Bo Beolens, the Fatbirder, was meant to give a talk at the recent Scottish Birdfair but didn’t make it further than south-east England. Here he explains – with a poignant honesty – exactly why he was the ‘No Show Man”…

Over the last half dozen years Bo Beolens (aka the Fatbirder) has had his wry, wise, and straight-talking column ‘The Grumpy Old Birder’ published in three different magazines. This year he’s decided to publish them online at ‘The Grumpy Old Birder, and at the same time record and publish them as a short podcast here on Talking Naturally. We’re delighted to welcome Bo to what we think is the perfect platform for the ‘Grumpy Old Birder’ podcasts!

• Do you have something serious, humorous, or informative to say about conservation or animal welfare but don’t have your own platform to say it from? Get in touch and we’ll help you reach the many hundreds of people who visit Talking Naturally every week!

Bo Beolens (aka ‘The Grumpy Old Birder’ alias ‘Fatbirder’) has been birding off and on for more than half a century – one day he hopes to be good at it. In 1998 he discovered the internet, but was frustrated by not being able to find what he was looking for – so created ‘Fatbirder’ to fill the gap. In 2001 he had the same frustrating finding no organisation to represent disabled birders interests he set up the ‘disabled birders
association’, which recently changes its name to ‘Birding For All’ which now has around 800 members. He has always considered writing his one skill and after a fun time trying to compile a list for his website that some had suggested on birds named after people he and a colleague wrote ‘Whose Bird’ which A&C Black published. While this is just about vernacular names the research had so many overlaps that they and another colleague began to compile similar works on mammals, reptiles and amphibians. Johns Hopkins University have so far published both ‘The Eponym Dictionary of Mammals’ and ‘The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles’. Bo also offers arranged tours for couples and small groups through his ‘Anytime Tours’ website and has recently launched the webs’ first ‘comparison’ website for birding tours ‘Birders Travel’. Anglers now have a similar web resource in ‘Fatfisherman’ and photographers are catered for by Bo’s son on ‘Fatphotographer’.

Talking Naturally was invited by the League to record interviews and ‘vox pops’ on the day, and despite the time constraints and a tight schedule League staff, guest speakers, and attendees kindly stopped to talk. The interviews, which have been edited and collated into the podcast below, provide a flavour of the day, a generous sample of the issues discussed, and conclusively demonstrates how both welfare and conservation organisations/activists are coming together to deconstruct and re-evaluate the shooting industry – an industry, to quote the League, “built on lies”.

(The League is creating an interactive report from the symposium and Talking Naturally will link to that once it goes online.)

• The contents of the podcast and the time that each interview begins are listed below:

• 00:00 Introduction
• 00:45 Lawrie Phipps, Trustee, League against Cruel Sports – recorded before the symposium began Lawrie looks forward to the day and reflects on what the symposium might achieve. Follow Lawrie on Twitter @lawrie
• 02:30 Ceri Levy, documentary-maker and activist against illegal hunting in Europe – Ceri talks about his reasons for coming to the symposium. Follow Ceri on Twitter @cerilevy
• 05:01 James Wheatley, landowner and victim of hunt intimidation – James features in the League’s ‘Gunsmoke and Mirrors’ video talking about hunt havoc: here he talks about the symposium and his experiences at the hands of hunters.
• 07:26 Stuart Winter, Environment Editor Sunday Express – Stuart was at the symposium to chair a discussion on the use of lead shot, here he talks about his concerns about the environmental impact of lead. Follow Stuart on Twitter @Birderman
• 11:35 Jeff Knott, Species Policy Officer RSPB and member of Defra’s Lead Ammunition Group – Jeff talks about the LAG’s role on collating information on the impact of lead in the environment and how the RSPB is willing to engage with all interested parties when it comes to conservation.
• 15:54 Dr Andrew Kelly, formerly with the RSPCA and now a freelance wildlife consultant – Andrew talks about his passion for animal welfare and the environmental problems caused by lead. Follow Andrew on Twitter @andrewkelly1962
• 20:43 Ian Beaumont, the League against Cruel Sport‘s Director of Public Affairs and Communications – Ian looks back on the first half of the symposium and reflects on what the day was intended to achieve.
• 24:29 Prof John Cooper QC, President of the League against Cruel Sports – John talks about his pride at seeing the ‘Gunning for Change’ symposium take place and his life-long passion for animal welfare. Follow John on Twitter @John_Cooper_QC
• 28:15 Christina Grodowski and Nuala, both League supporters, talk during the lunch break about their work in animal welfare, why they came to the symposium, and what they’d learnt so far. Follow Nuala on Twitter @NualaBugeye
• 32:12 Kerry McCarthy, MP for Bristol East and a vice-president of the League against Cruel Sports - Kerry talks about getting people interested in animal welfare and how we can all help get legislation protecting wildlife through parliament. Follow Kerry on Twitter @KerryMP
• 38:01 Bob Elliot, Head of Investigations at RSPB Scotland – Bob talks about the numerous wildlife crimes linked to hunting for sport and the RSPB’s attendance at the symposium. Follow RSPB on Twitter @Natures_Voice
• 42:50 Liz Brown, activist and volunteer with the Committee against Bird Slaughter – Liz talks minutes after giving an excellent presentation on the huge numbers of migrant birds killed illegally by hunters in southern Europe.
• 45:16 Bill Oddie, broadcaster, birdwatcher, and a vice-president of the League against Cruel Sports - Bill talks about his support for the League and his abhorrence of killing animals for sport. Follow Bill on Twitter @BillOddie
• 51:41 Dr Paul Jepson, University of Oxford’s School of Geography – Paul talks about his new initiative to crowd map an atlas of migratory bird hunting around the Mediterranean.
• 54:54 John Bryant, Council Member and Vice Chairman of the RSPCA and founder of Protect our Wild Animals – John talks about hunting, the hunting industry, and his admiration for hunt monitors.
• 58:54 Libby Andersen, founder of OneKind – Libby talks about the need for an immediate ban on snares. Follow OneKind on Twitter @onekindtweet
• 1:00:47 Mark Jones, UK executive director of Humane Society International – Mark discusses the talk he gave at the symposium on the huge growth in trophy hunting of rhinos in Africa and the laundering of animal parts via the trophy hunting industry. Follow HSI on Twitter @HSIGlobal
• 1:06:52 Joe Duckworth, chief executive of the League against Cruel Sports – Joe reflects on the symposium at the end of a very long day…Follow Joe on Twitter @LeagueJoe
• Ends

Gunning For Change: A Symposium on the Shooting Industry and Firearm Licensing

Date:  Thursday 25th April 2013
Venue: Central Hall Westminster, Storey’s Gate, London SW1H 9NH

• For details please go to Gunning For Change

In the short podcast below BirdLife Malta volunteer Robbie Spanring talks with another volunteer, Tom Hendry, about the first Pallid Harrier shot on Malta this year, and the number of injured birds brought into rehabilitation after Malta’s hunters had left them to die…

• BirdLife Malta press-release: Saturday 27th April

  Tomorrow, the second Pallid Harrier to be shot in Gozo in the space of a single week of this year’s spring hunting season will be taken to Sicilian wildlife rehabilitation center, Centro Recupero Fauna Selvatica, after being rescued by BirdLife Malta.

  The “near-threatened” Pallid Harrier, one of Europe’s rarest birds of prey, with as few as 310 pairs left breeding in the continent (1), is just one of 13 different protected bird species to have fallen victim to illegal hunting in Malta this spring. Others include Montagu’s and Marsh Harriers, Common Kestrels, Hobbies, Bee-eaters, Nightjars, Cuckoos and owls.

  

  In total, BirdLife Malta alone has recovered 18 injured or dead protected birds since the start of the hunting season, all of them confirmed by veterinary examination as having been shot.

  “This is already almost double the number recovered during last year’s spring hunting season, and there are still three days of the season left,” lamented BirdLife Malta’s Conservation and Policy officer, Chris Debono.

  “It is tragic to see so many protected birds gunned down by indiscriminate poachers, seemingly for no reason,” Mr Debono continued, “but we have at least been able to save a few.”

  On Wednesday evening, BirdLife staff successfully released a Nightjar at Is-Simar Nature Reserve in Xemxija. This intriguing bird is unusual in being nocturnal, feeding on moths and other night-flying insects and sleeping during the day.

  

  “In theory, Nightjars should be less vulnerable to illegal hunting than day-flying birds, but we have seen that many hunters are not respecting the 3pm curfew and have even witnessed incidents of hunters going into fields full of roosting birds of prey and shooting them in their sleep,” said Mr Debono.

  BirdLife Malta has also refuted the claim made by Parliamentary Secretary for Animal Welfare, Roderick Galdes, that there is no evidence to corroborate reports of widespread illegal hunting and trapping witnessed by Spring Watch volunteers during the spring hunting season. (3)

  “Apart from all the shot protected birds we have received, Spring Watch teams have recorded numerous other incidents, including protected birds being shot, illegal trapping and poaching inside nature reserves,” said BirdLife Malta’s Conservation Manager, Nicholas Barbara.

  “We will, of course, be publishing a summary of our findings after the end of the spring hunting season, as well as sending a detailed derogation monitoring report to the European Commission.”

  Yesterday, Mr Galdes told journalists at Malta Today that BirdLife’s criticism of the decision to draft Armed Forces of Malta soldiers in to help police the spring hunting derogation was “unjust”, claiming that the soldiers were being used to guard Nature Reserves in order to allow police to focus their efforts elsewhere.

  But BirdLife is sticking to its guns. “There are no Nature Reserves in some of the areas where AFM soldiers were deployed and we have not received confirmation that the men in question have received any special training in policing hunting and trapping,” said Mr Barbara.

To find out how to report illegal hunting visit www.birdlifemalta.org.

This conversation came about as a result of a chain of events that began with Lawrie posting a blog on the League’s website about this ‘season’s’ spring hunting on Malta, which was followed by a podcast with him here on Talking Naturally, which itself was followed by an interview with the Times of Malta in which the suggestion of perhaps staying away from Malta in protest at the hunting was floated.

What we discuss today are the well-rehearsed comments left by the hunting lobby in response to the Times of Malta article, which talk amongst other things about ‘legal’ quotas of Turtle Doves and Quail and that reports of other species being shot are always exaggerated, that it’s no-one else’s business what happens on Malta anyway and how dare the British criticise Malta when we ourselves hunt foxes and are preparing to kill our badgers. We’ll also look at what triggered Lawrie’s thoughts about staying away from Malta and nail the lie – as hunters like to suggest – that what really lies at the heart of campaigns against illegal hunting is just a dislike of Malta and the Maltese…

Shot Pallid Harrier, shot Golden Oriole, shot Grey Heron. Photos copyright BirdLife Malta.

The BirdLife Malta website: http://www.birdlifemalta.org

BirdLife Malta is part of an international network of fully co-ordinated ringing stations and National Ringing Schemes that have been indispensable for the efficient management of scientific bird ringing in Europe. We are the leading voice in ensuring that Malta’s hunters WILL conform with EU Directives and spring hunting will be banned in accordance with those directives. Birdlife Malta currently manages two nature reserves, Ghadira and Is-Simar, and also joint manages an afforestation project known as Foresta 2000 (located adjacent to Ghadira): the two nature reserves are both Ramsar-designated wetland areas and represent the largest free-standing sources of water in Malta.

• “The League is a charity that brings together people who want to stop cruelty to animals in the name of sport. Established in 1924, we successfully use lawful investigations, campaigning and lobbying to make a difference in the UK and around the world.”

  Website: http://www.league.org.uk
  Become a Member: http://www.league.org.uk/content/305/Become-a-Member
  Save Animals – Take Action: http://www.league.org.uk/content/357/Take-Action/

On a packed but enjoyable day, which included the African Bird Club’s AGM, six guest speakers talked on a range of subjects that encompassed topics from travelling to largely unvisited parts of Africa, an update on the status of the Liben Lark, a report from Libya on the isolated race of Lesser Crested Tern, an insight into work being done to recreate the lost avifuana of the Mascarenes, and a genetic study that promises to overturn the current phylogeny of Africa’s White-eyes (Zosteropidae).

Talking Naturally would like to thank Keith Betton, Chair of ABC, for the invitation and to the speakers (pictured below) – everyone of whom cheerfully made time for these interviews.

From left to right:Nigel Redman, Abdulmaula Hamza (and his son), Dr Paul Donald, Dr Siobhan Cox, and Jason Anderson [Dr Julian Hume had already left for another meeting]

• Please note, you can listen to all eight recordings by clicking the Podpress player above.

  If you would prefer to listen to each short interview in turn we have also uploaded them as separate files. Because of the way WordPress (the platform we use for Talking Naturally) and PodPress (our mp3 player of choice) interact we can not post direct links to all eight interviews we recorded on this one page. Instead clicking on the ‘Download’ link will allow you to download the file to your own computer, clicking ‘Play on Talking Naturally’ will open a new page on this website where the file can be played.

• In this first discussion Keith Betton, Chair of the African Bird Club, talks – against the backdrop of the muzak in a local cafe – about the excellent health of the ABC, his thoughts on birding in Africa and the day’s speakers, and explains the thinking behind this series of short podcasts.
  – MP3 112kbps. 5.45 MB. Running time 06:55 Download | Play on Talking Naturally

   

  In his talk ‘Birds and birdwatching in Rwanda – a gem in the heart of Africa‘, Jason Anderson, a teacher and passionate birdwatcher, gave an overview of a country riven by war in relatively recent times but that is now safe and offers birdwatchers three key habitats in a country just the size of Wales – the Albertine Rift, the East African savannah and the Victoria Basin papyrus swamps. Jason began our discussion with an overview of this exciting destination.
  – MP3 112kbps. 4.36 MB. Running time 05:21 Download | Play on Talking Naturally

   

  In her talk titled ‘Speciation in African White-eyes‘ Dr Siobhan Cox, described her work on the phylogeny of mainland Africa’s White-eyes. A morphologically similar group the relationships between the various described forms of White-eye have long been far from clear: for her PhD Siobhan used genetic techniques that – when the results are published – will completely revise our understanding of how these taxa have arisen. First of all though, congratulations were in order.
  – MP3 112kbps. 8.37 MB. Running time 10:26 Download | Play on Talking Naturally

   

  In his talk titled ‘Saving Ethiopia’s most threatened endemic bird in a constantly changing environment‘ Dr Paul Donald, Principal Conservation Scientist in RSPB‘s International Research Team, discussed the Critically Endangered Liben Lark, a species that appears to be on its way to becoming Africa’s first recorded mainland bird extinction. Paul began our conversation with the latest news concerning recent taxonomic developments in the small genus that contains the Liben Lark – heteromirafra.
  – MP3 112kbps. 10.14 MB. Running time 12:58 Download | Play on Talking Naturally

   

  In his talk titled ‘Libyan Lesser Crested Terns – a vulnerable and important population‘ Abdulmaula Hamza, the ABC’s Libyan representative and a PhD student at Hull University, talked about his work on the endangered emigrata form of Lesser Crested Tern which breeds in just a handful of sites in Libya and winters – presumably – off the West African coast. I’ve interviewed Abdulmaula before, in 2011, and we began our discussion with an update on his work since then.
  – MP3 112kbps. 8.30 MB. Running time 10:21 Download | Play on Talking Naturally

   

  In his talk ‘Reconstructing the lost world of the dodo; the extinct birds of the Mascarenes‘ Dr Julian Hume, author, artist, and research fellow at the Natural History Museum, described his work to piece together – using bones, skins in collections, and documented accounts – just which bird species have been lost in Mauritius, Reunion, and Rodrigues since their discovery in the 1600s. I began our conversation by asking Julian for an overview of the methods he’s been using to reconstruct the avian history of the Mascarenes.
  – MP3 112kbps. 6.14 MB. Running time 07:39 Download | Play on Talking Naturally

   

  In his talk ‘In Archer’s Footsteps: Birding in the Republic of Somaliland‘ Nigel Redman, publisher and tour leader with Birdquest, described the birds and landscapes of one of the least known regions in Africa, Somaliland, which lies in northwestern Somalia and is bordered – in the south and west – by Ethiopia. Nigel begins our discussion with an overview of a location that even the most intrepid birders may not have considered visiting.
  – MP3 112kbps. 5.46 MB. Running time 06:48 Download | Play on Talking Naturally

   

  In this final discussion Duncan McDonald, who, with his partner Pieter Wessels, is the African-born owner of Wildsounds, talks about the African Bird Club (which he co-founded), his love of Africa, and WildSounds’ role as a BirdLife Species Champion for the Critically Endangered Spoon-billed Sandpiper. We spoke shortly after Duncan had presented a cheque for £400.00 to ABC’s conservation fund.
  – MP3 112kbps. 9.95 MB. Running time 12:24 Download | Play on Talking Naturally

The BirdLife Malta website: http://www.birdlifemalta.org

BirdLife Malta is part of an international network of fully co-ordinated ringing stations and National Ringing Schemes that have been indispensable for the efficient management of scientific bird ringing in Europe. We are the leading voice in ensuring that Malta’s hunters WILL conform with EU Directives and spring hunting will be banned in accordance with those directives. Birdlife Malta currently manages two nature reserves, Ghadira and Is-Simar, and also joint manages an afforestation project known as Foresta 2000 (located adjacent to Ghadira): the two nature reserves are both Ramsar-designated wetland areas and represent the largest free-standing sources of water in Malta.

• “The League is a charity that brings together people who want to stop cruelty to animals in the name of sport. Established in 1924, we successfully use lawful investigations, campaigning and lobbying to make a difference in the UK and around the world.”

  Website: http://www.league.org.uk
  Become a Member: http://www.league.org.uk/content/305/Become-a-Member
  Save Animals – Take Action: http://www.league.org.uk/content/357/Take-Action/

Disclaimer: This podcast has been produced by Talking Naturally to support conservation. No fees or benefits of any kind have been charged or accepted by Talking Naturally.

The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew

The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew was founded in 1759, and declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2003. Alongside Kew Gardens in London, Kew has a second country garden based at Wakehurst which is the home of Kew’s Millennium Seed Bank. As well as being one of London’s top visitor attractions, Kew is also a world leader in plant science and conservation. Our work helps to discover and describe the world’s plant and fungal diversity, safeguard the world’s plant life for our future, promote the sustainable use of plants and inspire an appreciation of plants and the environment. Find out more about our Breathing Planet programme.

Throughout its history, the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew has made important contributions to increasing the understanding of the plant kingdom with many benefits for mankind. Today it is still first and foremost a scientific institution. With its collections of living and preserved plants, of plant products and botanical information, it forms an encyclopaedia of knowledge about the plant kingdom.

About Sam Jones:

Sam Jones is an ornithologist and naturalist at the start of his career in conservation biology. Since his graduation in 2010 he has travelled widely on an eclectic array of research, expeditions and fieldwork from single-species studies in the meadows of Friesland to compiling ornithological inventories and working on some of the worlds rarest primates in the cloudforests of the Andean east slope.

He can be contacted at samuel.ei.jones -AT- gmail.com

• Do you have something serious, humorous, or informative to say about conservation or animal welfare but don’t have your own platform to say it from? Get in touch and we’ll help you reach the many hundreds of people who visit Talking Naturally every week!

Bo Beolens (aka ‘The Grumpy Old Birder’ alias ‘Fatbirder’) has been birding off and on for more than half a century – one day he hopes to be good at it. In 1998 he discovered the internet, but was frustrated by not being able to find what he was looking for – so created ‘Fatbirder’ to fill the gap. In 2001 he had the same frustrating finding no organisation to represent disabled birders interests he set up the ‘disabled birders
association’, which recently changes its name to ‘Birding For All’ which now has around 800 members. He has always considered writing his one skill and after a fun time trying to compile a list for his website that some had suggested on birds named after people he and a colleague wrote ‘Whose Bird’ which A&C Black published. While this is just about vernacular names the research had so many overlaps that they and another colleague began to compile similar works on mammals, reptiles and amphibians. Johns Hopkins University have so far published both ‘The Eponym Dictionary of Mammals’ and ‘The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles’. Bo also offers arranged tours for couples and small groups through his ‘Anytime Tours’ website and has recently launched the webs’ first ‘comparison’ website for birding tours ‘Birders Travel’. Anglers now have a similar web resource in ‘Fatfisherman’ and photographers are catered for by Bo’s son on ‘Fatphotographer’.

Disclaimer: This podcast has been produced by Talking Naturally to support conservation. No fees or benefits of any kind have been charged or accepted by Talking Naturally.

Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust:
Gerald Durrell started out with a vision to create a stationary ark, a reservoir in which animals in need of protection could be kept and bred. Today, the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, headquartered in Jersey, has made a difference to more than 30 endangered species worldwide, and continues to maintain a record unparalleled by any organisation of its size. Durrell today works in some of the most threatened environments on the planet and has over 50 active field projects in 14 countries around the world, with a focus on critically endangered species and highly threatened island ecosystems.

About Sam Jones:

Sam Jones is an ornithologist and naturalist at the start of his career in conservation biology. Since his graduation in 2010 he has travelled widely on an eclectic array of research, expeditions and fieldwork from single-species studies in the meadows of Friesland to compiling ornithological inventories and working on some of the worlds rarest primates in the cloudforests of the Andean east slope.

He can be contacted at samuel.ei.jones -AT- gmail.com

• Do you have something serious, humorous, or informative to say about conservation or animal welfare but don’t have your own platform to say it from? Get in touch and we’ll help you reach the many hundreds of people who visit Talking Naturally every week!

Bo Beolens (aka ‘The Grumpy Old Birder’ alias ‘Fatbirder’) has been birding off and on for more than half a century – one day he hopes to be good at it. In 1998 he discovered the internet, but was frustrated by not being able to find what he was looking for – so created ‘Fatbirder’ to fill the gap. In 2001 he had the same frustrating finding no organisation to represent disabled birders interests he set up the ‘disabled birders
association’, which recently changes its name to ‘Birding For All’ which now has around 800 members. He has always considered writing his one skill and after a fun time trying to compile a list for his website that some had suggested on birds named after people he and a colleague wrote ‘Whose Bird’ which A&C Black published. While this is just about vernacular names the research had so many overlaps that they and another colleague began to compile similar works on mammals, reptiles and amphibians. Johns Hopkins University have so far published both ‘The Eponym Dictionary of Mammals’ and ‘The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles’. Bo also offers arranged tours for couples and small groups through his ‘Anytime Tours’ website and has recently launched the webs’ first ‘comparison’ website for birding tours ‘Birders Travel’. Anglers now have a similar web resource in ‘Fatfisherman’ and photographers are catered for by Bo’s son on ‘Fatphotographer’.