Marian Spain has been appointed as the ‘new’ chief executive of Natural England, taking the post on a permanent basis after serving as interim chief executive since December 2018. Environment Secretary George Eustice said: I want to thank Marian for all her excellent work over the last year. As we focus on setting environmental policy…
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If Starlings had…
If Starlings had contrails, like planes, then the sky above my garden would be painted with the paths of Starlings taking food to their recently hatched young. Starlings are single-prey loaders when their chicks are young (they fly out from the nest to collect one item of food and fly back to the nest with…
Bird song (45) – Nightjar
I think of Nightjars as being birds of southern England but they are actually quite widely found in the UK including parts of Wales, northern England and southern Scotland. But I first heard them on the Somerset Levels in my youth and my strongest memories of them are on heathlands in Dorset, Hampshire, Norfolk and…
Brood meddling doomed for 2020?
Natural England is expected soon to bow to the almost inevitable and drop any plans for brood meddling of Hen Harriers in 2020. All Natural England fieldwork is suspended at the moment in line with government instructions on non-essential travel. Natural England is re-allocating staff resources to priority areas in an attempt to ensure that…
Lockdown Nature-writing challenge
Comments Off on Lockdown Nature-writing challenge
At the time of writing there have been 91 votes cast for your favourite of the dozen entries (probably more by now) in this challenge to write about nature and lockdown. One entry has 20 of the 91 votes and one has a single vote: and the rest are strung out pretty evenly across the…
Bird song (44) – Corncrake
Much more often heard, often at night, than seen, the Corncrake was once found in every county in Britain and Ireland – that’s about 150 years ago. But it made the mistakes of nesting in grasslands and needing to produce lots of young every year to survive. Corncrakes are short-lived – only 25-30% of adults…
Bird song (43) – Woodlark
Skylarks have wonderful songs but so do Woodlarks. Both have tuneful songs but they are very different so you won’t get them mixed up with each other, nor, really, with anything else. Woodlarks often, but not always, sing on the wing but instead of the Skylark’s normal hovering flight Woodlarks are always on the move,…
Primates 2
The gibbons were particularly funky. And it’s the birthday of the primate narrator of this series today. Happy Birthday Chris Packham!
Nine years ago…
Nine years ago I was in Washington DC with jet lag but with 7 weeks to cross the USA in a hire car and chat to waitresses in diners. And The Guardian published this piece from me – which is interesting for me to re-read and perhaps for you too. It was a Janus moment…
Paul Leyland – Hairy-footed Flower Bee
Social Distancing Week 7. Hairy-footed Flower Bee. I’ve been watching a colony of these beautiful bees since the middle of March. I initially noticed them in one of the flower beds in my village five years ago and now I watch out for them each year. Hairy-footed Flower Bees (Anthophora plumipes) are one of the…