I travelled into London yesterday which meant that I could read this month’s Birdwatch (the one with the Crane on the cover). My ‘political birder’ column is about vicarious liability. Usually,I look through the accounts of the rarities in Birdwatch and think to myself a mixture of ‘I’d never have realised what that was’, ‘I wish…
Category: VERY BIRDY: birdwatching and birding nattering
A laughing matter
Birdwatching is such a laugh. Standing for 4-5 hours in the rain (which occasionally turned to sleet just to show how cold it was) and a biting wind is our idea of fun. I blame that Findlay Wilde for having a birthday and luring us all there with the promise (richly fulfilled) of cake. But…
And that quiz?
This list of birds was from…? It’s a slightly odd list – comprising winter and summer visitors, but not many of either. Waxwing, Fieldfare and Redwing, and Swallow, Blackcap and Whitethroat, but not much else. That’s a bit odd. Mostly big birds that are easy to see, too. I told you these came from multiple…
Quiz
OK – time for another little quiz, thanks to the wonder of Birdtrack. The list below is a birdlist from a site I have visited many times, not primarily to see birds, but then you can’t help but see birds if you have your eyes and ears tuned in. Mallard Pheasant Grey Heron Red Kite…
Birdwatch 2015
Comments Off on Birdwatch 2015
I haven’t quite finished my Christmas shopping and yet the first Birdwatch magazine of 2015 has arrived through my letter box. And it’s a good one. Chris Packham won the poll for Conservation Hero of the Year – quite rightly – for his actions on Malta, Hen Harriers and so much more. I’ve been lucky…
Shifting baselines
I was in the library at The Lodge the other day, reading for writing. It’s inevitable that I bump into quite a few people I know, and have a few conversations about life, the universe and everything. They are mostly conversations about birds and nature conservation. Two of them illustrate the scale of change in…
B(l)ooming great!
There are more Bitterns breeding in the UK than at any time in living memory. In fact, there are about 13 times as many bitterns now as there were in 1997, as there are over 140 booming males compared with 11 then. That’s one hell of a recovery – in fact, one heaven of a…
Vote – for your national bird
We are getting close to the end of the first round of voting in this poll for the National Bird– organised by David Lindo (The Urban Birder). There have been over 60,000 votes so far – but things are quite tight at the top. You’ve got until the end of the month to influence the…
Results of that ornithological teaser
I gave you a list of 73 bird species that I saw or heard on five visits to my local patch of Stanwick Lakes in early September and asked you to pick 5 species that I had seen on all five visits and 5 species I only saw on a single visit. This was a…
A national bird
David Lindo, the Urban Birder, has launched a vote, whose winner will be announced on election day next year, for Britain’s National Bird. Currently it is the Robin – a feisty little bird with a nice song that is familiar to almost all. There’s nothing wrong with Robins. On the long shortlist of 60 species…