I had a short piece in the Farmers Weekly this week and you can read it here. But have a look at the image that FW has chosen to go with the article – a nice bunting. But wait a minute – that’s not a yellowhammer or a reed bunting, and it’s certainly not a…
Author: Mark
Born Bristol, UK
Educated: Cleeve House School Bristol, Bristol Grammar School and Downing College Cambridge
Ph.D. University of Aberdeen, Winter activity of pipistrelle bats.
NERC post-doctoral Research Fellow, Edward Grey Institute, Oxford University
Former Conservation Director of the RSPB, 1989-2011
Spring?
It’s a funny spring – but then, they often are. As you know, if you are a regular reader, I’ve seen bee flies and primroses and a swallow three weeks ago at Cheltenham, and I’ve heard plenty of chiffchaffs but it feels like a stuttering spring to me. I heard a willow warbler last weekend…
Tesco favours wildlife
Tesco has had a tough time of it since teaming up with the RSPB earlier this year. But at least they have discovered wildlife including the mice that have ‘infested‘ their Covent Garden store causing it to close. It is expected to reopen as an RSPB nature reserve very soon. London tube stations are just…
Guest blog – Blogging for victory by Alison Fure
Alison Fure is a field ecologist specialising in studying the effect of light pollution on wildlife: particularly bats and river corridors. She moderates the Yahoo Group Lights and Wildlife and gave evidence to the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution (R.I.P). She is the south London contact for the London Bat Group and a local bat…
Flying noses – not to be sniffed at
I am a birder, but I have got used to looking for signs of spring other than the arrival of warblers and hirundines, wheatears and garganey, Sandwich terns and ring ousels. I can just about recognise a few butterflies and even some of the commoner spring plants. But I have become quite adept at spotting…