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Driving to Taroona on a misty autumnal night recently I was struck by a sense of déjà vu, a journey that was coming full circle. As a cub reporter a half century previously I cut my journalist teeth on the type of community meeting I was about to attend. Many men of my age speak of a misspent youth frequenting snooker parlours; I spent mine covering community gatherings like garden clubs with my reporter’s notebook. During summer weekends it was garden shows along with the … [Read more...] about A journey back in time

Migrating Tassie fantails have been captivating twitchers on the other side of Bass Strait this autumn. Victorian birders often gather at this time of the year along their southern coast to watch the arrivals of not just fantails but other Tasmanian-born birds before the migrants make their perilous journeys further north. On some occasions, with favourable weather conditions, there are “waves” of the birds to rival the spectacle of more famous migration sites in the Gulf … [Read more...] about ‘Waves’ of fantails head north

I stalked one of the ubiquitous “little brown birds” on a recent road trip through News Zealand’s spell-binding Southern Alps. The mountains formed a backdrop against the blue waters of Lake Tekapo but I ignored the stunning beauty of the snowy peaks, painted pink in the rising sun at dawn, to focus on the bird flitting around a low bush. The bird promised to be my first New Zealand species, although the trip was not primarily about birdwatching, I was on my way to the … [Read more...] about Hopeless hunt for NZ’s native birds

The wetlands of southern Tasmania have been described as the “litmus test” for rapidly decreasing migratory shorebird populations across their range and a look at BirdLife Tasmania’s surveys proves the point. The local affiliate of the national bird conservation body, BirdLife Australia, has the oldest data sets of shorebird populations and their records spanning more than half a century highlight the catastrophe enmeshing our wading birds. A presentation by a Birdlife … [Read more...] about Waders missing from the mudflats

Birdwatching is good for body and soul. I might be considered an evangelist when it comes to promoting the joys of watching our feathered friends but this is more than a personal flight of fancy. The latest research into the health of seniors in the United States suggests that developing an interest in birds can slow the ageing process. Also, I read on the Talking Point pages of the Mercury earlier this month that loneliness can be a very big problem among the ageing … [Read more...] about Twitchers stay young