Hedgehog voted number one Icon of the Environment

The humble hedgehog – immortalised by the character “Mrs Tiggy-winkle” in Beatrix Potter’s classic children’s books – has been voted by the public as England and Wales’ number one Icon of the Environment. As part of the Environment Agency’s 10th anniversary celebrations people were asked to take part in an ICON of the Environment poll and to nominate and vote for their favourite environmental icon, at the official ICONS – A Portrait of England website.

From a field strewn with more than 70 nominations, the hedgehog emerged victorious ahead of the otter, red squirrel, and oak tree, with bluebell woods rounding out the top five.

Midge Forecast website updated

Three years ago I blogged about a website to help avoid the midge in Scotland. The Scottish Midge Forecast website is back, for its fifth year, with a brand-new look, sponsored by Smidge midge deterrent (this post is not an endorsement of the product, though I do plan to try it).

The website brings you the power of Google mapping to find your way around Scotland's midges, and it is also available through the social media below:

Hedgehogs released into the wild after dieting success

Fourteen hedgehogs that became too fat to protect themselves from predators are being returned to the wild after being put on a strict diet. Hedgehogs usually live off their fat reserves in the winter, but the creatures at at the Wildlife Rescue Centre in Fife had become so big (after over-indulging on cat food) they were unable to curl into a ball to hide from predators. The 14 hedgehogs were among 70 that were rescued by animal welfare officers from the effects of this year's harsh winter.

See also: other blog posts about hedgehogs.

Wild Vision Tour Autumn-Winter 2009/2010

John Beatty is widely acclaimed as one of the most exciting and stimulating nature, travel and adventure photographers to have emerged in recent years. With over twenty years of assignments to his name, John’s work has taken him from the peaks of all the Greater Ranges to the American Deserts, to the teeming wildlife of East Africa and the wonder of the Galapagos Islands.

This autumn/winter he will be touring with his show Wild Vision: Images and Stories from the Wilderness. He will be appearing at Loughborough Town Hall on Thursday 4th February 2010.

Sounds of summer

The chirp of crickets and grasshoppers is overtaking native songbirds as the sound of the British summer, reports the Guardian today.

Wildlife podcasts

BBC Wildlife Magazine is the world's best-selling natural history and environmental magazine. The website includes resources, competitions, and a monthly podcast reflecting on recent wildlife news.

The RSPB also offer a monthly award-winning podcast: Nature's Voice. Each podcast brings features, interviews and news of birds and wildlife, from back gardens to the Sumatran rainforest.

During 2008/09 the National Trust offered a monthly wildlife podcast service looking at what is going on around England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Birdsong Radio lives on

Did you ever listen to Birdsong radio? Unfortunately the DAB Station went off air on 1st June. However, you can order the CD for offline access, or listen to the peaceful sounds of Dawn Chorus via your computer, using the player on http://www.birdsongradio.com/. You can also become a Facebook Fan or follow the service on Twitter.

Round-up of animal stories

• City birds sing higher than country cousins: birds living in cities sing higher-pitched songs than country-dwelling birds in order to be heard above the urban din.
• Beavers return after 400-year gap: beavers brought over from Norway for a reintroduction programme have been released into the wild in Argyll.
• Wallaby spotted in Cornish garden: a wallaby with a baby joey has been photographed hopping around the back garden of a house in Cornwall.
• Baby anteater finds its feet: a baby anteater has made its public debut at an aquarium in Tokyo.

Springwatch

Springwatch is back on the TV this evening for its annual three week run. Checkout the website for:

• Breathing Spaces - content that you can download, print out, and take with you into the great outdoors (pocket guides, MP3s etc);
• Do One Thing - lots of little things to do to make a big difference for nature;
• Springwatch Flickr group - share your pictures of spring or just browse beautiful images of the season's best flora and fauna.

Bluebells in Charnwood

It is the peak time for viewing bluebells in and around Charnwoood at present. The following sites are recommended if you want to wander walk through bluebell-carpeted woodlands: Serpentine Wood on the Calke Abbey Estate, Outwoods in Charnwood near Loughborough, Jackson’s Bank in Staffordshire or Staunton Ridgeway through Spring Wood Nature Reserve, near Staunton Harold.

See :

- Rolling Out The Blue Carpet in The National Forest

- The National Forest leaflet showing where to see wildlife, including wildflowers.

Ten wild corners of Britain & Ireland

Want to get far away from the madding crowds over the Bank Holiday? Here's advice on ten favourite "wilderness spots" in Britain and Ireland from the Wanderlust website. "A few special places on these busy islands where it’s still possible to feel as if you're the only person in the world".

Big Garden Birdwatch: results

Over the Big Garden Birdwatch 2009 weekend 73 different species were recorded. Well over half a million people took part in the 30th year of the Birdwatch, making this the biggest bird survey in the world. This year's survey took place on a chilly weekend and garden birds are heavily reliant on our supplementary feeding in the cold - it seems we were suitably paid back for our efforts. See the full results on the RSPB website.

Many of the birds that we're seeing will visit any habitat that provides food. Gardens will actually become even more important for wildlife if some areas of the countryside become poorer sources of food. This year's survey took place on a chilly weekend and garden birds are heavily reliant on our supplementary feeding in the cold - it seems we were suitably paid back for our efforts.

Listen to wildlife

The British wildlife recordings collection offers the opportunity to listen to over 600 recordings of wildlife from around the UK. Captured by three British wildlife enthusiasts from the 1960s to the 1990s, most are published online for the first time.

The selection of sound recordings of all kinds of wildlife from around Britain is from the British Library's Sound Archive's unrivalled natural sounds collection. Made for the most part in nature reserves and wild locations, the recordings often have special significance in documenting ancient habitats that are gradually vanishing.

Some habitats continue to dwindle under the pressure of development: peat bogs, old Caledonian forest and lowland heaths are all slowly disappearing. In others, wildlife populations have increased: on the Scottish moors, for example, as a consequence of the extensive re-planting of forests there. Every shift in the balance alters the sound of the countryside. The recordings selected here include not only the familiar noises of country gardens and suburban parks, but also the increasingly elusive cries of some of the country''s rarest creatures. Together, they paint a fascinating sound picture of Britain''s ever evolving landscape. Further information here.

Big Garden Birdwatch 2009

The Big Garden Birdwatch is the world's biggest bird survey, providing a vital snapshot of the UK's birds each winter. Help celebrate the Big Garden Birdwatch's 30th birthday over the weekend of 24-25 January.

All you need to do is watch your garden or local park for an hour on either Saturday 24 or Sunday 25 January 2009. Simply record the highest number of each species seen in your garden (not flying over) at any one time. You can download and print the counting sheet to help you keep a tally of what you see.

Checkout the Big Garden Birdwatch website for more resources.

Songbirds 'sing from hymn sheet'

The BBC reports that songbirds "learn to sing from a hymn sheet in their head", according to a new study. Swiss researchers have studied Zebra Finches and believe the birds use different regions of the brain for this: one for an internal recording of how the birds ought to be singing and another area which seems to enable the birds to identify mistakes in their songs. The research could also shed light on how humans learn to speak.

Don't forget the Hogalogue!

If you are looking for a Christmas gift for someone interested in hedgehogs, then check out the catalogue from the British Hedgehog Preservation Society - called The Hogalogue - with goods such as hedgehog food, hedgehog houses, cards, and books.

Alternatively, you could give them A Prickly Affair: My Life with Hedgehogs‏ by Hugh Warwick, which you may have heard plugged on Radio 4 and which is described as "a highly original and entertaining book".

August means animal stories in the news

Bird-feeding may be banned in Berwick-upon-Tweed but there have been more positive wildlife- and animal-related stories in the media recently:

• A night out with tag-team hedgehog
• Military penguin becomes a 'Sir'
• Wild dolphins tail-walk on water
• Three-legged dog loves train ride
• Animal magnetism

Animal Olympics

I had been hoping that the 2008 Olympics might be an excuse for the BBC to show again two "documentaries" from earlier Games. In the run-up to the 2004 Olympic Games, BBC One's Animal Games proved to be a big hit with viewers. "Athletes" from the mammal, fish, bird, herptile (reptiles and amphibians) and insect worlds competed in human events. All competitors were scaled to human size to allow them to compete against each other. This was followed by the Animal Winter Olympics (which doesn't appear to be available as a DVD) in 2006.

The programmes were light-hearted but informative. An online photo gallery from Animal Games is available.

Bird-feeding ban!

This is hard to believe but council staff in Berwick-upon-Tweed issued a public health warning to a retired couple telling them to stop feeding birds in their garden. See: RSPB supports couple warned not to feed birds

The “Bambi Factor”

Disney films have rarely been seen as contributing much more to environmental awareness than the creation of a clutch of cuddly talking animals to the cause. However, a new book by a researcher at Cambridge University is suggesting that, far from just cute, Disney icons like Bambi, Nemo and Baloo are the all-singing, unsung heroes of the green lobby.

According to academic David Whitley, Disney’s screen fables have been helping successive generations of children to develop “a critical awareness of contested environmental issues” ever since Snow White in 1937. Far from simply offering sheer escapism, he says the films carry important messages about our relationship with the natural world. Conservation is so central to Bambi, for example, that the film is credited with having inspired many 1960s environmental activists at an early age. Read the full story.