Guest blog – Walshaw Turbine 11 by Nick MacKinnon

Nick MacKinnon is a freelance teacher of Maths, English and Medieval History, and lives above Haworth, in the last inhabited house before Top Withens = Wuthering Heights. In 1992 he founded the successful Campaign to Save Radio 4 Long Wave while in plaster following a rock-climbing accident on Skye. His poem ‘The metric system’ won…

Book review – Legacy by Dieter Helm

I’m not a great fan of economics because it always seems to explain things in retrospect rather than predict them in prospect but you can write that off as hauteur from one trained as a scientist if you like. But I always like Dieter Helm’s books and in 2019 I chose his Green and Prosperous…

Book review – Groundbreakers by Chantal Lyons

  This is a fine book about a very interesting species. I’ve seen Wild Boar in continental Europe (Netherlands, France and Spain) but not yet in the UK. Decades ago, in the Camargue, I sometimes travelled the roads after dark in a flimsy ancient Citroen Deux-Chevaux and I always thought that any close encounters of…

Book review – Seabirds Count by Daisy Burnell et al.

  The British Isles provide nest sites for internationally important proportions of the North Atlantic biogeographical area seabird populations and, for several species, high proportions of global populations. If you want to see large numbers of nesting Manx Shearwaters, Great Skuas and Gannets then this is the place to come. And so it is concerning…

Book review – Local by Alastair Humphreys

I very much enjoyed this book, and when it is published on Thursday I  think many readers of this blog will like it too. Alastair Humphreys is a traveller and adventurer who has travelled the world but in this book he still has mini-adventures and is always travelling, it’s just that he chooses about 50…

Book review – Wild Shetland by Brydon Thomason

  This book is a visual treat. Photographs of Shetland’s wildlife, mostly birds and mammals, through the seasons. And the photographs are exceptionally fine. As you might expect, there are Otters, Bonxies and Puffins but also a range of unusual and rare birds and sea mammals, many other Shetland seabirds (including the wonderful Storm Petrels…

Book reprint – Exploring Wales by William Condry, an appreciation

This is not a wildlife book, although there is wildlife in it, but it is a reprint of a book first published in 1970 and written by a great naturalist, and this book reminds us, a great writer. Also, the introduction is written by Neville Jones, a friend of Bill Condry and an acquaintance of…

Book review – Bird Day by Mark E. Hauber, illustrated by Tony Angell

This small book is built around the idea of writing about 24 birds from around the world, but one for each hour of the day. What is the species doing at that particular time? It’s an approach that works partly but not, in my opinion, brilliantly. After all, you need to know something about the…