Robin-strokers disappointed, but north wales birder reaches milestone 500 on his dream lifelist.

The week (and probably the one before it too) in brief ...

Not sure if it was jynxed it or not, but the bird left. But then it was always going to ...

There does remain a certain amount of controversy over the bird however. The cosily familiar 2-bird theory  as well - the bird disappeared for a whole morning. Was it's reappearance actually the arrival of a second bird? The short answer is ... No. Probably not. Rather unlikely at any rate. It probably just fell down a worm-hole on the bowling green whilst play was in progress, resurfacing once the game had finished. Our scientific correspondent says that actually most extreme waifs and strays regularily utilise temporary rips (wormholes) in the space-time-continuum-thingy, as a migration strategy to the scottish islands and other isolated locations. Many aviaries even have one conveniently placed in a random corner ...

Closely related to String Theory of course.

Which is also quite big oop north ... only allegedly of course. It was of course only a matter of time before the true breeding grounds of the slender-billed curlew were discovered ...

All a big steaming pile of doggy-doos, some people might say .. which is also, ironically, what you actually get when you build a toilet for retired greyhounds (otherwise known as a slender-build cur-loo ...) Maybe there's just a very, very long underground passage between Crayford race track and the norf. Not sure how any battered old dogs got through, but there must be a few ...

In other news, Britain's finest have had a wealth of other good birdies to enjoy, including 67 species of scoter off the Scottish east coast, a rollicking good bird in Suffolk, and the south west, not be outdone, with 2 Seagulls and a Pigeon. Or something like that ...

After the Steinway scoter and Dresser eider off Ireland it was only a matter of time before the british isles were furnished with some classical yanky doodle ducky action. Top Bird according to those who've seen it, not so exciting according to those who live too far away to make the trip.

Further south, and a bit further inland, Lady Penelope rather enjoyed her first Roller. Surely not - First ? That wormhole time traveller thing again - (must be The Doctor again) - even the colour managed to get switched. Parker was not amused.

Something else rare turned up on the Isle of Man the other week. But no-one cared.


Twitching's great - you can't knock it. Well actually you can, but there of course worse things in life, like beating up old grannies, fiddling the inland revenue and listening to hip hop.

Not being a twitcher, of course, personally I never had the urge to rush up to the other end of the country to see the funny coloured robin... (It helped somewhat having just seen a couple of dozen a few weeks earlier in one of their native haunts, in eastern Turkey).

Twitch a White-throated Robin? - how mundane is that! Proper birding is planning on finding your own this autumn on the local patch ... Just need to find a suitable looking branch ...