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| Delight for Hannah when she spots a Corn Bunting |
AUTHOR Hannah Bourne-Taylor, who is best known for her high-profile campaigning for Swifts, has a main role in the penultimate episode of the last series of Clarkson's Farm on Amazon TV.
She helps him to track down - by sound - species such as Garden Warbler and Blackcap whose songs she likens to speeded up versions of Maria Carey.
There is also delight for her when, elsewhere, she locates both Corn Bunting and Yellowhammer.
During the course of the series, Clarkson has become increasingly fascinated by birds such that he is keen to encourage them - especially those, such as Skylarks, in decline because of changing farming practices (including those used on his farm).
At one point, Hannah finds herself at loggerheads with the presenter's farm manager, Kaleb Cooper, who is insistent on taking two silage crops per annum - a practice that is thought to be destructive to nesting larks many of whose eggs and chicks fall victim to the heavy duty grass-cutting machinery.
There is also a sequence where Clarkson engages the services of a drone operator with thermal camera in an attempt - unsuccessful - to locate by heat-spot potential nesting site for Skylarks.
The programme is fascinating but requires a subscription to Amazon Prime to be viewed on home TVs.
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| Birder-campaigner Hannah Bourne-Taylor offers species ID info to Jeremy Clarkson on his farm |
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| Greylag Goose - common species in many parks |
IF a senior politician allowed his off-the-lead dog to savage a goose to death, there would today be a public outcry.
But leaf back to April 6, 1996, when just such an incident occurred while Roy Hattersley, deputy leader of the Labour Party under Neil Kinnock, was walking Buster, his German Shepherd-Staffordshire bull terrier cross, in London's St James Park.
In view of passers-by, Buster - an adoptee from the Brent Animal Centre - seized a Greylag Goose in its jaws and killed it.
There was not a whisper of anger from anyone.
The incident was noted by police, and Hattersley, who died earlier this week aged 93, was subsequently prosecuted and fined £75 by magistrates.
But later, he made light of the incident, expressing no regret and blaming the goose for not flying away.
Later, the politician made capital of the episode, referring to it in a book called Buster's Diary which sought to present a light-hearted dog's-eye view of life.
The section reads: "I was not alone in the rhododendrons for long.
"Suddenly a goose appeared.
"Geese are supposed to be frightened by dogs and fly away, but this one barely seemed to notice that I was there.
"It just fluttered its wings a bit and went on pecking the ground.
"Naturally, I was offended so I gave it a nip on the back of the neck.
"It waddled off and I went into my stalking mode, but, when it flopped over the fence between the park and the pond, I lost interest."
Some time later, Hattersley - and Buster - accepted an invitation to open a new police station in the same park.
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| The former politician regarded the incident as matter for humour |
LAST night's Channel 4 TV documentary, Invasion of The Parakeets, did not best impress Anita Singh, the arts and entertainments editor of The Daily Telegraph.
What galled the critic was the apparent suggestion by presenter Chris Packham that those who expressed dislike for the birds might be racist.
In today's edition of the paper, Ms Singh describes the programme as "a barmy documentary which draws a parallel between green parrots and asylum-seekers".
She continues: "Thankfully, the xenophobia argument took up only a small proportion of the documentary.
"Mainly, Packham wanted to provide us with evidence that the species isn't doing great harm either to native bird populations or to crops."
She adds: "Racism claims aside the programme was quite jolly and even-handed."
The following is an extract from The Birds of Iona and Mull (1890) by Henry Davenport Graham.
As their mode of nesting differs from the Guillemot’s and Razorbill’s, Puffins are more local in their choice of breeding places.
Many of the islands, however, provide suitable spots for them. Some, like Staffa, in holes and crannies of the rock.
Others are crowned by banks of soft, unctious soil, grown over with grass and sea-pink, which are honeycombed by burrows of the puffins which have inhabited them for generations and have reared their young within sound of the ceaseless roaring of the surf which ever rolls under the feet of the frightful overhanging crags.
When intruded upon in these their dangerous haunts, they show little signs of timidity.
The old birds remain sitting on their eggs, with their grotesque faces and formidable bills protruding from the doors of their holes, prepared to guard their nest and administer a most formidable bite to any intrusive fingers.
Others continue flying uneasily past the intruders which they do in a very swift and undeviating line of flight, their wings vibrating with insect-like rapidity, their red legs and paws sticking out behind, wide spread in a most ungraceful fashion.
They sweep past, close along the face of the cliff, within a few feet of the visitors; then, swooping out seaward, they make a circuit, and so pass and repass again and again.
This they all do in the same direction (with or against the sun), and they never cease all the time you remain, giving the appearance of an aerial Puffin procession.
They never, however, come actually over the land,so that though any amount may be shot, they all go whirling down the abyss into the ocean beneath where they may be picked up by your comrade in the boat.
They are certainly the most eatable of their tribe, and, in St Kilda, form an important part of the islander’s sustenance.
At Lochgilphead, I saw little of the Puffin, though they came early in May in thousands which scattered themselves over Loch Fyne, all disappearing by the end of the month.
These were only a division of the grand army progressing north.
At this time, I often observed them, towards evening, fly in small flocks right up Loch Gilp; then, reaching its head, they make a sweep round it and stand out to sea again.
At this point, Loch Fyne branches out into two arms like the letter Y.
One runs up 30 miles to Inveraray; the other, a truncated one only of three miles, now terminates at Lochgilphead, but before the pre-historic fall of the sea-level ran through Glen Crinan and joined the Western Ocean.
Engineering has re-united it by means of the Crinan Canal, but it seems to me that the Puffin’s instinct forbids them to fly across the few intervening miles of dry land, and the attempts of these pioneering parties at discovering a north-west sea passage are futile, and so the great host must turn south again to double the Mull of Kintyre.
I have reared young Puffins successfully.
One became very tame and attempted to follow me. He was unmolested by cats or dogs when he waddled about, as they had a proper respect for his tremendous bill.
Before he entirely lost all his down, his appearance was, if possible, more comical, as a tuft adhered to his head like a chancellor’s wig.
Ring-necked parakeets are among Britain's most divisive birds, loved by some for their beauty but blamed by others for harming native wildlife. In a programme to be screened tomorrow, Monday, on Channel 4 TV Chris Packham investigates claims that they steal nesting sites and damage crops as he asks whether these newcomers are ecological villains or unfairly targeted outsiders? Here is the Q&A to promote the programme which starts at 8pm
Ring-necked parakeets divide opinion like few other birds. Why do you think people feel so strongly about them?
I think the first thing is that they're highly conspicuous and not a species that you can miss. They're bright green, they scream, and they fly around in daylight in public places. I think then there is a genuine underlying xenophobia in life which makes us fearful of change and new things. So, the arrival of a species like this, or at least the increase in its numbers, is something which triggers people's fear, and that's what we explore. Change, and a fear of change is something which underpins this programme, and so much more of our contemporary life, and I do think it's something that we need to address. If we address that, which is something of a side issue for many people, maybe that will stimulate them to think, 'well, I need to keep an open mind, or at least make sure that I'm very well informed before I come up with views about more immediate impacts within our life'.
What is it about them that captures your imagination?
It is there the fact that they've come here. I'm excited by the fact that we have a species which has come into the UK and has rapidly increased in numbers.
Their numbers have exploded in recent decades. Should this be of concern?
I don't think we should be concerned. We need to look at the science, and what is it about this species and Britain's environment which has facilitated the species' success.
Do we have enough evidence to know what impact parakeets are having on Britain's native birds?
We have growing evidence, and we are working with the scientist Dr. Amy Leedale, who's doing most specific targeted work on that. The evidence that we do have isn't specific to parakeets in particular, and their impact. It's looking at broader data, not that that shouldn't be a means of understanding the basic ideas about what's happening, and equally perhaps it should be an early warning system, but the early warning system shouldn't lead to us jumping to conclusions. It should lead to more scientific research, and that's what we say in our programme.
Your film features people who are taking action against parakeets. Were you surprised by the strength of feeling they provoke?
Very sadly I wasn't surprised because I see that in our everyday life where people act through fear and ignorance and take extreme action because they are ill-educated or ill-informed and that again is why we've made the programme. We want to draw a line in the sand with this and say, look, this is the situation as it is at the moment, from a from a purely impartial, independent scientific perspective. This is what you should be formulating your opinions on. And was I surprised? No. Was I sick of? Of course I was, because what we're looking at is just wanton acts of vandalism.
How should we approach the question of controlling a species that many people have come to love?
It's not just about the biology and the ecology, it is about the cultural impact and the cultural connection that people have with species. An enormous number of people like the grey squirrels in their parks and gardens, and the foxes, because they are entry-level wildlife for them, that's what they have in their environments, that they don't live in an extraordinarily rich biodiverse environment, and none of us do. Our research shows that people have a strong connection to them - they fill their lives which otherwise wouldn't be there.
After making this film, where do you stand on the future of Ring-necked Parakeets in Britain? Should we celebrate them, manage them or simply learn to live alongside them?
We should certainly learn to live alongside them. I think it would be reckless, culturally insensitive, and economically unviable to remove them, so we have to learn to live alongside them. In fact, I think that we should celebrate them for the time being, and if it turns out that at some stage in the future they, the changing population and or its behaviour means that they damage that natural human interest then we would have to learn how to manage them hopefully in a passive way, but if not, then in a humane way. But I think we're far away from that.
Do you think there's an element of what some have called "ornithological xenophobia" in the way parakeets are portrayed?
I do - I think it's an ugly side to life which we see in broader society. There's very, very definitely a tendency towards that.
When we describe species as "native" and "non-native", is there a risk that the conversation becomes more emotional than scientific?
Yes, language is incredibly important. Native and non-native, I think, are perfectly valid terms. So is invasive, so long as we understand what they mean and why we use those terms again in a scientific way, and not in a way which is designed to stir up antipathy and cause divisiveness or fuel hatred without any proper access to the truth. Language is incredibly important in our culture. That's why it's used so skilfully by those people who do want to generate division, and so on and so forth. We have to be very careful with the way that we use our words.
Do you think the debate around parakeets tells us as much about people as it does about birds?
Very much so And I think you can see in our programme. You can see hatred and you can see love and you know it from someone who loves life and all life, everything in the creeps, stings and slimes. You know, which side I'm going to fall on, and ultimately when it comes down to the individuals, it's not the squirrels' fault or the parakeets' fault that they're here. We should look at our behaviour, our attitudes and practices, and not focus our ire on a bird which has, against its will, been transported to the UK and established itself here. It simply wants to do what all other life wants to do, which just survive.
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Hats off to Mary Colwell for being awarded the MBE in the King's Birthday Honours List! This prestigious accolade results from her many years spent serving nature in numerous different ways but specifically in founding the conservation and campaigning organisation, Curlew Action. Ms Colwell, who is also a nature writer and former producer of wildlife programmes for the BBC, says she is "very honoured and moved" to receive the award.
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What a contrast! Some people behave badly to birds and some behind kindly. Reports that appeared today in the pages of The Sun (above) and in The Daily Telegraph.
Birds seldom took centre stage in the paintings of acclaimed Bradford-born artist David Hockney, who sadly died this week, but there were notable exceptions - notably in his study of a multi-coloured macaw and a black-and-white of a boy within the egg of a Raven.
HAVE conservationists given up on restoring the Red-backed Shrike as a breeding species to Britain? Time was when, in summer, the migrant bird was not infrequently to be seen in shrubby, insect-rich habitats in southern England. If there were plenty of bee-attracting flowers and areas grazed by cattle, so much the better. But, probably as a result of changing farming practices, shrikes went into decline and, by the 1980s, they were mostly only being seen as migrants on passage. In July, 2021, the RSPB advertised for someone to conduct a six-month study "to research the feasibility of reintroducing an emblematic, but now largely absent, species". It is understood an appointment was made and the survey carried out, so why has nothing been published? When, earlier tis month, the question was put to the RSPB's species recovery team, back came the reply "There was some research carried out but this was incomplete and the report was not published." So is that the end of the story? Not necessarily so. In his recently-published book, The Return of The Oystercatcher (Picador, £20), American birder-investigator Scott Weidensaul describes his visit to the Knepp estate in Sussex where he met Britain's rewilders-in-chief, Charlie and Issy Tree. He writes: "Buoyed by the success of White Storks, Charlie and Issy have been contemplating other reintroductions. "One that is high on their list is the Red-backed Shrike which has virtually disappeared from Britain. "A single male set up a territory for some weeks at Knepp in 2017 but did not stay. "Given the species' habitat requirements - scrubland and thorn thickets amid diverse grassland full of bumble bees, grasshoppers, beetles and dragonflies - Knepp would seem to be an ideal habitat, and a feasibility study for the potential reintroduction suggests the estate could support at least 25 pairs. "But until a proposed Shrike Conservation Landscape programme to create other Knepp-like oases takes off, the reserve remains an island in a sea of intensive agriculture." The Wryneck says: Having commissioned and paid for the research, it seems a shame that the RSPB has chosen not to share the findings whether or not they are complete. Even if a reintroduction project were found to be completely unrealistic, it would surely be of interest and value to have insights into a species that the RSPB acknowledges to be 'emblematic'. |
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| Name that species! The bronze artwork |
AN auction house re-identified a woodpecker species after being alerted to its mistake by this blog.
Salisbury-based Woolley and Wallis at first remained insistent that a bronze sculpture by Geffrey Dashwood depicted a Great Spotted Woodpecker rather than a Green Woodpecker as claimed by The Wryneck.
But just hours before the sale on June 2, the firm acknowledged its lapse and changed the ID of Lot 332 to Green Woodpecker which is a scarcer species.
In the event, the piece - which measures 19.2cm x 11.2cm x 6.2cm - sold for a handsome £3,810.
This was an excellent result for both auction house and sculptor because the pre-sale guide price was that the hammer would fall at somewhere between £2,000 and £3,000.
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| Glad to be in the great (and wild) outdoors - Chris (Bart Harder) and Lluis (Carles Pulido) |
ANYONE who enjoys birding in wild landscapes will warm to The North, a film that is currently being screened in some UK cinemas before its release in the United States this September.
The star of the film is Nature - particularly the Highland Way and the Cape Wrath Trail in the Scottish Highlands.
The action follows two old pals, Chris and Lluis, on their trek in mostly challenging conditions as they reconnect with one another, not always happily.
But considering the majestically scenic backdrop, it is perhaps surprising that birds seldom feature.
We have to wait for an hour into the movie before the first - a Great Spotted Woodpecker - is heard drumming.
Later to be heard are, for instance, Long-tailed Tit, Song Thrush, Carrion Crow and Redshank, but is not until near the end before we see action in the form of swooping Herring Gulls and Arctic Terns plus, distantly, a couple of shorebirds, possibly Sanderling, Ringed Plover or Knot.
There are no soaring Golden Eagles - that would be too simplistic for director Bart Schrijver - but perhaps sightings of a few Curlew might not have come amiss.
This is an excellent film which seeks to remind its audience that, as one of the minor characters declares: "There is nothing like a long walk in nature to bring out the truth in you."
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| Cast and crew take a breather from filming |
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| Filming in Milnavie at the start of the walk |
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| The majesty of the Scottish Highlands |
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| Filming on the beach at Cape Wrath as the action draws to its close |
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| White Storks on the move along the African-Eurasian Flyway - photo: BirdLife International |
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| Western Reef Heron - this slate-grey morph example was snapped in Bahrain by Charles J. Sharp - photo via Wikimedia Commons |
IT is not quite clear whether it is Simon Hugheston-Roberts or Lewi Burgess who takes the honours for having detected Britain's first Western Reef Heron at the weekend.
Some might fancifully describe the moment as the ornithological equivalent of being the first man on Mars.
The bird was firstly seen feeding in Foryd Bay, Caernarfonshire, then in nearby Caernarfon in the shadow of the castle.
Since then it has been watched by hundreds of twitchers whose arrival has brought a boost to the local tourist industry including hotels, guesthouses, pubs and restaurants.
With no historic British ornithological literature to provide context, description and perspective, where better to turn to than an article in the 1987 edition of the journal of the Bombay Natural History Society whose authors focus on the bird's habitats in Western India?
The authors write: "The Pithalpur colony located in an agricultural farm was the biggest colony in this area.
"The farm comprised of a farm house, couple of barns and a crop field and had about 250 coconut trees planted on its border.
"The farmer told us that they first nested in the farm in 1978, and since then they have been nesting every year.
"During one of our visits in winter we found that many reef herons were roosting on the same coconut trees.
"Because of the birds’ nesting and roosting activities, there was considerable loss of flowers and young coconuts.
"The coconuts were also damaged by the birds’ excreta dropping on them.
"We saw that the birds’ excreta had dripped down the surface of most of the coconut fruits.
"The farm owner estimated that he lost about 50 per cent of his coconut crop every year because of the herons.
"Despite the heavy loss of income, the farmer and his family tolerated the birds and did not molest them in any way.
"The herons and their broods on top of the tall coconut trees were almost free from predation."
The sharp-eyed authors, R.M. Naik and B.M. Parasharya, continue: "At another location, New Port, we found the biggest concentration of the nesting Reef Herons
"The port area is fenced and human entry to it is severely restricted.
"The area includes docks, warehouses, administrative and office buildings but no residential quarters.
"The birds nested on Mangroves, Peepul, Peeper, Tamarind, Casuarina, Mesquites and Portia trees growing on the roadsides close to buildings
"Although most of the herons' nests were low and the port area was buzzing with activities during certain hours, the herons remained apparently undisturbed.
"The birds would readily come down from the nesting tree to the ground to pick up nest material.
"They were actively protected by the dock workers and no one would dare to molest them.
"The dock workers had even nursed a large number of herons that were stunned by shock and cold during the cyclone which hit Saurashtra in November 1982.
"Occasional predation of the herons' eggs and chicks by the domestic cat and the House Crow occurred.
"White Ibis was a serious competitor of the herons for the nesting sites.
"The ibis came into breeding condition later than the herons and occupied the heron nests after ejecting the nest contents.
"The ibis, however, preferred to nest on top of the tall trees, so that the heron nests built lower in the same trees, and also those on short trees, were not affected.
"Another reason for the success of the New Port colony is that the nesting birds had rich and extensive feeding grounds available close to the colony.
"During the low tide, the mudflats, except the channel dredged for an approach of ships to dock, became exposed almost up to the horizon, and birds avidly fed on the mudskippers and other fish from the mudflats and tidal pools."
But back to the star visitor to Wales.
It will be a while before the record is confirmed by the various authorities pending which time there is always a chance that some spoilsport will deem the Western Reef Heron to be a sub-species of the Little Egret with which it sometimes hybridises.
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| How The Daily Telegraph newspaper reported the momentous event |
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| Caernarfon Harbour and Castle - photo A.J. Marshall via Wikimedia Commons |
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| Seaby's study was one of star Lots in Salisbury auction |
THIS unframed watercolour-on-linen, said to be of two Water Pipits, sold for more than double the highest estimate at an auction held earlier this month by Salisbury-based Woolley and Wallis.
Including the buyer's premium, the price achieved was £610 compared with a pre-sale estimate of £200 and £300.
The artist was Allen William Seaby (1867-1953), best known as an ornithological painter and printmaker who was also professor of fine art at the University of Reading.
It was he, too, who provided the illustrations for two Ladybird books - British Birds and Their Nests (1953) and A Second Book of British Birds and Their Nests (1954).
Seaby was the grandfather of another wildlife illustrator who became even more celebrated - Robert Gillmor.
Residents in Albania have taken to the streets of the capital, Tirana, to protest against a £1.2-billion luxury tourism development that will destroy precious wildlife habitat including the Narta Lagoon area on the western coast which is home to Flamingoes and well over a hundred other bird species, many of them rare. Foreign investors, including President Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, are understood to be involved with the venture which also has the backing of Albania's prime minister, Edi Rama.
*Photo: PPNEA (The Protection and Preservation of Natural Environment in Albania)
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| Regent House - home to nesting Swifts |
It has emerged that wildlife organisations failed to raise the alert on Swift welfare ahead of the demolition of buildings which have long provided a home for some 20 pairs of nesting Swifts
Surrey Wildlife Trust and Natural England were both consulted about the proposal to redevelop the site, Regent House - which is on the approach road Dorking Railway Station - but neither raised any concerns.
As part of an ecological appraisal, two site surveys were carried out by consultants acting for the developers.
But these were carried out on February 17 and September 28 when the birds would have been in Africa.
The consultants acknowledged that the buildings earmarked for demolition may have been summer home to Swifts, but maintained that mitigation could be provided by installing on the proposed replacement building a single nest box between three and four metres from the ground.
It is understood that Surrey Police wildlife unit and Mole Valley District Council are now investigating to establish what went wrong and whether there has been any breach of legislation.
It's not as if there had been no warning. Signage was displayed prominently in advance of the works
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| Artist's impresson of how the site might be redeveloped to provide 126 flats - but there is no planning condition requiring the installation of Swift bricks |
The Wryneck says: This is casebook example of how the welfare of wildlife - in this instance Swifts - is compromised regularly by deficiencies in the planning system. The consultants carried out the surveys in the wrong seasons and gave duff advice on Swifts' nesting requirements. Natural England and Surrey Wildlife Trust seem both to have been asleep at the wheel. And, particularly at such a prominent location, why did no local birder have the foresight to raise any concerns with the district council whose planning case officer, unforgivably, approved the demolition with no safeguarding mitigation. After this sorry event, there has been plenty of tut-tutting in both local and national media. Doubtless there will be inquiries into what went wrong. One of the main lessons is that planning officers, not just at Mole Valley council but everywhere, need to be properly trained on ecology and wildlife-safeguarding, to reduce their chances of making damaging decisions.
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| The St Kilda Wren was on the front cover of W.H. Hudson's pamphlet which was published by the Society for the Protection of Birds - forerunner of the RSPB |
IN a pamphlet published in 1894, W.H. Hudson asserted that the St Kilda Wren - a sub-species of the bird familiar on the mainland - had been extirpated by unscrupulous collectors.
Happily, he was wrong. The bird was not extinct - and it is the subject of a study on 'island gigantism' published in the most recent edition of the Evolutionary Journal of the Linnaean Society.
It seems odd to apply the term 'gigantism' to such a diminutive species - but apparently it can occur, as discovered by Charles Darwin, on islands when species evolve in a different way from their mainland counterparts.
At between 13 and 16 grammes, the St Kilda Wren can be twice the size of a mainland Wren which typically weighs in at 7-10g.
The authors of the new study on gigantism note that the former typically lives in very open and often sheer cliff face habitats which tend to be predator-free.
They also have longer bills and there may also be differences in song.
Unfortunately, the Evolutionary Journal is a bit of a soup, full of unfamiliar academic jargon which makes it difficult to follow.
By contrast, though written more than 130 years ago and flawed in its conclusions, the commentary of Hudson is much more accessible to the contemporary birder.
He writes of the St Kilda Wren: "This small feathered creature is a dweller among the rocks near the sea, and it frequently nests in crevices and holes just above highwater mark on the shores of places which the Great Auk once haunted.
"It will be remembered that, about nine or ten years ago, Charles Dixon found this wren quite common at S. Kilda, where it was the only small bird resident all the year.
"It differed from the Common Wren in its habits and more powerful song, its paler ground colour and its more distinct markings and stouter legs and feet.
"On account of these distinguishing characters, it was described as a new species - Troglodytes hirtensis.
"It is now believed by ornithologists that the St Kilda Wren is not specifically distinct from the Wren of the mainland but that it is a variety, or race, which has diverged from the parent form during the long centuries of its isolated life on that wintry island where not a tree or shrub exists.
"Species, sub-species or variety, it matters little, what concerns us just now is the following fact.
"No sooner had the news gone abroad that "lone St Kilda’s isle" possessed one little songbird of her own - a Wren that differed somewhat from the familiar Wren - than it was invaded by the army of collectors who did not mind its distance from the mainland so long as they secured something for their cabinets.
"And the result of their invasion is that the St. Kilda Wren no longer exists."
Cliff faces on St Kilda provide an all-year habitat for the island's 'giant' Wrens (photo: Stephen Hodges via Wikimedia Commons)
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| The feeders were bought from a company based in Canterbury, pictured (photo: Christine Matthews via Wikimedia Commons) |
A COMPANY that designs and assembles birdfeeders has returned £155 to the Scottish National Party after learning that three of its products had been purchased with misappropriated SNP money by its former chief executive, Peter Murrell.
The magnanimous gesture was today revealed by Graham Evans who is senior partner with Jacobi Jayne & Co which supplies feeders to customers all over the UK and beyond from its base in Canterbury, Kent.
In a letter published in today’s edition of The Daily Telegraph, Mr Evans writes: "While we are in the business of supporting garden wildlife, we have no desire to profit from a breach of trust.
"We are therefore donating the full £155 received for these items back to the SNP."
He continues: "We are an entirely apolitical organisation, but we believe that stolen money has no place in our accounts.
Mr Evans concludes with a challenge to other firms that also received unauthorised payment through the actions of the former SNP chief.
"It is our hope that other suppliers named in the investigation will follow suit to ensure that such funds are returned to their rightful owners," he urges.
At a total cost of £155, the three feeders sold to Mr Murrell are likely to have been top-of-the-range products which are resistant to all but the most cunning of squirrels.
It is not known if Mr Murrell bought the feeders for others members of his family or for him and Nicola Sturgeon, now his estranged wife, to watch the finches, tits and other birds that visited their garden.
Nor is it known if the feeders will be returned to Jacobi Jayne & Co following its refund of the £155.
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| On the up - the Dartford Warbler feeds on small spiders and caterpillars |
According to a press release issued this week by the RSPB, there are now reckoned to be about 4,100 pairs nationwide compared with 3,200 during the last national survey in 2006.
Of these, 264 pairs were last year counted on 14 of its own reserves - notably the ones at RSPB Arne in Dorset, with 97 pair, and Minsmere in Suffolk, with 41 pairs.
The bird is a heathland specialist, and the society has been developing this habitat wherever possible to safeguard its future.
* Photographs: RSPB
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| RSPB Arne - heathland hotspot for Dartford Warblers |
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| The Smøla windfarm. Some of the towers have been painted, thereby seeking to reduce bird collision risk. (photo: Brukar:bsigmundg via Wikimedia Commons) |
MIGHT the accident that killed a White-throated Needletail on Harris in the Outer Hebrides in summer 2013 have been avoided?
On June 26 that year, birders looked on in horror as the mega-rare bird flew into the tower of a wind turbine, dying instantly.
In his book, Twitching by Numbers, Gary Bagnell describes watching the bird "whooshing over his head" as "the defining moment" of his twitching career .
He writes: "If Britain ever gets another twitchable one, make sure you see it as it really is the ultimate twitch".
But might the collision have been avoided if the tower had been painted black, thus making it more conspicuous?
Bird collisions with turbine rotor blades are a well-known negative consequence of windfarms, but there has been far less attention to the risk of birds colliding with the turbine towers and how to mitigate this risk.
However, data from the 68-turbine Smøla windfarm in Norway indicates that painting part of a tower a black or a dark colour creates a visual contrast which reduces the number of collisions.
Researchers found there was a 48 per cent reduction in the number of recorded carcasses of Willow Ptarmigan at the base of painted towers compared with unpainted ones.
Their report states: The family of Grouse and Ptarmigan species are known to have poorly developed vision and flight manoeuvrability.
" In addition, many such species are often active during dusk and dawn when visibility is poor.
"These characteristics all make grouse especially prone to collide with man-made objects.
Historically, carcasses of collision-victim Willow Ptarmigan (Lagopus lagopus) at the Smøla wind-power plant were often found only a few metres from the tower base
"They showed signs of direct impact with a 'wall' rather than cuts and fractures which is usual for hits by turbine blades.
"In one case, fresh blood smear and feathers was also observed on the tower base where a fresh Ptarmigan carcass had found.
"Species in the Galliforme family typically fly relatively low above ground."
Some 97 per cent (138 of 142 flights recorded) of the Willow Ptarmigan that were flushed on Smøla showed a flight-height lower than 15 metres.
Data from both autopsy and flight height indicate that grouse are more prone to collide with the turbine tower bases than the rotor blades.
Elsewhere, several black grouse (Tetrao tetrix) that were found immediately under turbines in an area in Styria, Austria, are thought to have died because of collision with tower bases and not the rotor blades, even though the cause of death was never observed directly.
Corpses were analysed by veterinarians who concluded that injuries were consistent with the birds flying into a hard surface.
Furthermore, collision between a Willow Ptarmigan and the tower base has been confirmed by an actual observation in Sweden where one individual, part of a group of 10 birds, crashed directly into the tower base at 2.7 m height above ground.
This was at 7.05am on September 25, 2011.
The report's authors conclude: "Our study shows that painting of the wind turbine tower base reduces bird collisions.
"This relatively simple and cost-effective mitigation measure should be considered in the planning of new windfarms, especially in areas where there are species in the Galliforme family and other birds with relatively poor vision and manoeuvrability and which generally perform low altitude flights."
The report was compiled by Norwegian researchers Bård G Stokke, Torgeir Nygård, Ulla Falkdalen, Hans C. Pedersen and Roel May. Their investigations were funded by the Research Council of Norway.
* Since then, the operators of the Smøla windfarm, Statkraft, have also applied black paint to a single blade on some of its turbines, resulting in fewer fatal collisions for raptors such as White-tailed Eagles.
