The pre-sale estimate for this six-volume 1891 set of Morris's British Birds is that they will fetch between £150 and £200 when they go under the hammer as Lot 164 at the sale to be conducted by Dominic Winter auction house at their sale to be held at Cirencester in Gloucestershire on Wednesday November 4.
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| The last Slender-billed Curlew - photographed by Chris Gomersall - before the species was declared extinct |
ALTHOUGH he could not have known it at the time, Chris Gomersall's encounter with a Slender-billed Curlew on a marshland in North Africa was an historic moment not only in his own career but also in ornithological history.
The many photographs he took of the bird 31 years ago are almost certainly the last before the species went globally extinct - and was officially confirmed as such in November 2024.
At the October meeting of Grimsby RSPB Group, Chris described how he came to be within 45 metres of the bird that fateful day in February,1995.
It was early morning, and he had been taken by a Moroccan bird guide to the Moulay-Bouselham lagoon - adjacent to a strawberry field - at Merja Zerga, south of Agadir in Morocco.
The previous day the duo and one other had been out in a boat looking unsuccessfully for one or more examples of the bird.
That following morning, some playful and inquisitive children were also present, and the guide, Hassan, kept them diverted to allow Chris to study the rare wader undisturbed after it was distantly spotted on the edge of the lagoon.
"So as not to disturb it, I crept head down through a growth of lupins until I had reached a good vantage point," he told his audience. "At first, it was quite distant, but, as it grew in confidence, it gradually came to within 45 metres.
"I spent the next 90 or so minutes observing the bird as I worked my way through more than four rolls of film."
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| Chris Gomersall - he crept through lupins to secure his momentous photographs |
Chris revealed that he had not been in Morocco specifically to look for the Slender-billed Curlew.
As a staff photographer/researcher with the RSPB, he had been on an assignment to study the Northern Bald Ibis.
While he was delighted at his encounter with the vanishingly rare curlew, he could not have known that the species' ultimate fate was extinction.
It was fortunate that he kept most of the photographs - many of which he showed in his Grimsby presentation - when he could easily have thrown all but one or two away.
What he reckons to be his best photograph of the bird has now become well-known featuring on the cover of British Birds journal and even the high-circulation French daily newspaper, Le Monde .
As far as he is aware, Hassan is still working as a guide at the same place, but he himself his never been back.
Given the fate of the species, Chris' photograph is unique.
This would cease to be the case if the bird was ever to turn up anew, for instance, in its breeding grounds in Siberia or again wintering in North Africa.
Even so, Chris says no one would be more delighted than he if it were to be rediscovered.
During his fascinating talk, Chris outlined the history of Slender-billed Curlew research, both before and since he took his famous photograph, referring to earlier photographs, including ones by Richard Porter, Yemen in 1984, and by the dedicated French conservation pioneer, Michel Brosselin, who tragically lost his life, aged 43, when he was trampled by a bull on his wife's farm.
Then there was the controversial bird spotted at Druridge Bay in Northumberland in early May 1998. This was thought to be the first and only British record of the species.
However, following an in-depth review of photographs and descriptions, the 'identification'- was subsequently deemed 'not proven'.
Some 15 years later, to the disappointment of many who had travelled to twitch it, Slender-billed Curlew was removed from the British List.
Experts decreed that the bird in question was most likely to have been a juvenile Eurasian Curlew.
During his talk, Chris also described his examination of a collection of of skins of dead Slender-billed Curlews that are held at the National History Museum's ornithological library in Tring, Hertfordshire.
He went on to the case of the stuffed bird that, in April last year, sold for £5,000 - more than 10 times the guide price - at Tennants auction house in Leyburn, North Yorkshire.
He also spoke of a University of Munster project which involved analysing minute chemical food and water traces taken from the feathers of museum skins to see whether they could reveal the former breeding locations of Slender-billed Curlews.
The write-up subsequently published in the journal Bird Conservation International indicated that the place to look for any surviving breeding birds were the steppes of northern Kazakhstan and southern Russia.
But when, in the late 1990s, researchers from Glasgow University went to investigate, no birds were found.
The Slender-billed Curlew was once relatively common, so why its demise?
Could it have been largely due to Nikita Kruschev who, as president of the Soviet Union between 1958 and 1964, decreed that vast tracts of the birds' marshy breeding grounds in Russia and elsewhere should be drained to make way for vegetable and cereal crops?
In naming Kruschev, Chris was not pointing the finger of blame. He noted that prioritisation of food production has long been a policy of governments across the world, including our own.
Has he ever been back to that lagoon in Morocco, if only for old time's sake?
No, but, as far as Chris is aware, Hassan is still working as a guide at the same place - and doubtless hoping against hope that he might one day again see a Slender-billed Curlew?
See also: www.Grimsbynews.blogspot.com
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| The stuffed specimen that sold for £5,000 at a Yorkshire auction in April 2025 |
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| The huge Rothbury Estate boasts many magnificent views |
THE Wildlife Trusts have hit their £30-million target to purchase the expansive Rothbury Estate in Northumberland.
That has opened the chapter for a host of nature conservation initiatives including the introduction of Golden Eagles and . . . European Bison.
This heart-shaped estate, stretching over 3,800 hectares, holds spectacular views, hidden valleys and rivers alive with birds, fish and invertebrates
The Simonside Hills, famed for their rugged beauty, offer spectacular views across the Coquet Valley and all the way to the North Sea.
The estate had been in the ownership of the Percy family - the Dukes of Northumberland - for almost eight centuries and now it is in the care of The Wildlife Trusts for the benefit of people and wildlife.
Breeding birds include Skylark, Cuckoo and Merlin, plus, in the riverside woodlands, Wood Warbler, Redstart and Pied Flycatcher.
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| Shaped like a heart, the estate hosts breeding Curlews, Skylarks and many songbirds |
Born on March 25, 1810, Francis Orpen Morris was an Anglo-Irish parson-naturalist and author of many books on natural history and heritage buildings, plus some for children. He was a pioneer of the movement to protect birds from the plume trade and was a co-founder of the Plumage League. He died on February 10, 1893 and is buried at Nunburnholme in the East Riding of Yorkshire. Below is an extract from his account in A History of British Birds of the Great Grey Shrike, both in the wild and in confinement.
The Great Grey Shrike us is found in Denmark, Russia, Norway, Sweden, Lapland, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Holland and other countries of Europe, as also in all the temperate parts of North America.
In England, specimens have been procured in Yorkshire (one on April 18, 1849), Cumberland, Northumberland, Durham, Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire, Worcestershire, Dorset Devonshire, Wiltshire, Sussex, Surrey, Cheshire, Essex, Staffordshire, Derbyshire, Bedfordshire, Warwickshire and Kent.
In Ireland, in the counties of Down, Antrim, Sligo, Londonderry, Westmeath, Dublin, Tipperary, Waterford, Cork and the Queen's County.
A few have been met with in Scotland.
In the Orkney and Shetland Islands, it has hitherto been non inventus.
This species is sufficiently scarce in this country to make it a valuable addition to a collection; and at the same time not so extremely rare as to render its acquisition almost hopeless.
It frequents groves and forests, wooded hedgerows and parks.
During migration it may be seen perched upon some hillock or hovering in the air, then descending in pursuit of its prey when discovered within reach.
F.O. Morris - parson-naturalist and author
These birds may be readily tamed, even if captured when adult, and will come to a call.
When in confinement, they follow out their natural bent, adapted to the circumstances they are in, affixing their prey between the wires of the cage, doing so from evident choice that they may pull it from between them, and leaving it there when they do not require it for immediate consumption.
"This bird," says William Yarrell, "is used by falconers abroad during autumn and winter when trapping falcons.
The shrike is fastened to the ground, and, by screaming loudly, gives notice to the falconer, who is concealed, of the approach of a hawk.
It was on this account, therefore, called 'excubitor' - the 'sentinel.'
Mr. Knapp, the author of the excellent Journal of A Naturalist, notes that it seldom conceals itself in a bush, but sitting perched on some upper spray, in an open situation, heedful of danger or watching for its prey.
Another author relates that, in Russia, it is trained to catch small birds, and is valuable for its destruction of rats and mice.
It is a very courageous bird, attacking fearlessly those that are much its superior in size, even eagles, it is said, and will not allow a hawk, Carrion Crow or Magpie to approach its nest with impunity.
Bishop Stanley, having kept one awhile in confinement, was soon glad to get rid of it as the sound of its voice at once hushed to silence the notes of his choir of birds.
Their antipathy when at large is shown at times by teasing it in concert, as they do an owl, though at other times they surround him without any apparent fear.
Montagu, who kept several, found that at the end of two months they lose the affection for each other which they seem to exhibit in the wild state, and quarrel and fight even until one is slain.
The flight of this species is interrupted and irregular.
When perched, the tail is in constant motion.
Its food consists of shrews and mice, small birds and occasionally even Grey Partridges, Fieldfares and other larger birds, lizards, frogs, as also the larger insects and grasshoppers.
They are said to resort to the same thorn on which to fasten their captures.
In carrying a mouse or a bird some distance, they have been seen to shift it alternately from the bill to the mouth, as an alleviation of the weight.
In the spring they are noisy. It is said that they imitate the notes of small birds for the purpose of luring them to their destruction, but I cannot myself entertain this supposition.
Meyer says the call of this bird sounds like the words "hack, shack", while "truewee" is one of its spring notes; it is also said to sing very pleasingly a sort of warbling song.'
Mr. Knapp says that these birds breed annually near his residence, in the neighbourhood of Thornbury which, I believe, is in Gloucestershire;
The Rev. N. Constantine Strickland says it also nests at the foot of the Prestbury hills, near Cheltenham.
Lewin has said that he had seen them in Wiltshire and had no doubt of their breeding there.
While the hen is sitting, the male is very vociferous if any one approaches the nest, and, when the young are hatched, both exhibit a clamorous anxiety which often defeats their object by betraying their callow brood to the callous bird-nester.
The young indeed themselves join in the untoward imprudence.
The nest is built in trees, hedges or bushes some height above the ground.
It is large and ill-concealed, but well put together and is composed of grass, hay, small roots, stalks, and moss, then lined with wool or down.
The eggs are four or five, but sometimes, it is said, as many as six or seven.
They are of a greyish, bluish or yellowish white ground colour, spotted at the thicker end with different shades of grey and light brown, forming an irregular band.
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| A driver with the coach company took this snap to illustrate the issue |
Double-parking by Nutcracker-twitching birders has been blamed for disruption to local transport services operated by Sanders in the Mundesley area of North Norfolk. The bird, which turned up in a garden last Friday, was still present today (Wednesday) and reported to be feeding on wasps.
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| Ironically, this Sanders coach features on its flank five birds in flight. Could it be that they might just be . . . Nutcrackers? |
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| The moorland habitat earmarked for the controversial project |
FORMER England test cricket captain Ian Botham claims moorland windfarms are a menace to birds.
In a contribution to The Daily Telegraph, he expresses particular scorn for proposals to build one of 23 turbines - each 200 metres high - on the top of Hope Moor near Barnard Castle in Co Durham.
He writes "These monster turbines would be a nightmare for the endangered birds that flourish on these moors.
"Their habitat would be destroyed, their lives disturbed by constant noise and blade tips slicing through the air at over 170 mph."
Lord Botham continues: "They would be a disaster for people, too.
"I have spent my life walking across these moors. I love them.
"These mega-turbines must be stopped.
"If you care about the desecration of our environment, please join me in resisting this stupidity."
In an earlier piece for the Daily Mail, Lord Botham identified the three species - all raptors - that he fears might be most at risk: Hen Harrier, Merlin and Peregrine.
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| At risk? Lapwing |
Breeding Curlews, Lapwings and possibly other wading birds - plus Meadow Pipits, Twite, Linnets and Grey Wagtails - are also believed to frequent this peatland habitat.
The consortium behind the venture, which is in the North Pennines, is called simply Hope Moor Wind Farm. The member-companies are not known.
It states: "We take the potential impact of Hope Moor on birds and other local wildlife very seriously, and we are committed to protecting and enhancing biodiversity onsite.
"Research indicates that windfarms have a minimal impact on bird habitats and flight patterns, particularly when viewed alongside wider environmental pressures such as climate change, and that careful positioning of turbines can further limit any effects.
"We recognise that the area supports rare and red-listed bird species, and we will undertake detailed environmental and technical surveys to monitor these species and adopt suitable mitigation measures."
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| Between Barnard Castle and Richmond - location of the proposed windfarm |
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| The former cricketer's comment piece in The Daily Telegraph |
