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Waders have long fascinated me – there is such variety in this wonderfully complex group of species. I well remember flushing my first Jack Snipe, from a derelict gunsite on the Hampstead Heath extension in north London, back in 1952. Many years later I wrote the text to complement Stephen Message’s excellent illustrations in our field guide Waders of Europe, Asia and North America.

Some sensational snipes.

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While the challenges of separating very similar species, like the ‘peeps’, are always fascinating and can provide one with great satisfaction, when a correct identification is made, it is often some of the more exotic species that provide me with greater excitement, including some outside the range of this book. Some years ago I set myself the ambitious target of seeing all the waders of the world and photographing as many of them as possible. The book essentially deals with those species in the northern hemisphere and just one still eludes me, the Great Thick-knee.

As you read this I shall probably still need to see just five southern hemisphere species too, having added the last two African species during November. Somehow, I’ve managed to miss the Australian Pratincole, but the real challenge is to see the last four South American snipe species which have so far eluded me: Puna, Giant, Fuegian and Imperial. Having travelled widely in this pursuit, there are many tales to tell.

Australian Painted Snipes. The female (left) is the brighter and more colourful in this species.

The separation of the Australian Painted Snipe as a different species from the Greater Painted Snipe meant a trip to Australia. I again arranged to join Philip Maher, as my guide, and he came up trumps. He had located an area, north of Deniliquin, where he’d seen a pair. During the afternoon, we did flush one but never saw it at rest. Towards dusk we prepared to wander around the open marshy habitat again and once darkness fell, we started our exploration. It wasn’t long before his searchlight shone on one, but again, it flew and it was a while before we relocated it. In fact we discovered a male and a more attractively plumaged female, both of which I was able to photograph successfully, as we were apparently less of a threat to them in the dark. It was an immensely rewarding experience.

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To see remote species, like the Tuamotu Sandpiper, requires joining an organised birding trip in order to get to isolated islands where small populations survive. In September 2010 I joined the Birdquest group on their French Polynesian tour, which provided me with that opportunity. As I lowered myself off the zodiac onto the rocky shore of the island of Tenararo, then walked up the sandy beach, I was virtually greeted by a pair of these exquisite birds running across the sand towards me. They are so different from any other wader and a real delight to spend time with. Several pairs of them entertained me for much of my time on this exotic island, with their squeaky calls, short-tailed fluttering flight, confiding, even curious behaviour and habit of alighting practically anywhere – on the shore, among the palm vegetation, or on the branches of even the tallest palms.

The Tuamotu Sandpiper - one of the world's rarest waders.

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Don Taylor is the author of our Helm Field Guide Waders of the Europe, Asia and North America.

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Last weekend we noticed several young Hedgehogs in my parent’s garden. The prickly little mammals were out foraging for food around midday, which seemed a bit unusual. So we consulted the East Sussex Wildlife Rescue and Ambulance Service. They told us that Hedgehogs being out in the daytime at this time of year was quite a bad sign, and they’d now be unlikely to get to a size where they could successfully hibernate through the cold winter months.

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The Wildlife Rescue and Ambulance Service offered to come and pick them up if we could capture them. I can exclusively report that young hedgehogs – which didn’t seem too bothered by the concerned humans nearby – don’t move very fast, and instead rely on rolling into an inpenetrable ball of prickles. Frankly, they were easy to catch.

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We gathered three and placed them in a basket, weighing one of them on kitchen scales in the process – 116 grams. We also discovered that their spines are sharp enough to go through a gardening glove …T

The wildlife rescue people arrived quickly (though disappointingly not by helicopter as I’d hoped). They popped the little hogs into a basket on top of a heated blanket and whisked them away to be fed up in safety over the winter.

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The next morning we found a fourth Hedgehog in the garden, who had been left behind.  A Watership Down moment was averted by the fact that we took it off to join the others at the Hedgehog Hotel. The hogs will be brought back and released into the garden in the Spring to continue their sterling work eating slugs, snails and other invertebrate enemies of the gardener.

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All photos are © Adrian Downie. You can see more of Adrian’s photos here.

Learn more about hedgehogs and other back-garden animals in RSPB Handbook of Garden Wildlife.

* If you are concerned about a young Hedgehog in your garden, follow Adrian’s lead and contact your local wildlife rescue service.

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I never thought a day would come where I could go rockpooling in the middle of an arboretum but, through the power of television and the expertise of the National Marine Aquarium, a ‘mockpool’ tank of intertidal organisms was fashioned for the Autumnwatch Unsprung programme. As is often the case with television, I found myself coming away from the filming thinking of all the things I could or should have said. So in this blog I’ve decided to expand a little on some of the themes I touched on.

First, I have to mention what a prolific ‘mockpool’ that was, which is not to say that the real thing doesn’t have a similar level of diversity and species. However, the chances of seeing species so clearly are lower because they are likely to dart into any crevice as soon as you approach a real rockpool. The vibrations of your feet on the rocks are enough to cause even the most ‘aggressive’ of crabs to hide! So it’s always a good idea to sit quietly and watch a rockpool for a while to see what might emerge from the safety of seaweed and rocks. It’s the combination of the chance element of discovery and the thrill of exploration that makes rockpooling such a delight.

Snakelocks Anemone. An intertidal beauty.

The Snakelocks Anemone in the ‘mockpool’ tank was a beautiful specimen, with its long fleshy green tentacles and purple tips. It certainly looked as though it hadn’t gone without a good meal in its comfortable surroundings. On the programme I mentioned the anemone’s rather intriguing adaptation of using its mouth both as its bottom and as the orifice from which it releases its egg and sperm. However, the story does not end there, they also bud to reproduce a perfect miniature form of themselves. These anemones are found around the majority of the British coast but are rarely (if ever) found on the east coast of England and Scotland or the easterly parts of Ireland. However, with warmer temperatures and changing currents in our seas the distribution of species is changing.

The vivid coloration of the Snakelocks is in part due to the presence of algae that love sunlight, which live in the tentacles. You will tend to find these anemones in the sunnier patches of rockpools. Unlike their cousins – the Beadlet Anemones Actinia equina – the Snakelocks rarely withdraw their tentacles to prevent themselves from desiccation on the low tide. The Beadlets will be found in shaded areas and can survive in areas where they will be left high and dry over the tidal period – in rocky, shaded crags for example. There is also a brown, paltry form of Snakelocks Anemone that is more common in areas protected from the harsh rays of the drying sunlight. But, as with the colourful algae-filled Snakelocks, the brown form will mostly be found in the pools even on the lowest of tides. This anemone was thought to lack the presence of the algae, but it is now thought to possibly even be a different species.

Cushion Stars will dry out if left out of the water for any period so replace in pools as quickly as possible.

There were also some small, but always popular, varieties of starfish within the ‘mockpool’. Hidden in the pool on the surface of the rocks and seaweed were a perfectly formed Cushion Star and Common Starfish. These always seem to capture the enthusiasm and delight of rockpoolers, young and old. They have some amazing adaptations, with tube feet on their underside that they control with hydraulic pressure. They use these tube feet to glide seemingly effortlessly around the surfaces of rocks and seaweed.

Seven-armed Starfish – the tube feet of the starfish, which they use for locomotion and predation, are clearly visible.

The Common Starfish – the larger, orange specimen – also use their hydraulic tube feet to predate on their food. They will give an unsuspecting mussel a seemingly affectionate hug, enveloping the mussel in their strong arms, attaching the many tube feet that run the length of their five arms to the mussel’s shell. Once the starfish has a good grip it gently prises the mussel shell apart. It then ejects its stomach from its mouth in a bizarre and, for some, disturbing way and digests the mussel within its own ‘protective’ shell.

In times gone by if fishermen found these starfish eating their commercially valuable mussels they would peel off the starfish and rip them in two. But in unforgiving tidal and marine environments the starfish have adapted to withstand the pressure of harsh waves and predation using the powers of regeneration – they will quite simply re-grow lost limbs and it’s not uncommon for their usual pentameral symmetry to be broken by a shorter, ‘stumpier’ arm.

I could tell you so much more about the incredible adaptations of the organisms that are found in the intertidal zone, but I’d better save some facts for my book, the RSPB Handbook of the Seashore, coming in early 2013. I am looking forward to being able to really expand on the amazing stories that these wonderful beasts have to tell. By the end of the writing months, I hope to have so many more new facts for you to read, but also to maintain my chances of ‘out-geeking’ the knowledge fountain that is Chris Packham!

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You can watch clips of Autumnwatch Unsprung’s ‘mockpool’ on the BBC iPlayer via these links  – the marine sections are at 6.20, 15.00 and 24.45 minutes (UK only).

The Bloomsbury Sparrowhawk tucks into an unfortunate pigeon. Photo by Nick Humphrey.

This year, after years without an addition to the list, we’ve had two. A pair of Goldfinches has taken up residence in the square. They were first found by Jim, but are now to be heard singing or twittering on most days. Then, a snatch of song on 6th May alerted me to the presence of a Black Redstart in Frith Street. It did not show itself, and a frustrating few days went by before it was heard again. The next time it was a few streets away, but again it was not seen. Finally, I nailed it back in Frith Street, and I was lucky enough to actually see a pair. Since then, it’s been fairly regular in the Frith and Greek Street area, being recorded as far afield as Chinatown and Great Marlborough Street.

Black Redstart, taken earlier from the office window*. What a cracker.

We’d been hoping for this city speciality for some time. Jim thought he’d got one a couple of years ago, but it turned out to be someone’s Canary singing away from the balcony of a top floor flat! Black Redstart is a rare breeding bird in Britain. It only started breeding in Britain on bombsites in London in 1940, and its population remains fairly stable at only around 100 pairs in the entire country, mostly in towns or on power stations. So, it’s a pretty scarce bird, and to have a pair around your usually rather birdless office is quite a treat.

St Anne's Court, Soho. Scene of Jim's canary-based ID disgrace.

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*this is a lie.

When was my first time?

Well it wasn’t when I was a child.

My first experience with nits was exactly a year ago. At eight and a half months pregnant  my toddler daughter came home on her last day at nursery with ‘the letter‘.

We’ve timed that well, I thought, after a quick scan of her scalp. She’ll spend the summer home with me and her soon-to-arrive sibling completely nit-free.

Two weeks later I had another squint at her head as I washed her hair. What the hey?! Forcing myself to take a closer look I discovered an impressive infestation.

Nits in action

That night while my daughter played happily in the bath I slathered conditioner on her hair. Nit-comb and tissue paper in hand I was ready to start the eradication process.

One comprehensive round of clearing later I knew I was supposed to wait five days before checking for newly hatched lice. But, with nothing but time on my hands, it became an irresistible daily urge to take a peek every bath-time. Did that speck just move? Is that one? Is it a different colour to the ones I removed before?

I thought I’d  just ask my mum to check me. Seconds later she was presenting me with exhibits on a white tissue to examine and confirm. No! NO! Surely not me too? Days from my due date I had to concede that, yes, my cuddly little bed-invading toddler had passed on her infestation.

Action stations. I would not have a baby while there were things on my head having babies of their own!

A head louse, yesterday.

My mum was a godsend and as the first days after my due date passed I was just relieved. I’ll be able to get rid of the little bleeders before the babe arrives, I thought.

By day ten after my due date I was too hot, tired and emotional to do anything except eat ice lollies, keep my feet elevated and hope that something was going to happen today.

Due date +12: my daughter’s head was looking more louse-free by the day. And I was now so adept at the conditioner/comb combo that, despite my long locks, I could do a pretty good job on my own, then ask my mum to check through my workmanship.

So there I was, sitting on my bed watching Timothy Olyphant being Justified combing through my softly slathered tresses when I thought, “hmm, was that a twinge?” I quickly finished combing, jumped back in the shower to rinse off and realised if it’s making me groan out loud it’s not a twinge, it’s a contraction. And after two weeks wait they came fast.

At 4.30pm I was on the bed with Timothy, by 6.20pm I was on a hospital bed meeting baby.

Olyphant: expressed 'sympathy' for Julie's plight.

She was born with a beautiful dark head of hair which, like lice, is subtly changing colour with age, but thankfully within which the little blighters have yet to be found. But now she’s at nursery too I know it’s only a matter of time until I reach for those combs again.

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This blog was inspired by the brilliant NIT HEADS blog, by Richard Jones and Justine Crow. Richard and Justine are currently writing The Little Book of Nits – indispensable advice for any parent. Coming soon …

Pretty with pink.

I love Paris in the springtime; I was there a couple of months back. Like many other European cities, Paris, too, now has its very own recently established parakeet flock. I was pleased to watch a group screetching away merrily in some trees outside the Panthéon, before taking off in a swooping green flash across the city.

Later that day, I ambled into the Musée de Cluny, and popped inside to see, among many wonders, one of mediaeval Europe’s most famous tapestries – La Dame à la Licorne, or The Lady and the Unicorn, a series of six imposing, largely red panels, five of which are loosely based on the ‘senses’. Made around 1490, they truly are a wonderful sight. Among the richly detailed needlework, and nestled among the intricate leopards, monkeys and giant white rabbits on the panel known as ‘taste’, I was truly gobsmacked to see this:

Its a parakeet! But on a tapestry made in 15th-century France. It has to be a Psittacula parakeet, but which one? The absence of a red on the wing strongly suggests that this is Ring-necked (as opposed to Alexandrine, the only other contender). How on earth did this exotic wonder crop up in a tapestry in mediaevel France? The bicoloured bill is suggestive of the north Indian subspecies of this bird (as opposed to the geographically closer African one).

A little research suggests that the species has a long history in aviculture, so it may be that the bird our Lady is feeding was actually bred in captivity. Or it might have been traded across from eastern Europe or, who knows, even further afield. Either way, birds of the same introduced exotic species that was swooping above my head some half an hour before were presumably kept in the very same city, more than 500 years before.

So although it seems like they’ve only just bustled into our lives, these noisy green parakeets have been with us in Europe for a long time – I had no idea just how long.

Ring-necked Parakeets on the Eiffel Tower, yesterday.

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Learn more – lots more – about parrots in this Helm guide:

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“Mum, there’s a pig at the front door” is not necessarily what you want to hear when you’ve just changed and are about to go out to dinner. “A” pig rather than “a couple of pigs” is even more tiresome as it means one is missing. Never give your pigs names you are advised, if they are going into the freezer – this is fine advice until it comes to calling them when they are lost.

Pigs can be kept on very little or a great deal of land. If you give them as large an area as you possibly can, with plenty of room to root, they will follow their natural instincts.

The pig at the front door is very happy to trot back down to its field with the help of a bucket of nuts, but then there is the problem of finding out where its strong snout has managed to lift up the fence in order to squeeze under. It is quite remarkable how small a gap a large pig can slip through.

Gloucestershire Old Spot sow. The Gloucestershire Old Spot is a pig well suited to the smallholder with a bit of land as they are hardy and excellent foragers.

Finding the lost pig is another matter. We are lucky enough to live on the edge of a huge area of heathland and one feels awfully foolish wandering about shouting “piggy piggy piggy”. Dog walkers are rather surprised, though not half as much as when they meet a large spotted pig trotting merrily along the footpath towards them. Our pigs never went far, however, and were always overjoyed to see you when found.

A healthy snout is cold and moist. The snout is used to dig into the soil to find food and is a very acute sense organ.

The field where our pigs live has a hill right in the middle, which necessitates a long walk all the way round if the pigs aren’t visible, so I taught them to come to a whistle which also saves a lot of calling. The only problem is that lop-eared pigs have trouble locating where a sound is coming from, not to mention being unable to see because their ears hang over their eyes – they hear the whistle and run, but frequently in the wrong direction. Stop, look about, I whistle again and they hurtle in a different direction. Eventually they see me and come running, ears flying – their funny stiff gait always making me laugh. Pigs have the reputation for being intelligent but mine never seemed to learn that when I whistled I was always by their ark where they were fed.

Gone are the days where you could feed your pigs with scraps or kitchen waste. But you may feed fruit and vegetables from your garden and your pigs will certainly appreciate it - windfall apples are a perfect example.

Pigs are characterful creatures that become extremely tame and I did rather regret the way they trotted happily and trustingly up the path and into the stable to start their journey to the abattoir. These two were lucky pigs though, that had five acres to root up – which indeed they did.

Celia Lewis and her Gloucestershire Old Spots.

Celia Lewis is the author and artist of the wonderful Illustrated Guide to series, which are delightfully illustrated and informative books ideal for anyone interested in keeping pigs or chickens who wants to choose the most suitable breed for their circumstances.

There are two published titles in the series so far: the best-selling The Illustrated Guide to Chickens and, brand new this month, The Illustrated Guide to Pigs.

Celia is currently hard at work writing and painting for her next title in this series The Illustrated Guide to Ducks and Geese, due to publish in summer 2012.

I was double-pleased, when researching the images, to find that there were a few species that have simply never been photographed (or if they have I can’t find any!), and one of these was the Cook Islands Reed Warbler. And I was about to go to the Cook Islands. So I decided to take matters into my own hands and fill this gap myself.

The bird occurs on two islands – Mitiaro, which is virtually impossible to get to, and Mangaia, which is only very, very difficult to get to. I plumped for the latter.

To say Mangaia is remote is something of an understatement – I was met off the tiny plane from Rarotonga by the Minister of Tourism, who told me that not only was I the only tourist on the island, I was the only one they’d had for three weeks. Its an amazing place, once you get past the initial shock – the people are warm, friendly and rugby-obsessed, and there’s good birding to be done – watching two species of tropicbirds soaring high above the coral cliffs was a sight I’ll never forget. However, the undoubted star of the show is the island’s endemic kingfisher, found nowhere else in the world.

White-tailed Tropicbirds do their thing, high above the taro swamp.

And then there’s the reed warbler. Very much a bird for the connoisseur, this little brownish-yellow bird is common throughout the island, even in the ghastly, useless introduced pine plantation on the coral plateau that girdles the island. It doesn’t seem too bothered by the lack of habitat, or the infestation of rats and cats the island seems to suffer. Its jangling song, a bit like a Blackcap after a few too many rums, became a welcome soundtrack for my time on the island.

My favourite acro. What's not to love?

The world will see the fruits of my subtropical labour of love when the book comes out in November … if by chance you’re heading to Henderson Island in the Pacific before then and you fancy tracking down and photographing a small, brown, endemic warbler, do let me know …

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Learn more about Cook Island, Henderson, and many other warblers here:

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It’s cold, actually it’s freezing – hard to believe that I am in the Iberian Peninsula and not somewhere in the Arctic. The temperature has plummeted to -11oC here at 1,600 metres in the Pyrenees. It’s January. Having to keep motionless in the dark really doesn’t help much, nor do the layers of thermal underwear, tights, pairs of socks … the sky outside is intense blue. That should, at least, ensure good conditions for photography. But will our target birds arrive today?

It’s now 10am and my wife and I have been in the hide for four hours. The sun is up but the temperature stays below freezing. Some silhouettes flit past. They are large. We focus the cameras on the deer carcass laid out barely 15 metres away, and we wait … out of nowhere a Griffon Vulture appears, as though by magic, but he’s been soaring cautiously above the bait – we just couldn’t see him with our limited view. A blink of the eye and there are now twenty vultures on the ground. They look around nervously, unsure. We avoid the temptation of clicking away. This would be the wrong moment. If they get spooked now, that will be it for today. Ten minutes later and a hundred or so Griffons approach the carcass. The first one goes for the intestines and starts to open up a gash. Others come in quickly. They start to scream and chatter at each other. The frenzy has started. Now we can start to shoot!

Griffons doing their thing.

Twenty minutes and hundreds of photos later the deer is a skeleton but our work has only just begun. Hanging around the edge of the frenzy, eight Black Vultures now come forward. They may be larger but they cannot compete with so many Griffons. But there is plenty for them to eat now; tough tendons, sinews and hide all get torn to shreds by their powerful beaks. Even now we haven’t got what we came for and we know we may not get it at all. Previous visits have ended in disappointment – they didn’t come down or they kept some distance. Today is different. We can see their distinctive shadows on the ground – large with a wedge-shaped tail …

Black Vultures - the Face of Death.

Then, as unexpectedly as the first Griffon, our first Lammergeier is down – a first-year bird. This one stays on the edge of the commotion. It looks around nervously but then starts to walk towards the hide. A second bird puts it up as it lands. These birds seem to have the habit of landing close to each other in threatening fashion, often displacing each other. And the young ones seem more aggressive than the adults. Then the “wow” moment as the first adult lands. Its hard to believe how spectacular this bird is when it is just a few metres away.

The Lammergeier.

Anvils? Who needs anvils. The Lammergeiers find their ideal bones, manipulate them with dexterity and swallow them whole! That’s just one lesson from watching birds close in. It’s only when the optimal bones are exhausted that the larger ones are carried away, held in one foot or with the beak.

The scene I have described would have been a familiar one to our prehistoric ancestors. In fact, most of the Palearctic species around today predate the last two million years of glaciation and many are much older. Lammergeiers shared their Palaearctic range with the Neanderthals – the fit is almost too exact – and they must have come into close competition for bone marrow. No doubt the Neanderthals watched the vultures, who led them to sources of food.

An Egyptian Vulture joins the fun.

I’m now back at home in Gibraltar, going through the palaeontological collections that I have been excavating here for twenty years. I bring out a set of bones from a Neanderthal occupation level. In my hand is a metatarsus of a Lammergeier and the box also contains Griffon, Egyptian and another large vulture (probably Black). The bones are 40,000 years old. I reflect on the history of the avifauna of the Palearctic. How did climate shape the fates of the birds? Can we combine the fossils with the living birds to give us a better understanding of the history and biogeography of Palaearctic birds? In Avian Survivors I hope to answer these questions and more …

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Clive is the author of Avian Survivors: The History and Biogeography of Palearctic Birds – on sale next month!

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A nice portrait, but what really blew my mind was this. Take a look.

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A bird carrying nest material? Wrong.

This cuckoo is actually feeding on a gigantic, branch-sized stick insect!

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I had to know more, so I had a look at Amila’s blog (his profile claims that he ‘holds the record as the first birder from Colombo to visit the Sinharaja rain forest in a tuktuk’ – very much our kind of chap). Amila took the photo during a trip to Sinharaja in 2004, just days after the devastating Boxing Day tsunami had hit the island. After seeing the bird in one of the mixed-species flocks (or ‘bird-waves’) that are a speciality of the forest, he took photos as the bird gave the insect a good bash, removing the limbs and the possibly defensive chemical-containing thorax, before tucking in.

Far from being any old stick insect, this is actually one of the world’s biggest insects. After an initial misidentification, an expert in the phasmid world told Amila that his malkoha was munching an adult female Phobaeticus hypharpax, one of the largest of the so-called ‘mega-sticks’, with a body length of up to 236mm. What a whopper.

This wasn’t just a great photo of a great bird doing something remarkable. It turns out that prior to the publication of these photos, the range of this insect was mysterious (with the handful of ancient specimens in collections all labelled simply ‘Ceylon’). So entomologists now know a little more about the beast, although its biology remains almost completely unknown.

Mighty though P. hyparphax is, it is some way behind the world record holder – P. chani, Chan’s Mega-stick, which lives on the island of Borneo. Formally described in 2008, Chan’s Mega-stick has a body length of up to 357 mm; its overall length with the limbs stretched out is an astonishing 567mm! Just imagine that.

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Read about Amila Salgado and his tours – and see more of his great photos – here.

Amila is a contributor to Cuckoos of the World by Johannes Erritzøe, Clive Mann, Frederik Brammer and Richard Fuller – coming soon.