How many countries can you name in five minutes?

That's the question, have a go and let me know what you got. Good luck!

Just click on the picture below, it'll take you to the site.



So far my highest score is 106.

Otters including the recent sighting in Wales

Over the last few decades otters were in decline because of pesticides and habitat loss, but over the last few years the numbers have steadlily increased in the UK.

An otter has recently been discovered in a nature reserve in Denbighshire in North Wales. The sightings have been at the River Clwyd where it has been feeding. Conservations are hoping to set up a holt for the otter, hoping it will take up permanent residence.

Otters are also taking up residence in Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire. There's a great breeding population of otters on the Shetland Islands, and on the Isle of Mull in Scotland.

I've been lucky enough to see wild otters before, on the Isle Of Mull, at a place called Salen, on the eastern side of the island. It was an amazing experience seeing them catching fish, and feeding the young, and something i'll never forget, they're such magnificent creatures.

It's great to know otters are on the increase.

Mistle Thrush and Song Thrush differences in flight

I did promise you I would show you the difference between the Mistle Thrush and Song Thrush in flight, so here it is. I didn't have a clear example I could take and adapt from a book, so I ended up having to draw them myself. Surprisingly this took me 3 hours to draw, it's not a great drawing, but you can tell them apart by the colours.

If you saw a thrush you probably would be able to tell the difference from this. I know i would.
I hope it's useful to you.

Lincolnshire nature reserves

Last week (Monday-Thursday) I went on holiday for a couple of days to Sandilands near Sutton On Sea in Lincolnshire with my family, it was a great couples of days regarding bird watching, yet not so good regarding wildlife photography. There was a lot of fog, making it awful to take photographs, yet there was a flock of birds I had never photographed before, and they're a winter visitor to the UK, I didn't want to miss the oppurtunity.

Do you know what they are?





They're brent geese. These pictures were taken at Freiston Shore, there must have been over 600 birds altogether. One minute they were all in the marshland feeding, the next they were flying right over the hide I was in. Such a fantastic sight.

So we went to Freiston Shore, we also went to Gibraltar Point, the other nature reserve we went to was Donna Nook, which is partly used by the RAF for bomding target practice. I didn't see a single bird at Donna Nook. To really be honest I didn't like Donna nook at all, it was quite disconcerting with red flags flying warning you bombing could be happening.

Here is a list of all the birds seen on my holiday

• Common Snipe
• Shelduck
• Little Grebe
• Magpie
• Mallards
• Moorhen
• Coots
• Blue Tits
• Blackbirds
• Shoveler
• Teal
• Curlew
• Pheasant
• Gadwall
• Brent Geese (600+)
• Redshank
• Kingfisher
• Goldfinch
• House Sparrow
• Wigeon
• Starlings
• Wren
• Little Egret
• Canada Geese
• Goldeneye
• Lapwings
• Golden Plover (500+)
• Pintail
• Black Headed Gulls
• Mistle Thrush

Panamanian golden frogs removed from the wild

A fungus called chytrid, has caused a dramatic decline in a lot of amphibian species in North America, Central America, South America and Eastern Australia. The fungus can not be controlled very easily, meaning the fungus is still spreading. One amphibian species with the disease is the golden frog.

Golden Frogs live in the Panamanian rainforest in Central America, bordering Costa Rica and Colombia. Shortly after the BBC One series Life In Cold Blood had been filmed the golden frogs had to be taken from the wild and put into captivity to avoid the species catching the disease which could result in it becoming extinct.

Until there is a chance of the disease dying away the frogs will be kept in captivity, where hopefully they will breed (increasing the numbers), and then hopefully released back into the wild, if the disease eventually dies away from the area.

Barn Owl Webcam

The Barn Owl Trust has a great website, have a look, there's owl identification and calls of all the UK owl species.
I really like owls, especially barn owls, they're such magical and magnificant birds. There's a webcam on the Owl Trust website, have a look, the link is enclosed.

Here's a screen shot taken a while ago.


http://www.thewebbroadcastingcorporation.com/barnowlcam.html

Barn Owl

I've had a great day today, on the way to school this morning, I saw a barn owl, only a couple of meters away from the car, the closest i've ever seen one. I once saw one at Cley next the sea in Norfolk, but in flight and quite far away. Such a great way to start off the day. I thought it was a little strange that it was so close to the roadside and in the morning, I wouldn't have said it was a great place for owls to be hunting.

If only I had my camera, I would have got some amazing shots, possibly with it hunting as well, but i didn't have my camera, and I had to get to school otherwise I would have been late.

Then in my Geography lesson I saw a flock of goldfinch out the window, and after school a song thrush singing, which was really lovely to listen to, such a lovely song and a great way to end the day.

So a great day, i've seen some great birds, here they are:

• Song thrush
• Goldfinch
• Barn owl
• Blue tits
• Blackbirds
• Chaffinch

Chinese River Dolphin - Extinct!!!!

Heard some shocking news today. In my Geography lesson we were studying the Three Gorges Dam in China, and the environmental impacts of it. Mentioned was the extinction of the Chinese River Dolphin which lived in the longest and most polluted river in China, the Yangtze. I have to say if no one was in the room with me, I probably would have been very upset, but I didn't really want to embarrass myself infront of the class really did I?. It's said that even if there are a few river dolphins left (which is very unlikely), they'll have no chance of survival because of the impact of The Three Gorges Dam, which has polluted the river. These dolphins have been on the verge of extinction for years. The Chinese River Dolphin dates back over 20 million years, and now it no longer exists, which is very upsetting, such an innocent creature has gone.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/12/061214-dolphin-extinct.html

Mistle Thrush and Song Thrush differences

I've been a birdwatcher for over 8 years now and it came to me today when I saw a thrush, that I still struggle with the difference between the song and mistle thrush.
I look in books and still have problems with identifying them, so I thought why not make my own guide to knowing the difference. I combined all the information I had in books and magazines together to make something i'd remember.
With an image of each bird, I made this:





I hope it's as useful for you as it is to me. I'll also add the flight pattern for each thrush as well, in due course.

Welcome!

Hi and welcome to my Wildlife Blog, I hope your enjoy looking around and find all the information posted on here very useful. Feel free to post a comment.

Last weekend I went to my local reservoir, to photograph wildlife with my camera and new adapter. I came home with a lot of photographs that day, some of which needed work doing to them in Abobe Photoshop, it always helps to photograph with good light; that day the light was just right. Some photographs came out really well, and if I may say so, some were very well composed seen as I was having problems with my tripod.



This Great Tit seemed rather tame, it was though he was asking to be photographed, he seemed to like the attention he was getting, which always helps.