Last night saw the first of this three-part series on primates, narrated by Chris Packham. The images were stunningly good showing the habitats occupied, whether a flooded Amazon rainforest, Madagascar or the temples of Kathmandu. But my favourite sequences were of Drills (similar to, but different from, Mandrills) from the tropical island of Bioko (formerly…
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
Lockdown Nature-writing Challenge – closes midnight Thursday
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Entries are coming in – but you still have plenty of time to compose and send in yours – by Thursday midnight. Across the world, people are experiencing a shared concern for themselves and their loved ones and many are enduring a period of social distancing and being cut off from wildlife. But, also, many…
Paul Leyland – The Footballer
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Social Distancing Week 6. The Footballer. The Footballer (Helophilus pendulus) is a colourful hoverfly that has started appearing in my garden over the last few days. It’s a chunky fly which rests with its wings open. The striped thorax is what makes it stand out from most other flies, so it’s quite recognisable. It’s a…
Market lessons
We are re-emerging after decades of hibernation as a campaigner for global free trade. And frankly it is not a moment too soon because the argument for this fundamental liberty is now not being made. The reason we do not seek membership or part membership of the customs union or alignment of any kind, is…
Tim Melling – Steppe Eagle
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Tim writes: Steppe Eagles (Aquila nipalensis) are a bit smaller than Golden Eagles and breed across the desert steppes of Central Asia but migrate south to winter in sub-Saharan Africa, India and Southeast Asia. Huge numbers pass through certain places on migration, such as the Middle East and Nepal, and its name (nipalensis) refers to…
Fake News (10) by Diogenes
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Saturday cartoon by Ralph Underhill
BTO press release – A Cuckoo called Carlton II
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A Cuckoo called Carlton II has just arrived back in England having spent the last ten months travelling to and from the Congo rainforest, becoming the first of the BTO’s satellite tracked cuckoos to return to this country in 2020. Aided by favourable southerly winds, he completed the last leg of his mammoth journey in…
NEWS: No Fin whaling in Iceland in 2020
It’s been confirmed that there will be no Fin whaling in Iceland this summer. Kristján Loftsson’s reasons for not going ahead, he says, include the difficulty of competing in the Japanese market now that the Japanese government supports its own whaling industry. According to Kristján, prices are low and costly testing for chemical analysis doesn’t…
Bird song (40) – Turtle Dove
The Song of Solomon talks of the voice of the turtle being heard in the land – that was the Turtle Dove, not some warbling reptile. But it is a song rather rarely heard in the land these days. The Turtle Dove was once a very common bird in southeast England and its purring was…