Hello and welcome back to Global Birdfair 2024: the final day. Can’t stop, we’ve got an appointment with Leica for a nature walk. Bye!
Just kidding, but we did have to move quite rapidly for that Leica nature walk. Anyway, Harry Read, handy with a camera, was leading another nature walk alongside Elle Kaye, birder and taxidermist and Katie from Wild Finca, sustainable living advocate. Now you have all the job titles, lets go on a walk. We set off on the same path as yesterday, again spending time with the Whitethroats in the exact same Hawthorn bush.
Green Woodpeckers and Chiffchaffs formed a duet as we found ourselves at the vantage point, over the meadow and the vastness of Rutland Water. A Kestrel, eager to please, hovered so close that you could see every little black spot on its gingery back. Kestrels are the definition of work smarter, not harder. They can track better than Steve Backshall or Bear Grylls, due to their ability to find and follow the UV light in a vole’s urine trail. Mind-blowing! The Common Terns were back too, surfing the air with their needle like wings.
And surprisingly, it didn’t take long for the king of Rutland to rear its head again. First its gull-like form emerged from behind the treeline, floating from invisible strings. Its movements are never wrong, each one calculated to be clinical and precise. Even just flying requires the utmost decency. Luckily, the avian monarch possesses that in bucketfuls. Its black, white and brown plumage gives the impression of smart and regal, dressed for a wedding or a grand opening. Even the way it kills requires dignity, the hover, the dive and the pinpoint accuracy to kill the fish on impact, and carry it away in one fluid swoop. Is there another bird that has a better claim to the throne? Surely it could only be the Osprey.
As the path led us down to the banks of Rutland Water, it brought us adjacent to the meadow. Curiosity led to stealing into the meadow, grass brushing against bare skin, a pleasant tickle in the warm air. But before I could get a tickle from one such blade of grass, a red object caught my eye. Two Red Soldier Beetles, clasped in each other’s legs, clinging to each other with passion while forming their own circle of love. I think you know by now what I’m talking about. Harry scooped up the two beetles in his hands, careful not to disturb their clearly intimate relationship. That’s right. They were mating.
But I was distracted temporarily as there, on a bed of green, lay a feather barred with two different shades of brown; on more buffy, and one clearly darker. It turns out that Elle is a renowned taxidermist and expert in feather ID, having got up close and personal with many avian creatures. Don’t worry, she only works with birds that died of natural causes! She confirmed my train of thought. A Kestrel feather. Could it be property of the bird we had witnessed just 20 minutes ago. In fact, I held that thought, because here came that very male again, flying over our heads before hovering in a distant corner of the meadow. I must admit, I was glad I found that feather. It was only small, but beautiful. So beautiful.
And now we returned to the Leica stand, feather in tow, to the news of a baby Cuckoo being fed by a female Dunnock right next to where we had just stood, by the Whitethroat nest. Naturally, news spreads like wildfire at the Birdfair, and Harry and Elle both headed off after saying goodbye. I had enjoyed walking with them and Katie, because I feel like there was a certain understanding between us after a while. We asked questions of each other (friendly quiz-based format, nothing nasty) and ended up identifying each other’s sightings. It had been another successful nature walk at the Birdfair!
We moved off to explore the marquees a little deeper, as we didn’t really do anything detailed yesterday. Birda was a good one to talk to, the new app rivalling ebird and bird-track. I have to admit to the fact that I use all three! Ebird I mainly use to keep track of life lists, bird-track I use because its run by the BTO and goes straight to a county recorder for data monitoring, and I really like the social media aspect of Birda, so I use that to interact with other birders in a huge global community. They’ve also got some really clever Star Wars slogans, used for their May the 4th recording challenges. ‘Obi Swan Kenobi’ and ‘Darth Wader’ really hit home!
Birdlife International also had a fun game that sent you on a wild goose chase to every corner of the show. You had to get a stamp from around 10 different stands, all partners of Birdlife International, and put them in your ‘Flyways Passport’. If you completed it all, you got a free pin badge. But Birdlife are one of the main driving forces in conservation and combatting climate change on the planet. They bring together over 100 organisations worldwide to form a tight-knit partnership. Their philosophy is that decline in bird populations shows a wider loss of habitat, pollination and other populations. In other words, they can be an early warning sign to any damage that is to be done in the near future. And this helps them to initiate conservation efforts before its too late.
There were scores of other exhibitors at the Birdfair, all plying their trade and crucial work at the world’s biggest annual birding hub. But for now, we were back off to Zeiss again for an Osprey Walk with none other than Toby Carter, keen birder and Zeiss ambassador. Zeiss had played a huge role in my Global Birdfair 2024 experience, and it looked like that was set to continue. I know this is the one actual Osprey Walk we’ve done this weekend, but honestly more of the same and the walk will be a success.
We had a larger party than the previous two we’d been on, but that was no deterrent for us or the Osprey. In fact, as soon as we reached that same vantage point, over the bird came, their majesty the Osprey. Dignified, regal, majestic, magnificent. Enchanting. It flew the same direction. In over the Water towards us, over our heads and then over the golf course and out of sight. It was hard to tell if it was the same bird because we couldn’t tell if it had a ring or not from this distance, but there was every chance it could be the same bird from this morning, or even yesterday. Well, that’s a job done. Osprey walk heralds an Osprey.
There was little else bird wise from then on, so exploring the meadow became a fixture for the younger people there. Crickets and grasshoppers, huge ones, sat on the stems, chirping away to form an endless white noise. No let-up. There were so many that if one dropped out for mere moments, the collective sound of its counterparts masked any blip in the buzz. Catching them proved to be a little harder than anticipated, but it was definitely worth it when you could see them up close. As widespread and common as they are, you can’t deny that they’re really cool insects!
Looping back around the meadow, we rejoined our original path and were met with the site of two wheeling Red Kites, their forked tails, rusty red colours and angled wings distinctive from this angle and distance. According to Toby, they’d been flying and calling above the same cluster of trees for a while now, and it made sense that they must have a nest there. Right on cue, their resounding whistling began, ending in a ‘pluuuuu’ sound as they descended before rising again. Both the sound and the movement of the birds was enchanting, and the scene instantaneously portrayed serenity, calming a racing mind.
On the way back through we came across the Whitethroat pair once again, flitting across the hawthorn bush by the gate. This particular couple and their nest had proved a mainstay of Global Birdfair 2024, and I was glad that their scratchy warbles had punctuated each and every nature walk we’d embarked on during this weekend. Back at the Zeiss stand, we had one last look around before setting off toward the Eyebrook Wild Bird Feed stand, in order to purchase a new feeder to replace our old stalwart that had been destroyed by the resident Grey Squirrels. Then, we indulged ourselves with the amazing array of collectable RSPB pin badges on offer, before returning to grab a bite to eat for the drive home.
Global Birdfair 2024 had been an incredible experience, going above and beyond my already sky-high expectations. A birder’s Glastonbury, many people call it, and I can definitely agree with that comparison. By scale, yes, but also by the huge array of events, activities and talks on show. Not to mention the few hundred exhibitors there from the ecotourism and travel industries, to the conservation organisations, artists and optics companies. Add to that the lectures and ringing demonstration, and dare I say Global Birdfair is, in my opinion, miles better than Glastonbury or any music festival for that matter. Thank you Global Birdfair. Its been unforgettable.
The Bovey Birder 