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Putting The ‘D’ In National Whale & Dolphin Week
Over the years I’ve tried to participate in Sea Watch Foundation’s annual National Whale & Dolphin Watch as often as possible. Some years this has involved attending the ones arranged by Dave McGrath, some years I’ve arranged my own or done something impromptu. One of the issues with the dates being set in advance is…
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Nobody Expects The Spanish Indecision
I spend rather too much time scanning through gulls flocks at Skippool for ringed birds these days. It has had its moments though, incIuding three Norwegian Common Gulls earlier in the spring which were the first I’d ever managed to read anywhere. A couple of weeks back I was surprised that literally the first Lesser…
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Conference Birding
James (centre), myself and other participants in the morning bird walk I have a number of blogposts I’d like to write that I haven’t got round too. We’ll see if I get round to them. This week I was at a work conference at the Cotswold Water Park. Clearly I’d worked out that even in…
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Night Manoeuvres
The CLdN Performance leaving Heysham as we returned in the evening I was on the Marinelife Heysham-Dublin survey again this month. It was a very long day, but so very worth it. Late Monday night I drove up from Blackpool, met my surveying colleague Jon and we were swiftly escorted onto the CLdN Pace. The…
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Cyprus
Crested Lark, Paphos headland Last month Jane and I went to Paphos, Cyprus for a week. We were supposed to be going to Porto Santo again, but the flights got changed several times and in the end it wasn’t practical to go. We settled on Cyprus as it’s currently very reasonably priced and it’s good…
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Welsh Wanderer
I’ve finally got enough time to do some blogging. I have a few things from during the radio silence I will cover in the next week or so. But I’m starting today on the familiar ground of ringing recoveries and feral geese. Viewing the River Wyre at Little Singleton this afternoon there was very little…
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Review – Black Ops and Beaver Bombing
I went to the Wainwright Awards for Nature Writing last year where this book was shortlisted, and Fiona and Tim talked about the reasons for writing it. I haven’t read as much about Britain’s mammals as I should have and made a note to read it at some point. At the outset I would stress…
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Gullible
I agreed to count Blackpool beach for the Wintering Gull Survey. All the Ribble Estuary sites were supposed to be done last Sunday, but it was biblical then so it was moved a week. The title refers to the fact that I didn’t quite appreciate what I’d got myself into. For a couple of reasons. Firstly the…
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Review – The Delightful Horror of Family Birding
When this blog is updated it does feature some book reviews. Although this book was published in 2018 I hadn’t heard of it before seeing it in New York last autumn, so I guess many UK birders may not be familiar with it. As you would expect from someone who extols the virtue of nature professionally…
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Out Skerries – Review Of The 2023 Birding Year
Booted Warbler by Roger Riddington 2022 – Update In last year’s article I said I would update for any late December records, which seemed unlikely. As it turned out there was something else to mention – a flock of Bean Geese found by Kia James alongside the burn in December was the fifth record. Whilst covering…
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