Did you see University Challenge last night?  I enjoy shouting out the answers at the TV.

The RSPB's Big Garden Birdwatch got a mention - and the songs of some common birds made up one of the questions. 

A few years ago I was part of an RSPB team which took part in University Challenge - the Professionals.  It was good fun, although we lost in the first round - out-gunned by the Imperial War Museum! 

As you might expect, it's a lot more difficult dragging those answers out of your brain under the lights of a TV studio than sitting in your own home.  We got off to a very slow start (and that increases the pressure!) but came with a rush at the end to just about reach respectability! 

Jeremy Paxman had been on a trip to Scotland a while before we met him and was very enthusiastic about seeing sea-eagles.  As a fisherman he was rather less keen on cormorants! 

A love of the natural world demonstrates that a person is a cultured inhabitant of planet Earth.