Natural Selection

I’m not doing enough to reduce my birding carbon footprint, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t share my efforts to improve. Today I had a work meeting in Bispham at the north end of the North Blackpool Pond Trail. I live fairly near the end of south end of the NBPT so I decided to…

I was looking for dolphins off Gynn Square last week unsuccessfully, though several seals were keeping me entertained. I scanned north to see if there were any waders on the edge of the go kart track. A pipit popped up next to the Oystercatcher I was watching, and even though I was distant viewing through…

Recently on Shetland I took the opportunity to do some bird related reading in the evenings on the less productive days. I started with ‘A Mind Blowing Trip To A Planet Called Earth’ by Nigel Wheatley. This weighed in at a whopping 737 pages, and when I got through it I was after something more…

I’ve been a bit busy to do a blog lately, but I’ve been meaning to do something on the bird highlights of my recent trip to Shetland. They came at each end of the trip, and one was rather more bittersweet than the other. For the first time on my northern ventures I stayed on…

I’ve had a long-standing wish to see a Small Blue butterfly. I achieved that ambition today and I’m pleased. So now we know there’s a happy ending let’s rewind a bit. Names given to animal species can sometimes be left field, but this is the smallest blue butterfly in Britain. It’s scarce and declining, and…

Many thanks to Karen Lloyd for sending me a copy of this new book published by Saraband. I got through most of it on the journey home from holiday, and read the rest today. Andrew Millham’s first book explores the relationship between birds and folk songs. It’s an area briefly covered in Patrick Galbraith’s In…

I’ve always wanted to see a pterodroma petrel. Soft-plumaged Petrel in old money, most realistically Fea’s Petrel or less likely Zino’s Petrel in new money. I haven’t helped myself by my only visit to Madeira being in October, when they’ve departed. I could also have just gone seawatching in Ireland in August a few times…

This blog has an identity crisis. It’s very rarely a photo-essay, but today it is. I hope some readers will find something of interest in it. This morning in the Ribeiro Salgado there was at least one Purple Heron, and a Grey Heron. I got a few pics so here they are. Purple heron above,…

There’s plenty of reasons to be cheerful on a sunny island off Madeira. But looked at objectively the birding involves relatively few species. If I was to have been asked what my target would be, I think I’d have said ideally a good bird from the east and a good ‘un from the west. That’s…

Hoopoe and Junior today Technically I’m not in Madeira, I’m back on Porto Santo where I spent a week last autumn. I came here with Jane then, but she can’t get the leave so this time I’m on my own. Someone decided to teach me a lesson for coming away on my tod as there…