and invest in local public services.
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Eric Topol @erictopol.bsky.social · 21/04/2026
There's a lot we can do to reduce our microplastic burden. A randomized trial proves how much can be achieved in just 7 days www.nature.com/articles/s41... www.nature.com/articles/s41...
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 22/04/2026
Everyone needs this book.
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 13/04/2026
Rue - regret, repentance. Bitter medicine. On the street. Rue.
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
David Graeber Institute @davidgraeberinst.bsky.social · 12/03/2026
Ann Pettifor on why there is always money for War (of course!).....but why there is never any money for programs to help people.
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Ed Poole @edpoole1975.bsky.social · 05/03/2026
The Green Party takes a holistic approach to health. So when considering the NHS you also need to consider housing, air quality, water quality, food quality, social care etc. We'd also fund it properly and run it for patients not profit. The Policy is being updated at the moment. So more to follow
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Ed Poole @edpoole1975.bsky.social · 05/03/2026
What's happening in the NHS?
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 27/02/2026
The @greenparty.org.uk under @zackpolanski.bsky.social know that the nature and planetary health crisis is a social crisis of inequality. They are not separate issues. This understanding is how we win against the Right.
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 23/12/2025
What’s up with the WCV website? Lots of broken links…
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 10/12/2025
“I don’t know what the majority of our artists at ActionSpace have got, Idon’t know any clinical diagnosis. And I don’t want to know, because they’re people.” Eventually the clinical healthcare approach will catch up to the arts approach…Eventually. www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...
theguardian.com
‘Her need to make is off the scale’: why Nnena Kalu’s Turner prize nomination is a watershed moment for art
The Glasgow-born artist makes huge cocoon-like sculptures out of found fabric and videotape. We meet the team who helped her become the first learning-disabled person to make the award shortlist
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 04/12/2025
Yes, but also the off-the-charts mental health collapse is indicative of a nervous system collapse that is entirely linked to the destructive, extractive economic system we built and cannot live/work equitably and healthfully under. Until that is addressed politically, bring the diagnoses.
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 28/11/2025
So, a cowardly attack to heat up a long-standing Dartmoor culture/land war, in which hereditary farmers feel threatened by ecologist’s efforts to deal with their ignorant “traditions”. The underlying problem is the structure of land ownership in the UK. Nature loses.
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Eoghan Daltun 🌍 @irishrainforest.bsky.social · 27/11/2025
Biodiversity is *crucial* to our wellbeing. We need to stop treating it as expendable. share.google/pKw8odZguEG8...
share.google
How a radical experiment to bring a forest into a preschool transformed children’s health
In Finland, kindergartens are exposing children to more mud, wild plants and moss - and finding changes to their health that show how crucial biodiversity is to wellbeing
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 27/11/2025
You said it yourself- “We can’t organise and struggle if we can’t even afford to feed ourselves or pay our bills.” This is the current reality. It is up to those who are solvent to organise. That increasingly looks like retired boomers- they can either go on another holiday… or get radical.
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Rupert Read @rupertread.bsky.social · 14/11/2025
Read this. It is absolutely cretinous that this ‘Labour’ Govt refuses to renationalise water. Millions of us are now at grave risk, when increasingly likely climate-extreme events are incoming. www.ft.com/content/97e4...
ft.com
Single fault at Thames Water works could imperil London’s supply
Coppermills plant, which serves up to 4mn people, underscores scale of the challenge for troubled utility
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Prof Christina Pagel @chrischirp.bsky.social · 10/10/2025
After a long pause, I've just done another England Covid & NHS update as we head into the autumn/winter season. TLDR: we're in a significant Covid wave now, the NHS is stretched, get boosted if you're eligible. christinapagel.substack.com/p/england-is...
christinapagel.substack.com
England is now experiencing a significant Covid wave, after 10 months of relative quiet
The latest Covid situation in England and a look at where NHS services are as we head into winter
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 10/10/2025
‘It is peculiar, to say the least, that Israel is being given, in a “peace deal”, land that it has not managed to capture militarily.’ @selmadabbagh.bsky.social on Gaza, from the blog: www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2025/oc...
lrb.co.uk
Selma Dabbagh | Knowledge of the Relevant Facts
Israel has assassinated a record number of Palestinian journalists, refused to allow international reporters to enter...
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Ireland against Fascism @irlagainstfascism.bsky.social · 09/08/2025
youtu.be/XaeiPl6zUg0?...
youtu.be
‘They used my chain to choke me’: Chris Smalls speaks out after Israeli prison assault | Real Talk
YouTube video by Middle East Eye
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 09/08/2025
Nature connection needs to be part of healthcare infrastructure.
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 31/07/2025
SLT Research idea - how can SLT’s design nature-based interventions via social prescribing? Oh wait, that was my dissertation… www.theguardian.com/environment/...
theguardian.com
‘Better than medication’: prescribing nature works, project shows
Scheme helping people in England connect with nature led to better mental health, report finds
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 31/07/2025
SLT dysphagia research idea - the effects of enforced starvation on the suck-swallow-breathe mechanism for infants and their mothers.
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Beatrice Adler-Bolton @reallandsend.bsky.social · 18/07/2025
Family abolition is about asking why families are expected to do everything alone. Asking why housing, food, medical care, love, education and even basic safety, are things you earn through the “right” kind of family. Why family can be the pretense by which these things are denied to people.
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 22/07/2025
Mostly done by NE volunteers over the last 2 yrs. We also patched up the farmer’s stone wall and barbed wire fence.
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Adam Aron @swaziadam.bsky.social · 15/07/2025
For climate activists, adaptation has been a dirty word. In this piece today I ask whether a new UK-based proposal from the Climate Majority Project @climatemajority.bsky.social has legs. @cityatlas.bsky.social @anne-urai.bsky.social www.resilience.org/stories/2025...
resilience.org
Is it strategic to refocus towards climate adaptation?
As global heating accelerates and climate damages mount all around us, and as climate organizations and activists grow desperate about what to do, SAFER provides important new thinking. The challenge,...
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 16/07/2025
After decades of tension between Dartmoor sheep farmers and environmentalists, a legal challenge seems the only way through deadlock. Headage payments + £32m in HLS schemes haven’t changed practices. Commoners have shown they are ideologically entrenched in not changing. The hubris of inheritance?
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Richard Warren @richardmw1653.bsky.social · 15/07/2025
I just signed a @stopburningtrees.bsky.social petition: Say No to New AI Data Centre Powered By Drax. Sign here: actionnetwork.org/petitions/sa...
actionnetwork.org
Say No to New AI Data Centre Powered By Drax
Drax, the University of York and the North Yorkshire Combined Authority have just submitted a bid to host an AI data centre at Drax, powered by burning millions of trees. The Government recently de...
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 12/07/2025
‘Criminal laws exist that can and have been brought against its actions. But it is this very course of justice that the proscription aims to impede.’ Huw Lemmey on Palestine Action, from the next issue: www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Huw Lemmey · Short Cuts: Who’s afraid of Palestine Action?
I believe there is a moral case for disarming the machinery of war that is killing innocent civilians in Gaza with the...
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Reposted by Rachel Baker
Hari Kunzru @harikunzru.bsky.social · 25/06/2025
All the right people are crying over Zohran’s victory. They’re going to monster him and all the billionaire money will be used to oppose him in the general but this is a moment of real hope in dark times
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 10/06/2025
Would be interesting to adapt psychotherapeutic talking therapies with speech and language therapy techniques for stroke patients with language difficulties.
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WildDartmoor @tonydartmoor.bsky.social · 09/06/2025
The avoidance by livestock of the central Molinia-dominated areas also places more pressure on the peripheral areas commons, preventing the recovery of the heaths and driving the poor condition of the protected areas. www.dartmoornature.org.uk/post/sssicon...
dartmoornature.org.uk
New Natural England assessments reveal the appalling condition of Dartmoor’s Protected Sites
Tony WhiteheadWithout so much as a whisper publicly, Natural England this week updated its assessment of Dartmoor’s protected sites, the three big Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs) that cov...
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WildDartmoor @tonydartmoor.bsky.social · 09/06/2025
On the central high moor, its dominance is unlikely to be due to falling livestock numbers in the 2000s as some commoners regularly claim. It had a hold before this ... here's a picture from the Dartmoor Archive taken near Cut Hill in August 1992
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 23/05/2025
“The devaluation of Aboriginal graphic writing systems reflects a broader colonial bias that equates written language exclusively with alphabetic systems.” theconversation.com/aboriginal-m...
theconversation.com
Aboriginal message sticks are a fascinating insight into a complex system of written communication
Aboriginal message sticks are hand-carved wooden objects traditionally used to send messages across long distances, complemented by oral messages.
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 21/05/2025
Yes, the *system* of land ownership and the (ir)responsibilities attached to nature stewarding need ongoing scrutiny and debate. Not just individual landowners.
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 06/05/2025
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
sciencedirect.com
Childhood air pollution exposure is related to cognitive, educational and mental health outcomes in childhood and adolescence: A longitudinal birth cohort study
A growing body of evidence supports an association between air pollution exposure and adverse mental health outcomes, especially in adulthood however,…
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Rachel Baker @bakersunday.bsky.social · 24/04/2025
THANK YOU 🙏 ❤️ Very familiar and well-articulated. And necessary, like many personal AuDHD testimonies. The more the better, I say, bring an army of them. Also need more from working class/non-white perspectives. P.S the tyranny of the linguistic and the verbal will be defeated from within.
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