Talking Naturally – The Post Birdfair Conference Calls

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Talking Naturally

Rare Eagle Snatches Clergyman

In a shock news release Songbird Survival is reporting that a rare White-tailed Eagle has snatched a vicar from the RSPB reserve at Abernethy Forest and taken it to feed it’s young. The Very Right Very Reverend Hunter S Thompson Farquar Farquarson, an uptight Presbyterian Minister was reported as being snatched by Beatrice his pet Toulouse Goose around 9am yesterday. Beatrice said ‘I’d just waddled out from the stables and saw the eagle mantling the Vicar. It then chased me off before returning to the Vicar and dispatching him with one if it’s talons.’

Beatrice the Toulouse Goose

Beatrice, who is no relation to The Spruce Goose was understandably shocked and rang Songbird Survival. ‘I didn’t know who to contact’ she said ‘but then I’d heard of Songbird Survival and knew they hated birds of prey.’

Jeremy Clarkson, a shit thick TV presenter said ‘It’s well known that these Eagles are being reintroduced and the science behind it is flawed. It’s a known fact that these birds regularly take babies from prams and terrorise whole villages.’ Mr Clarkson put down his bowl of Ortolan Buntings and produced photographic evidence of an Eagle taking a child. ‘The camera never lies’ he said.

White-tailed Eagle

The RSPB was not available to comment but an insider told us that ‘this is all a load of wank.’

Cover Me

A great song really is a great song and unless an X-Factor contestant murders it then no amount of covering can destroy that song. One of my favourites has to be I Fought The Law recorded in 1959 by The Crickets, written by Sonny Curtis it was the first post Buddy Holly single. Enjoy…

Next up comes a cracking version recorded by the Bobby Fuller Four.

Finally the definitive version for me recorded by The Clash.

Libyan Twitchers Celebrate After Ticking Egyptian Plover

A bit of Western Palearctic news today. A report of an Egyptian Plover in the Bab al-Aziziya district of Tripoli sparked a massive twitch today. Armed birders commandeered pick-up trucks as they rushed to the area. Using heavy weapons to smash down the walls on this private nature reserve the heavily armed twitchers finally added this first for Libya to their lists.

Successful twitchers fired live ammunition into the air. Later arrivals were disappointed as the bird was last seen flying into an underground bunker and did not show again by dusk. Scuffles broke out amongst the crowds later, as the successful birders were seen to ‘grip-off’ the late arrivals.

A few charter aircraft with serious West Pal listers were also seen patrolling the skies over Tripoli this afternoon.

Dove From Above

Everyone know what a complete media whore I am so when I got the chance (thanks to Jim Lawrence at Birdlife) to go ‘backstage’ at the Birdfair to meet Ceri Levy and Jimi Goodwin of the band Doves, I didn’t need to give it a second thought.

Ceri and I had ‘met’ online a week or so earlier when we did The Conference Calls together. Ceri has been putting together the excellent Ghosts Of Gone Birds and presented images, poetry and music in the Events Marquee on Saturday lunchtime. There was also a panel discussion including Stephen Moss, Rob Lambert, Chris Gooddie and John Barlow along with Ceri and Jimi.

Ceri and Jimi meet The Drunkbirder

I would urge everyone to support the Ghost Of Gone Birds project, go along and see the exhibition where you can. I’m hoping that Ceri will be able to bring the show to Leicester in 2012. Watch this space…

The Conference Calls Live?

No – Birdfair.

I had the very great pleasure to finally get to meet Charlie this morning. Even though we’ve done a good few Conference Calls we’d never actually met face-to-face. It seemed like we’d been mates for years. I’m looking forward to doing lots more with Charlie in future – he really is one of the good guys.

Testing... testing...

Who the fuck is Tom McKinney?

After meeting up with Charlie I headed over to the LROS stand to catch up with Dave, Andy and Skev.

M2/37

If you’re at Birdfair tomorrow pop in and say hello. I’ll be on the stand from 2 till 5.

LROS Annual Bird Report 2009

2009 Bird Report

I picked up my copy of the 2009 Leicestershire and Rutland Ornithological Society Annual Bird Report from Ken Goodrich this evening . A quick look through reveals another brilliant report put together by Carl Baggott and the team. Excellent work folks, a brilliant job.

The report will be available to pick up at the Rutland Water Bird Fair this coming weekend, so if you are attending the Bird Fair please come and find us on Stand 37 in Marquee 2.  If you are unable to get to the Birdfair, we shall also have the reports at the Eyebrook Summer Fair at the Fishing Lodge at Eyebrook Reservoir on Saturday 27th August, also the National Forest Wood Fair at Beacon Hill Country Park on Monday 29th August.  So please come and introduce yourselves and collect your copy at one of these events.  If you are able to pick up your copy, it will save us the cost of posting.

Reports can also be purchased for £6.50 at Birdfair.

BBC To Investigate Claims Of Phone Hacking At Birdnews International

In a shock move today the President of the Biritish Birdspotters Club announced an investigation into claims of phone hacking by Birdnews International, a birdnews service owned by tycoon H.M. ‘Howling Mad’ Murdock. News of the scandal emerged when private detective Mandy Coulson was detained by BBC officers at Rutland Water last night. The Drunkbirder understands Ms Coulson was taken to the new Dunlin Hide to face questioning. Suspicions were raised by birders after Birdnews International reported news of a Marsh Sandpiper at Blacktoft Sands RSPB reserve moments after news was phoned in to Rares Alert Net on 12 July 2011. The finder John Smith was birding with his friend Bosco Albert Baracus, who owns a Birdnews International pager when the news came through on Baracus’s pager first.

HM 'Howling Mad Murdock

Smith, known to his friends as Hannibal, as he once twitched a Wallcreeper in the Alps by Elephant, immediately contacted the British Birdspotters Club who are renowned for acting as judge, jury and executioner on the British Birding scene. A team of investigators known as the A-Team was soon assembled and the answer phones of all the major birdnews companies were found to have been tampered with. Lieutenant Templeton Peck told reporters that it appeared that Birdnews International had been guilty of systematically hacking the answerphones, copying the news of rares and then deleting the answerphones so they could claim to be ‘first for birdnews.’

Birdnews International had grown to become the largest birdnews provider with almost 1m members based on the slogan Birdnews You Can Trust. Owner ‘Howling Mad’ Murdock, so called for his habit of howling like a wolf when he ticked a first for Britain is expected to face tough questions from BBC members on Thursday when he appears in front of the rarities committee.

In a shock development as The Drunkbirder was about to press publish, it emerged that Mandy Coulson had worked for the BBC  for three months back in 2010. This calls into question the role of the BBC as the guardians of the twitching scene in Britain.

Convicted Twitchers Sent On Foreign Holidays

by a Drunkbirder staff writer

The Drunkbirder has today learned that convicted twitchers are being sent to Malta to learn to shoot birds out of the skies indiscriminately. The programme run by Club Malta aims to teach birds and birders respect for birds by blasting them out of the sky.

Birders at Camp Malta

Tony Bastardo from the Maltese Hunters set up the camps this year as a way of helping rehabilitating the more manic twitcher. ‘We only managed to shoot 1842 Turtle Dove this year’ said Mr Bastardo. ‘The Maltese government reduced our quota to 9000 Turtle Dove and we were nowhere near that. That meant 1000s more Turtle Doves were available for avid year-listers in Birtain. Sending twitchers here to shoot them ought to redress that balance and allow us to meet quotas.’

Turtle Dove

Mr Bastardo claims the camps are far from holidays. ‘Birders are up before dawn and don’t get to bed until at least midnight if we discover a raptor roost’ he said. ‘It’s tough, slaughtering birds is no picnic.’

Marsh Harrier

Speaking elsewhere in today’s Drunkbirder, Richard Littlecock said ‘birding’s going to hell in a handcart!’

The shooting camps will run each Spring and Autumn and the Government has signed a three year deal with Club Malta.

Anxious Mother Faces Eviction After Son Caught Twitching

by a Drunkbirder reporter

A mother faces eviction tonight after her son was found guilty of twitching in Hartlepool in June. Tina Bellend (47) a single mother of 15 is likely to lose her home after her son Tim Bellend was filmed stealing a look at a White-throated Robin in Hartlepool.

Tina Bellend

Tina who does not wish to be named spoke to The Drunkbirder today. To protect her identity her voice has been disguised. ‘I’m at my wits end’ she said ‘Eton Borough Council have served me with an eviction notice.’ Tina went on to explain that her son, a manic twitcher suffers from a mental illness and that the whole family were being punished for his crime. ‘I just don’t know what we’ll do’ said the mother of three ‘we haven’t got a pot to piss in.’ Miss Bellend has five other children all under the age of 16. ‘Why should my 12 other kids suffer?’ she said.

The leader of the Conservative run council, Gervaise Brook-Hamster, said ‘the rules of her tenancy were quite clear about her responsibilities.’

Gervaise Brook-Hamster

Mr Brook-Hamster felt that losing her home was enough of a punishment, ‘we could have had her tied to a railway line’ he said.

Nigel Incubator-Jones, Lib Dem opposition leader at Eton Borough Council felt the eviction was counterproductive. ‘The council will end up footing the bill for Miss Bellend to be placed in temporary accomodation such as a shoe. All this will end up being passed on to the Tax-payers.’

Tim Bellend was unavailable to comment as he was seawatching in Ireland, The Drunkbirder understands. The leader of the British Birdspotters Club who did not wish to be named, said he had a datebase containing evidence that Hartlepool was not the first time Tim had been involved in twitching. ‘He’s been for loads of birds and I’ve personally verified this by phoning him at twitches. Tim’s seen lots of birds but once I heard he’d been caught I had to remove him from the 2011 year-listing rankings and question all his sightings.’

It is thought that Tim was caught after his year-list total was posted on Bobu and his sister Tanesha-marie Chlamydia Bellend saw him up a ladder on the news. ‘I knew something was wrong’ she told our reporter ‘as he were due to sign-on that day and then he had a job shifting some hooky TVs for Del Trotter, innit?’