Plantlife, the wild plant conservation charity, is telling us it’s OK to pick flowers – some flowers anyway! Good for them! I trust they will be on the Today programme this morning on Radio 4 – it would be criminal if they are not. Here is their press release and I’ll be featuring the flowers…
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
Nice wine, nice bird
We had a good bottle of Malbec before attending a performance by comedian Mark Steel at the Derngate Theatre in Northampton a couple of weeks ago. We didn’t just have the Malbec – we had it with Pizza etc in the nearby Pizza Express. I’ve been wondering ever since why an Argentinian wine has…
Swallows don’t make a summer at Stanwick Lakes
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Yesterday produced my first Swallow of the year at Stanwick Lakes. Spring is ticking slowly along. This Swallow was a little bit later than my earliest records but well within the range, according to my records from Birdtrack. It still feels as though spring is a bit unsprung to me though. And it certainly felt…
Massive payment
I’m not complaining at all – but those who seem to think that writing books (at least writing my books!) is the easy route to riches might like to help me decide how to spend these royalty payments for 2017 for Birds and Forestry, A Message from Martha and Inglorious. What this does mean…
Signatures – an update
In the week since Gavin Gamble’s e-petition closed, his e-petition has still added far more signatures than the Jane Griggs e-petition supporting grouse shooting and the Ed Hutchings, RSPB-supported, e-petition calling for licensing. Far more than the two of them put together in fact! How can that be? It’s because for several days people were…
Some firsts
I heard my first Sedge Warbler of the year at Stanwick Lakes yesterday – and it wasn’t my only ‘first’. The weather forecast was a bit rubbish but it wasn’t raining when I made some tea at 0630 and so the aim was to get to Stanwick Lakes before the rain started. I almost didn’t…
Natural England continues not to come clean – Bowland Gull Cull 9
The story so far: Smidgeons of information on gull culls from NE – 14 February 2018 Bowland gull cull licensing facts still kept secret by NE – 6 February 2018 FOI Bowland gull cull – November 2017 Quick response from NE on Bowland gull cull – 7 September 2017 Any NE news on Bowland gull…
Paul Leyland – Orange Tip
Paul writes: Orange-tip is a great early spring butterfly. It is one of the first butterflies to emerge that hasn’t over-wintered as an adult, so is always beautifully fresh at this time of year. In Yorkshire, over the last ten years, the first sighting has ranged from 22 March in 2011, to 23 April in…
Book review – Framing Nature Toolkit by Ralph Underhill
Reviewed by Ian Carter My wife picked up a copy of this short book at a recent Natural England event where Ralph was giving a talk. To be honest I was rather surprised they let him inside the building given how rude he has been about them – including that logo with the roof. The…
Tim Melling – Golden Takin
Tim writes: the Golden Takin is a rare mammal that inhabits the same mountainous bamboo thicket forests as Giant Panda. There are four subspecies and this is the form that lives in Sichuan (Budorcas taxicolor tibetana) with more blotchy flanks than the true Golden Takin (B.t.bedfordi) from Shaanxi, NW China. The remaining two subspecies are…