An overwhelming proportion of the respondents to the poll on this website do not approve of the planned change of the name of BIRDS magazine to ‘Nature’s Home’. The final results were 66 (12%) in favour and 497 (88%) against the change . When the poll started, the first 13 votes were ‘no’, and I…
BLOG POSTS
Guest Blog – Birds of a feather? by Frances Hurst
Frances Hurst is passionate about charities (and birds). She is co-founder of Birdsong Charity Consulting, which has been helping charities work more effectively with their people for more than a decade. She is a trustee of the BTO and spent the 1990s working as the RSPB’s Marketing Director. Have you ever quit a job out…
You have been warned…
Today, until midnight, is the last chance to buy the new Bird Atlas of Britain and Ireland at a reduced price. I’m looking forward to my copy and will review it here some time – but you will definitely want your own copy because it will be a fascinating read. Click here to avail yourself…
The best read
I think Butterfly Conservation‘s magazine, wittily called ‘Butterfly‘, is the best read of all the magazines produced by wildlife NGOs. I’m not sure whether it has had a make-over because it has always been excellent, but the current issue, that has a common blue on the cover (a close up of the image used at…
What’s in a name?
I’m quite happy being called Mark. It’s nice and short, easy to say and comes from the Roman god of war – Mark was one of the three commonest male names in Ancient Rome. And seems fitting given that I was born in March too. My surname, Avery, is of uncertain origin. I had a…
Sunday Book Review – Finding birds in southeast Arizona by Tucson Audubon Society
This part of the USA has some great birding sites and some great birders. I didn’t field-test this book as I was given it when in Tucson and I had Richard Fray to show me birds so I didn’t need a book. But flicking through the pages now, it has everything that you want from…
Gardening leave
I don’t get out much these days – I spend much of the day sitting at a computer and writing. I’m not complaining – it’s what I want to do, but I am a bit deskbound. The other day I heard a bird call come through the window that was closed to keep the heat…
Guest Blog – Action wins! by Jonny Rankin
Based in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, I have a number of interests but I am always content to be out birding, which is usually every day walking my dog Fender. I do a lot of birding in Suffolk Breck but of course go further afield too. Knowledge speaks, wisdom listens, but in the end, it’s…
Big in his field
I’ve had a couple of fairly long drives through the countryside in the last week. There are some quite good-looking crops in these parts – unfortunately some of them are crops of black grass. Considering the awful autumn, wet winter and soggy spring it’s surprising that some of the fields are looking so good. Many…
The quiet man of Defra?
What is the point of the Liberal Democrats exactly? And what is the point of David Heath? Who is David Heath, you might ask? David Heath is the single Lib Dem Minister in Defra and he is the middle-ranking Minister between the boss-man Owen Paterson (excellent at giving out prizes to pork pie people we…