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urban birding

Book Review: How to Be an Urban Birder

One of the best things about birding is that you can do it wherever you happen to find yourself. Whether you’re in your own back garden, travelling to the remotest corners of the globe, or simply popping out to the shops, birds are everywhere, and there’s always the potential of….

Thrombolites: Lake Clifton’s living fossils

Thrombolites, Lake Clifton

Thrombolites are amazing structures. Along with their close relatives stromatolites, these ancient bacterial colonies are ancestors of the very first life forms to exist on earth, and the hard calcareous deposits created by these colonies are bizarre. It’s actually quite humbling to stand alongside these living relics. These thrombolites are on the….

The Urban Birder in Ireland

The Urban Birder in Ireland

I was born in London but whenever anyone asks me where I’m from my stock answer is always that I am a black, Afropean, child of the earth and Honorary Irishman. I particularly cherish the ‘Honorary Irishman’ bit of my epithet because I really do feel a close affinity with….

Don’t just look up: look everywhere!

“Look up!” is the catch phrase coined by celebrity UK birder David Lindo, the self-styled “Urban Birder”, and it is, by and large, pretty sound advice. If you find yourself wandering the city streets with time to kill, glancing periodically above your head can reveal some truly remarkable things. David….