Standing up for Nature
Oscar writes: I came across this adult on the beach at Minsmere. It was running along the top of a ridge so I got ahead of it and took this as it came past me. Nikon D800, Nikon 600mm f4 AFS-II, Nikon 1.4x TC
On Saturday I had another visit to Duncan Farrington’s excellent farm. I was on the look-out for Turtle Doves as they used to be here but I haven’t seen, or heard, one for years in this spot. Duncan’s farm looks good for Turtle Doves to me – plenty of thick nesting cover on the old…
Oscar writes: While I was at Minsmere I spent a lot of time in the Bittern hide trying to photograph Hobbies. They spent a large part of the middle of the day hunting for dragonflies over the reedbeds, and so I was delighted to catch one as it stalled slightly, with the light around its…
Today our e-petition passed 4600 signatures – thank you! On Friday the RSPB in Scotland issued this to the media: RSPB Scotland is calling for more sporting estates to take action to protect the country’s hen harriers during the breeding season. The conservation charity says grouse moor managers and gamekeepers must do more to prevent…
Oscar writes: I’ve just got back to London after spending three weeks staying at RSPB Minsmere in Suffolk. It’s probably my favourite nature reserve in the UK so I was very pleased to be able to spend three weeks there, photographing almost every day. As I’m sure plenty of you will have seen on Springwatch,…
Heather burning is vitally important to grouse shooting. Burning the heather on a rotational basis, every few years, creates a pattern of young and older heather. The younger heather produces green vegetation that is eaten by Red Grouse whereas older heather provides more nesting cover. This image from talented wildlife photographer Peter Cairns shows…
I’m really quite fond of my Breeding Bird Survey square (I have two but there is one that I think of as ‘mine’ more than the other). It really doesn’t photograph that well – being a bog-standard bit of arable farmland – but still, I am fond of it. On Sunday morning I made my…
The science suggests that there should be a lot more Hen Harriers in the UK uplands than there are at the moment. Let’s just take Scotland for the moment. The science says there should be c1650 pairs (I have taken the central point of an estimate and then rounded it) in Scotland on the basis…
Dear Steve Hi! Happy 60th anniversary of the Protection of Birds Act! It must be around now that you are heading off to Conservation Committee to discuss the RSPB’s conservation work. And then, in July, there will be a Council meeting, I guess, unless things have changed a lot in the last three years (which…
Educated at Imperial College London, Derek Thomas (@Coffeewarblers ) spent his professional life as a mathematician, but has also had a lifelong interest and involvement in natural history. Now retired, he is fully occupied as a nature conservationist. He has served at a local and national level in many guises with a variety of organisations…