Urban birding

A handsome Redwing

A failed internet connection, a late night and downright laziness all contributed to my lack of entries over the past few days. Of course, I had offers from some very kindly folk to use their offices (including my good mate Fiona Barclay - she of Birdguides fame). I decided to suffer and spend the time screaming down the phone at British Telecom instead.

To recap, on Sunday morning I was watching 3 cute little Stonechats, a solitary Redwing and the first returning Linnets at my beloved Wormwood Scrubs. Later that morning, I was in Southwark in south London - Bermondsey to be exact, to lead a walk through the streets for the council. The idea was that I'd take members of the public on a truly urban bird walk. Well that was the plan. In reality only one person turned up thus she had a complete one-on-one. The best bird was a high flying Sparrowhawk being mobbed by Carrion Crows over the drab cityscape that I had found myself in. We ended up back at her house after an hour in the cold, slurping tea with her partner chatting about Carmine Bee-eaters!

Yesterday morning I was Kensington Gardens taking part in a BBC Radio 4 documentary on the demise of the House Sparrow. I was chatting about their general decline across Britain and specifically in Kensington Gardens where in 1975 over 2500 were counted whilst in 2000 there were none. And there's been none since apart from a lone female that showed up for a few hours in 2003.

Later, I was delighted to receive an email from the venerable Hugh Harrop who agreed to me using a couple of his images for a piece on my website. You should check some of his photos out as they are wicked www.hughharrop.com.

Tomorrow, I meet with my lovely agent for a spot of plotting and planning.