Handa Island solar panels
AES Solar installed an off-grid solar PV system on the remote island of Handa in the north-west Highlands. The island has no mains electricity and the installation allows the Scottish Wildlife Trust to power their laptops, chargers and shower system for a complete off-grid system, when they are on the island between March and September.
The Farne Islands, Northumberland. UK
Slideshow of the birds and mammals which inhabit the Farne Islands on the Northumberland Coast.
Birds and Nature in North Scotland-Footage
Birds and Nature in North Scotland
Places visited:
Kinellan Loch
Handa Island
Black Isle
RSPB Udale Bay
Glen Affric
Glen Strathfarrar
Birding at Farlington Marshes Nov 2016 - British Wildlife - UK Nature
Bird watching at Farlington Marshes, Hampshire, England.
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Music by audionautix.com
Northern Gannet (Morus bassanus)
Filmed at Bempton Cliffs, east Yorkshire, UK, on 11th April 2014 with a Canon PowerShot SX50 HS.
For information about the status of this species in the UK see the link below to the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) fact-sheet.
For information about the global status and distribution of this species see the link below to the BirdLife International fact-sheet.
For information about Bempton Cliffs RSPB see the link below.
Bird trip Scotland June 2018
Water Vole reintroduction to Ffrwd Farm Mire nature reserve
WTSWW have been working in partnership with Natural Resources Wales who have led a water vole reintroduction project at Ffrwd Farm Mire nature reserve (Gwernydd Penbre SSSI) in Carmarthenshire a part of a longer-term aim to increase resilience in the population of water voles remaining in the Llanelli area.
ISPS Handa Premiership Match Week 5 Goals
Check out all the goals from the fifth match week of the ISPS Handa Premiership.
Typhoon Survivors Try To Flee, As Others Return To Devastated Villages
Hundreds line up at Tacloban's ruined airport in the central Philippines, scrambling to get a flight out of the typhoon-hit city.
Sixteen-year-old Justin Cabidog has been waiting all night, soaked by torrential downpours.
(SOUNDBITE)(English) JUSTIN CABIDOG, TACLOBAN RESIDENT SAYING:
We have been here since yesterday early morning, we have nothing to eat and we're struggling and we don't have any energy.
While aid has begun to reach more remote areas, people are still going hungry.
These survivors took refuge in the city of Cebu when the typhoon struck.
Many stocked up with provisions in Cebu and now are returning home despite the grim conditions.
Even if you have money, this man says, There's nothing to buy back home. The stores are gone.
A massive relief operation is finally kicking into gear and aid is slowly reaching the badly hit provinces. But aid agencies say it could take years to rebuild the shattered towns.
The booming bitterns of Leighton Moss (RSPB)
The Bittern has a strange haunting booming call. One of the few places in Britain where its call can still be heard is at the RSPB Leighton Moss Reserve in Lancashire. In this short oral history excerpt local farmers recall the Bittern before the RSPB took over the site, and John Wilson, the 1st RSPB Warden at Leighton Moss, recalls their early success.
Fulmar Close-ups
A few Fulmars found at The Gloup, a collapsed sea-cave at Mull Head Nature Reserve, on Deerness, Mainland Orkney. I liked the fact that they weren't at all bothered by my presence!
Best Beaches for British Nature
Right around Britain in one year with a seabird's eye view... revealing the most beautiful, wildest beaches with the most exciting wildlife to be found there.
Meet puffins, sharks, red squirrels, masses of shore birds, ducks and geese, ospreys, reptiles, rare butterflies, otters, salmon, pine martins, little egrets, seals, and orchids in beautiful sand dunes.
Fulmar Spotted at Fort Dunree Lough Swilly Donegal
We have called into the spectacular Fort Dunree north of Buncrana to visit the old military base museum and coastal gun battery. This whole headland area overlooking Lough Swilly is a massive nature reserve. The bird life is varied and numerous. Here we spot fulmar seabirds nesting close into the fort walls.
Fulmars are tubenosed seabirds of the family Procellariidae. The family consists of two extant species and two extinct fossils from the Miocene.
Fulmars superficially resemble gulls, but are readily distinguished by their flight on stiff wings, and their tube noses. They breed on cliffs, laying one or rarely two eggs on a ledge of bare rock or on a grassy cliff. Outside the breeding season, they are pelagic, feeding on fish, squid and shrimp in the open ocean. They are long-lived for birds, living for up to 40 years.
Fulmars breed on cliffs, laying a single white egg. Unlike many small to medium birds in the Procellariiformes, they are neither nocturnal breeders, nor do they use burrows, Their eggs are laid on the bare rock or in shallow depressions lined with plant material.
Fulmars feed on the open sea outside the breeding season, like most tubenoses, feeding on fish, small squid, shrimp, crustaceans, marine worms, and carrion. The range of these species increased greatly in the 20th century due to the availability of fish offal from commercial fleets, but may contract because of less food from this source and climatic change. The population increase has been especially notable in the British Isles.
Like other petrels, their walking ability is limited, but they are strong fliers, with a stiff wing action quite unlike the gulls. They look bull-necked compared to gulls, and have short stubby bills.
Fulmars have for centuries been exploited for food. The engraver Thomas Bewick wrote in 1804 that Pennant, speaking of those [birds] which breed on, or inhabit, the Isle of St Kilda, says—'No bird is of so much use to the islanders as this: the Fulmar supplies them with oil for their lamps, down for their beds, a delicacy for their tables, a balm for their wounds, and a medicine for their distempers.' A photograph by George Washington Wilson taken about 1886 shows a view of the men and women of St Kilda on the beach dividing up the catch of Fulmar. James Fisher, author of The Fulmar (1952) calculated that every person on St Kilda consumed over 100 fulmars each year; the meat was their staple food, and they caught around 12,000 birds annually. However, when the human population left St Kilda in 1930, the fulmar population did not suddenly grow.
Scotland's magical seabirds
A short video featuring (HD 720p) the magical spectacle of a seabird colony in summer at Fowlsheugh on the east coast of Scotland. The video and audio are the copyright of Scottish Natural Heritage.
Grafham Water boat trip
The Wildlife trust organised a bird watching boat trip around Grafharm Water in Cambridgeshire using a group of fishing boats to take visitors around part of the reservoir near the nature reserve.
Grafham Water is the eighth largest reservoir in England by volume and the third largest by area at 1,550 acres.
The lake was created by filling a valley full of water which is retained by an earth and concrete dam built in 1965.
The nature reserve contains semi-natural ancient woodlands that are at least 400 years old and more recent plantation woodlands, grasslands and wetland habitats such as reedbeds, willow and open water.
Grafham Water is one of the prime bird watching sites in the county, with rare and scarce birds such as osprey alongside the more familiar resident mallards and greylag geese.
With nine miles of shoreline, and around 170 species of bird recorded each year, there is always something to see.
Terns are another feature of the reservoir. Common Terns are present in large numbers in passage periods and up to 200 Arctic Terns have been recorded together, but small numbers are more usual. Both Little and Sandwich Terns are almost annual, and Black Terns are always present during passage periods, with up to 400 recorded in record years.
On our trip around the lake we saw herons, swans, gulls and ducks and found out the best places to view birds from the shore.
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Kintyre looks set for scheme to reintroduce lynx to Scotland
Three sites across Scotland could become homes to the lynx (Image: getty) Researchers looked at three potential release sites, in Roxburghshire, Aberdeenshire and the Kintyre peninsula, and used computer modelling to predict how the animals would fare over 100 years. They found that Kintyre would be the most suitable, with the lynx colonising new habitats across the Highlands but the Central Belt acting as a barrier to further spread south. Stirling University PhD researcher Tom Ovenden, who led the study, said: “This initial research is encouraging and suggests that Scotland is indeed ecologically suitable for the reintroduction of Eurasian lynx – but this suitability is highly dependent on where reintroduction takes place and more modelling work is required. Related articles Family attacked by LYNX after fluffy kittens turn out to be PREDATORS Lynx campaigners REFUSE to give up on big cat comeback Reintroducing large carnivores is often complicated and expensiveTom Ovenden “Reintroducing large carnivores is often complicated and expensive, meaning that getting things right first time is extremely important. “Therefore, advances in modelling approaches, as utilised during our study, are extremely valuable.” Mr Ovenden wrote his paper using solar power, while running the Handa Island nature reserve, off Sutherland, for the Scottish Wildlife Trust. Jo Pike, director of public affairs at the SWT, said: “Returning the lynx to our landscape as a top predator could help restore the health of Scotland’s natural ecosystems. “Any future reintroduction would have to be carefully planned, widely consulted on and rigorously assessed against national and international guidelines.”
WECare Worldwide... What we do
Discussing the extent of the problem with the street dogs here in Sri Lanka and how we aim to put a stop to all of the suffering, at this current moment and going forward.
Chris Taylor. Wildlife Ranger
Chris Taylor talks about his job as a Wildlife Ranger with the Scottish Wildlife Trust in Montrose
Otumoetai v Rotorua United
football