Friend's just posted photos on Facebook; very large fire around there at the moment, 10 fire engines trying to put it out, not sure exactly what areas from the photos. Just gutted.
Thought I should give this site its own topic as the area is quite busy at the moment. It is basically a large area of fields used for horse grazing with a small area of parkland with about twenty mature trees and bushes. A visit from 3:15pm - 3:40pm produced the following: 42 Jackdaws (possibly more, its...
I was contacted recently regarding Operation Wallacea, an organisation that runs conservation projects in a number of richly biodiverse areas and important conservation zones across the world. They are currently looking to recruit an Ornithologist for a position in their Greece project on Sam...
Just thought that I would start a thread giving respect to the Greater Manchester Local Patchers - Local Patchers are the unsung heroes of conservation, and a lot of us do voluntary hard work for the places, and the birds, we love - Local Patchers are in the field in all weathers collecting scientific i...
Early afternoon 1 Brown Hawker 1 Common Hawker 1 Common Darter 2 Green-veined Whites 1 Meadow Brown 2 Speckled Woods Red-tailed Bumblebee Carder Bees Tree Wasps
13 Goosander at midday on one of the two small reservoirs between Eagley Brook and Longworth Lane (the road to Dunscar Golf Club to the west of Blackburn Road). Some of these birds then took off upstream in the direction of Belmont. Normally these reservoirs only hold Mallard, Coot and Moorhen but a fo...
Meadowcroft Wood First bluebell flowers today - all of two spikes. Amazing how they have come on in the past week with a little rain and the lift in temperature. -- Edited by Ian McKerchar on Thursday 18th of April 2013 06:31:41 PM
With the recent Iberian Chiffchaff or 'atypical' Chiffchaff up at Penwortham still not been identified as one or the other yet, I thought I'd ask, simply coz I don't know, why is it so controversial with this particular one that nobody has stuck their neck out to call it? Myself and Simon Gough were the...
The colony of breeding lapwings in Diggle is under threat from council proposals to move Saddleworth school directly on top of the fields in which they nest. (see plans here: http://www.savediggle.org.uk/efa_proposal.html). I first did a full survey of nesting Lapwings across Diggle, Castles...
Just half an hour ago I took in a commission sale which may be of interest to some on the forums here. It is a mint condition pair of 8x42 Zeiss Conquest HD Binoculars, they are only 6 months old so have almost the whole guarantee left. They were an unwanted gift as the owner has a pair of 8x32 Conquest HDs alr...
Having experienced searching for The Big Five in Africa in 2008 (saw Lion, Leopard, Elephant and Buffalo) and having plenty of time to dream up marketing schemes for my main local patch, Salfords' docklands, whilst wandering around the site, one day I thought it would be fun to select a Salford Dockl...
I was alerted to the presence of a possible Iberian Chiffchaff yesterday by Ian's text service and which was eventually being reported on various news services/forums where doubt was being cast as to whether or not it was Iberian. At Higher Penwortham this morning I watched and listened to a Chiffch...
Mint Canon 400 f 5.6 lens - Nov 2013 date code Best BIF lens for canon crop sensors £620 collected -- Edited by Ian McKerchar on Saturday 9th of April 2016 03:50:49 PM
Ian is absolutely right to maintain standards as the 'wildlife photographers' take over but it's a mixed situation. 'Greater Spotted Woodpecker', 'Chiff Chaff' etc. plain wrong; 'Med Gulls', 'Tufties' etc. how they may go down in the notebook alongside 'BH Gullls', 'BN Grebes' and any other shor...
We have just taken in on commission sale a scope outfit, complete and ready for getting out in the field to find Spring arrivals. It is an Opticron ES80 SD body with a HDF Zoom eyepiece, a stay-on case and a Velbon Tripod. The whole kit is in good condition and the seller only wants £399 for the complete out...
Regulars will have noticed a fair bit of editing to this forum recently and quite frankly tough!
A minority of posts and posters have seemingly attempted to bring this forum down to Birdforum levels and if you don't know what I'm on about there, I suggest you take a look at the latter forum at the sta...
Madrid 05/04/16 Whilst enjoying a free morning birding Casa de Campo (one of my regular sites here) and noting everything possible, I heard the " kek..kek..kek" type calls of what I expected to be a kestrel. However on scanning the overhead trees I was surprised to see that the culprit was a perched b...
Arrived here just a day ahead of a general strike (how lucky is that?) and found that my granddaughter ( six in January) has developed an interest in birds. Is there some genetic malfunction involved here? We started a casual list in the local park where an immediate problem materialised in that the ho...
23rd January. I have put previous postings for this site on the Odds and Sods thread but seeing as I have taken on this area for this winter and the coming summer for coverage for the BTO 2007 - 2011 Atlas and GM Breeding Birds atlas projects then I thought I might as well start a new thread!! I visited Drink...
Thread originally started by Simon Adam, all posts including replies from other birders starting with the oldest st the bottom of this post and working up towards the newest: Simon Adams wrote: Sorry to keep banging on about this but it's bugging me now. I have looked on YouTube at Hen Harriers and the...
We have just taken in a pair of mint condition 8x42 Leica Ultravids on a commission sale. They come with strap, rainguard and carry case and have jsut been serviced by Leica (we sorted that this week so I know that they have!!). The customer wants £599 for these and I think they are worth a look, not anythi...
Hi al, since I have had lots of contacts which I have replied to individually I will pop a note on here too. The Focalpoint Forums are down at present whilst our web master migrates the site to a new server. He is trying to do all he needs as quickly as possible and I will post on here when it is restored in case...
