Audience research and digital content for climate, health and community-focused projects, with Wilsome LLP. Founder of Birdsong.Academy, putting names to bird sounds. Patch birder on the Pevensey Levels in Sussex, UK. Father, lapsed musician, owner of UK’s most gluttonous labrador.
RT @NigelWitham
Mowing became fashionable during the Industrial Revolution when it was how the wealthy showed off they didn't need to grow their own food.
250 years on and manicured lawns are so embedded in our culture that despite the adverse impacts many can't envision any alternatives.
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Using an infrared thermometer to measure the difference in temperature between mown paths and the unmown areas in my garden.
Refusing to make *any* more packed lunches for my kids until No 10 explains what happened to my peerage #StandWithNadine #BorisJohnson #Boris4WorldKing
We need fewer trees.*
This area of the community woodland at Laughton Greenwood was heavily harvested in 2021, leaving a few sentinel trees and plenty of material on the ground.
This morning… Spotted Flycatcher singing at the edge of the clearing. The first I’ve seen here in spring, and a new species for our breeding bird survey.
By far the standout find, in what’s now the most open area of the whole site.
* fewer trees packed together, all of the same age and species, in the wrong places
Who reinvented clipart as emojis? 🤔
"The danger is now." I believe it. https://robertreich.substack.com/p/the-danger-is-now
Taking this along for a ride with my ego today: “Evil and dysfunction (or at least obnoxiousness) occur in proportion to how solidly a person believes that his projections are correct and energetically acts upon them.”
https://www.themarginalian.org/2023/04/09/george-saunders-uncertainty/
Iberian Chiffchaff at Abbot’s Wood, East Sussex. If accepted this will be the first record for Sussex. Found by me and Dylan Walker while we completed a breeding bird survey yesterday - the rarest bird I’ve found in almost 40 years of #birding 🎉
(pic by Chris Ball)
An early Nightingale - my earliest ever? - singing in Abbots Wood, nr Hailsham, around 250m south of the lake.
Many Chiffchaffs, Coal Tits and Great Spotted Woodpeckers calling, with a couple of Mistle Thrushes, Treecreepers and Siskins heard, and a single Firecrest singing.
A patch of Scarlet Elf Cups among the mosses and damp dead wood.
#SussexBirding ##Sussex #birding #ukspring
Surprisingly, I was the only person in the hide over high tide at Bowling Green Marsh this morning. It was sooooo peaceful. Thirty-three species of birds including two Spoonbill and a Spotted Redshank.
#Devon #BowlingGreenMarsh #birds #nature #wildlife #wetlands #SpottedRedshank #Greenfinch #Spoonbill
📷 Spotted Redshank
📷 Greenfinch
Some spring variety on Down and Horseye Levels this morning, with an OSPREY high North at 10.42, a record (for me) 8 WATER PIPITS sitting in hawthorns, the long-staying ringtail Hen Harrier, an adult male Marsh Harrier, Red Kite, Shelduck, 3 Sedge Warblers, Swallow, 2 Great White Egrets, 5 each of Gadwall and Shoveler, and a Green Sandpiper. #Sussex #birding #SussexBirding #PevenseyLevels #PatchBirding
@RobRowteight it’s a bit mysterious - overall in the UK they have been increasing in recent decades, but in Wales and SW England they have declined…
Grey Wagtail 😍
Grey is the last thing that comes to mind, but definitely wagging.
@doersino lovely, I like the contrast between the rough bark of the tree and the finer markings on the treecreeper's back.
@RobRowteight them's some muscular roots!
Five Chiffchaffs singing along the #cuckootrail this morning. Green Woodpeckers yaffling from either side. Yesterday three Ravens flew through, loud and low. #Sussex #birding
Maybe swap “scientists” for “anyone with a heart”.
This makes me want to smash stuff up.
#WeBS survey for on Down and Horse-eye Levels this morning: 2 Black-t Godwits, a pair of Shelduck, a few dozen Wigeon and Teal still, Peregrine & Red Kite, Egyptian Goose, Water Pipit (CB), Water Rail and 3 Great White Egrets. Chilly, but spring in the air with display from Lapwings, Meadow Pipits and Skylarks. The first Wheatear or Garganey this week? #Sussex #birding #SussexBirding #PevenseyLevels
“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”
