Can you recognise the bird above – it’s already on my list although the examples I have seen were all in fresher plumage because this is a 46,000 year old bird found preserved in Siberian permafrost. It’s actually a Horned Lark (or a Shore Lark, or maybe something a bit different and earlier than either…
Category: VERY BIRDY: birdwatching and birding nattering
Michael Morpurgo joins DEFRA general licence team?
I caught Tweet of the Day this morning just before making the tea and listening, briefly, for bird song (a lovely Song Thrush). Today’s presenter was Michael Morpurgo and his bird was the Magpie – listen here on BBC iPlayer. It was a refreshingly different take on things, unless it was meant seriously. While looking…
Bird song (2) – Great Tits (1)
The Great Tit is a familiar bird on our bird feeders and in our gardens and woods, and its song is pretty familiar too. If you aren’t already familiar with it, then if you keep your ears open in the right sorts of places you will hear its song at this time of year and…
Bird song (1)
At about the time that this blog post is published I will probably be making the first cup of tea of the day – at 6am. That would be normal in my house. Today it will still be dark, but if I take a step outside the back door, as I often do, then there…
Can you help please?
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I’m doing a fun bit of research using Birdtrack. If you are: a regular Birdtrack user have a few (30?) minutes to spare feel reasonably confident about using the ‘Explore my records’ function on Birdtrack and have any complete lists of birds seen at the following sites Minsmere (RSPB) Titchwell (RSPB) Cley Marshes (Norfolk Wildlife…
Wicken Fen
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I was at Wicken Fen, Cambridgeshire, on Sunday afternoon just as the weather turned nice. And a friend was there yesterday at dusk. At the moment, at dusk, it is a great place to see Hen Harriers as they come in to roost. A group of us had fantastic views on Sunday of several ringtails…
Dead Starlings on the road update
I’ve meant to come back to this for a while. Do you remember the dead Starlings found on a road in Anglesey? Well the police say that they were avoiding a predator – see here. I wonder. I’m not sure that the burden of evidence is anything like good enough. I’m happy to put it…
British Birds – February issue
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There is plenty of interest to read in this month’s British Birds. For example, Adrian Pitches’s always-excellent News and Comment section talks about Werritty, the first successful breeding of Spoon-billed Sandpipers at Slimbridge, our own wild-hacking story, the impacts of a heatwave on Guillemots in the Pacific and much more. But as you can see…
February Birdwatch (2)
There is even more in the latest issue of Birdwatch than I let on earlier. There’s an excellent article by Dominic Mitchell on revisiting a former local patch of his which is strong evidence for my contention (oft broken, I admit) that one should never go back to a place where one loved the wildlife…
February Birdwatch (1)
There’s a cute owl on the cover of the latest Birdwatch magazine and a cute Bill Oddie too. What’s not to like? But lest you think you can just gawp at the cover in your local newsagent shop then let me tell you it’s worth sitting down with a mug of tea and some Digestive…