Standing up for Nature
Two unanswered questions in the Bird Brain of Britain quiz (winner, David Lindo) at the Bird Fair on Saturday had their answers in my book Remarkable Birds – see page 174 for the name of the female Chatham Island Black Robin from which all the population is derived and page 127 for more information on…
Yesterday I was at the RSPB nature reserve at Frampton Marsh on a cloudy, slightly drizzly and breezy day. But it was great, and we saw lots of birds. In fact, we saw 68 species and through the wonders of Birdtrack I know that on the same date last year, on another visit to Frampton…
Aldo Leopold was a wildlife philosopher and guru, and is widely seen to have been a highly influential leader of environmental thinking in the USA. This book, written by one of his daughters, is a tribute to Leopold and an account of the family times in the shack in the Wisconsin woods which features in…
I was in Edinburgh over the weekend and took a trip out to Dunbar to see where John Muir grew up. The house with a very good display about his life and achievements used to be the grain store next to the house where he lived (which is big, and for sale if you fancy…
Dear Mark, First I would like to thank you for your beautiful and sad book about the passenger pigeon. I came across it by chance as I looked into a bookshop´s window in Amsterdam. There it was, a small, red book with the word passenger pigeon written across it. I went in and bought it….
Those Americans who went to bed at a normal time may well be waking up around now to discover who is their new President-elect – the Trump. I woke at 05:30 UK time, about 00:30 East Coast time, to discover that my hopes for the USA had been dashed by Americans. I wasn’t pleased, but…
My book about the extinction of the Passenger Pigeon, A Message from Martha, is still available in paperback but will soon go out of print in hardback (jacket above). So I have snapped up most of the last hardbacks and can offer them to you at around the price you will pay for the paperback…
This post was written at the weekend – before whatever happened yesterday at the debate on the future of grouse shooting happened. I never really believed that we would get this debate until we were in the 90,000 signatures in early August 2016. But we have. And the way that people look at driven grouse…
I’m giving a talk at the YWT Stirley community farm on Thursday evening. Details and how to book – click here. ‘Author, campaigner and naturalist Mark Avery on his campaigns to protect the Hen Harrier and why he thinks driven grouse shooting should be banned. The venue for the talk is Hall Bower Chapel, 69A…
Helen Pilcher is a science writer and comedian – and not many people can claim that. In this book she looks at the possibility of de-extinction – bringing back extinct species – and searches for the species most worthy of the effort. This book made me laugh (as early as the last four words on…