keep us posted and let us know where to oppose any land management changes which may affect access. I am listening

Let me check I'm getting this. Are the RSPB essentially proposing that they start managing the sites you mention and, hence, are able to control access to them? If that's the case then you're damn right we should all be listening very carefully

Many climbers, including officers of the BMC, already are members of the RSPB. Climbers all over the country have negotiated restrictions with the RSPB. In the Peak district, local volunteer access officers such as Henry Folkard negotiate on a regular basis with conservationists of every type. Now, Offwidth me old china, I reckon YOUR response is the slightly paranoid one. Do you honestly believe that the BMC Access Team, both volunteers and professionals, isn't FULLY aware of the RSPB's priorities and policies? Can you come up with one occasion when they haven't bent over backwards to accomodate the conservation lobby? Nobody is suggesting that the crags are solely the preserve of climbers. If that were the case, why would climbers have received plaudits from the Peak Park for the way they reacted to Ring Ouzel bans at Stanage last year? Please don't patronise people who do this kind of work on a daily basis. Climbers are instinctive allies of the conservation lobby but we won't be fall guys.

Surely it wouldn't hurt to let these overused crags recover for a century or two? 99.99999% of the world's climbable rock would be uneffected.