Blogger: Sarah Green Project Coordinator - Natura People Partnership Project
A few months ago I marked my very first trip to the Birdfair. I was there to assist with the RSPB birder reception, where a small but very keen team of us mixed up approximately 350 Black Grouse whiskey cocktails for sampling by lecture attendees.
Why Black Grouse whiskey? Well, the RSPB has a partnership with Famous Grouse whereby for each bottle of Black Grouse sold a donation is given to our Black Grouse conservation work. Since 2008 we have raised £300,000. At the Birdfair we made Black ‘N Black cocktails – fill a glass with ice, squeeze fresh orange juice over the ice, add a shot of whiskey, top up with coke.
Cheers!
Inbetween preparing for the reception I got to watch some excellent lectures including the British Bird Photography Awards, presented by Simon King, and Martin Garner and Tormod Amundsen discussing how to push the boundaries of birding – in Tormod’s case he moved his family to Arctic Norway!
There were some spectacular images in these presentations including a couple from the Norfolk area. The award winning photo shows Norwich’s very own peregrine falcons teaching their young to hunt. In third place is a stunning photograph of a common swift flying across a roof. I need to give a special mention to what may be my favourite photo, the dunnock and the greenfinch, coming in at 9th place. You can view them all here.
Meanwhile at the RSPB stand we had information about our reserves (including a gorgeous aerial picture of Minsmere), turtle doves, our work combating wildlife crime and our albatross campaign. Above the stand was a model of an albatross. I keep wanting to call it a giant model, but it’s not giant, it’s life size, it’s just that they are THAT huge.
It was an inspirational day.
What was that in my title about wellies? Well, I hadn’t quite realised the logistics of the Birdfair. It’s in a field. Rutland had experienced a deluge of rain early that morning and as I arrived I re-considered my choice of footwear. After 4 hours on site our feet looked like this:
Yep, we really should have worn wellies.