Natural Selection

On Sunday night Jane and I had a Valentines stay at Pine Lake Resort, which for those who don’t know it is a former timeshare complex just off the M6 north of Carnforth with lodges bordering a former gravel working that has flooded. There are several other pits in the same area now in various…

You’d be forgiven for assuming nature groups on social media would be a safe haven for people interested in wildlife and conservation free from ill informed and unhelpful opinions. Today was one of those days where it didn’t quite work like that for me. A chap on a forum I won’t name was upset that…

Saturday morning saw me join other hardy souls for the first Secret Foulshaw event. I say hardy souls because it was lovely weather for ducks, although as I write this in the midst of Storm Dudley and with Eunice incoming every day is a bit like that at the moment. And when I say ‘join’…

I bought this book recently and have read it whilst I have been away. It’s a book about sites created or altered by humans where nature flourishes or at least subsists effectively. It’s a path that’s been well trodden by other writers over the year, which Stephen openly acknowledges in the prologue. The epilogue dedicates…

Today I checked Mythop before work. There were no fewer than 260 Teal on the floods, but the quest to find a Green-winged Teal (see previous blog on the subject) goes on. It was nice to be out though, with Shoveler and Wigeon for good measure. On my way to watch Barrow AFC in their…

If you are wondering what the picture is about it’s one Bryony took from her bedroom window when she lived here. Depending on your eyesight / imagination the dark cloud in the centre looks a bit like an owl about to stoop on prey. Or not. Today before work I swung by Mythop to check…

I was at Stanley Park for meetings today so went to the lake at lunchtime to go through the gulls. Very little turns up among them, but as spring approaches there is always the chance of something dropping in like last spring’s Iceland Gull. Today was notable for no fewer than five Great Black-backed Gulls,…

The Willow Tit is probably Britain’s fastest declining bird. It is presumed to be extinct as a breeding bird on the Fylde and yet birds continue to appear. One is visiting a feeder at Inskip, one was seen at a feeder in Preston last year, I heard one near a feeder at Little Singleton the…

I have just started reading The Accidental Countryside by Stephen Moss. I’ll address the main themes in the book when I eventually review it on here, for now I want to mention the prologue. This is a reminder of the chequered history of Peregrines, the impacts of hunting and pesticides and their recovery and recolonisation.…

There’s a received wisdom to always bird the weather. If you are fairly local and I assume most you are you won’t have missed that it has been a stormy weekend in north west England. So with a couple of Little Gulls blown in at Heysham and one at Seaforth Docks, Liverpool yesterday I decided…