Tag: Wildlife

  • Gatwick’s grasslands give up a gem: juvenile harvest mouse, 3g

    Sunday At 05:00 this morning I headed out onto almost deserted roads, the cars outnumbered by planes overhead on their final approaches: as I cruised up the A3 to junction 10 I waved farewell to those heading north into Heathrow and instead turned east onto the M25 with those Gatwick-bound. Our destination was the same,…

  • If it moves, ID it; and if it stays still, ID it too! #BioBlitz! Wisley and Ockham Commons @SurreyWT

    457 Species and counting! I love Bioblitz! Not all of my time is spent out and about on Surrey’s rivers or wetlands searching for the illusive otter and water vole, or creeping along my beloved hedgerows for dormice, stoat or orange-spotted elm-lichen. So when the moment arrives when I can spend 24 hours in the…

  • Reflections on International Mountain Day: Choughs, Chamois, Kilimanjaro

    Today is International Mountain Day http://www.un.org/en/events/mountainday/ We don’t have any mountains in Surrey. The highest point is Leith Hill near Dorking http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leith_Hill at between 293-295m above sea level which is the second highest point in South East England after Walbury Hill http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walbury_Hill, East Berkshire at 297m asl. Gibbet Hill at Hindhead http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gibbet_Hill is the second highest point…

  • Sorrow and delight in the same breath: a quantum conundrum as a noctule #bat comes my way

    Ranger Gemma bought me a present this morning and since its very nearly my birthday I got excited. Then she produced a small plastic bag and out of it pulled this Noctule bat who had caught her last insect on the wing. Gemma had found her at  at Wisley Common and by the look of the…

  • The Essex Otter and The Mayfly Knight

    A week or so ago I found myself in Essex on the Rivers Colne and Stour http://wtp2.appspot.com/wheresthepath.htm?lat=51.91318812737575&lon=0.8061829263453214&gz=11&oz=6&gt=1   I was meeting up with other otter ecologist colleagues from neighbouring counties where otters are few and far between to keep our hand in with surveying for otter and water vole signs. After about our third attempt at…