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I returned to Tawau Hills Park in Borneo in February 2026, eight years after joining a citizen science expedition to discover new species (see below). Alongside plenty of incredible wildlife, I was delighted to find the semi-slug species (left) our team first described all those years ago.
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My feature on Britain's hardy sea ducks made the cover story of the RSPB Magazine Winter/Spring 2026 edition, with seven pages inside.
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Great to be back in the studio joining the gardening show on BBC Radio Devon/Cornwall to talk with BBC Gardener's World presenter Toby Buckland about Westcountry wildlife highlights in 2025. My weekly voluntary wildlife segments have aired on his popular Sunday show over the last few months and covered topics such as garden birds and butterflies, pond life, identifying bats, seasonal amphibians etc.
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The Western Morning News has been shortlisted in the prestigious national industry awards for the UK regional press. The newspaper is recognised in the Regional Press Awards category for Front Page of the Year. The shortlisted front page was at the height of protests by farmers, including many from the South West, over farm inheritance tax. The edition, which included several pages of coverage inside, highlighted the significance of farming and the rural economy to the region and our readership. The awards ceremony will be held in March 2026. Two years ago the newspaper was a finalist in the category of Campaign of the Year for our stance over the threatened closure of railway station ticket offices.
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Pleased to donate a wildlife walk for the Grand Nave Dinner auction of promises at Exeter Cathedral in October 2025, which raised £850, and enjoyed giving a free talk on wildlife at a Plymouth meeting of the Devon Birdwatching and Preservation Group (Devon Birds) in September.
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Delighted to appear on the SW regional BBC news programme Spotlight in July, talking about wildlife following the publication of my latest Bloomsbury book, the RSPB Everyday Guide to British Wildlife. The feature was excellently filmed and narrated by the BBC's Andrea Ormsby and featured moths, dormice and Dartmoor scenery. It was accompanied with segments on BBC Radio Devon and on the BBC website here.
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Joined former BBC Gardener's World lead presenter Toby Buckland on his excellent Sunday show for BBC Radio Devon/Cornwall to chat wildlife and writing. I have since featured weekly with a short slot describing various Westcountry garden wildlife.
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Delighted as Editor of the Western Morning News to attend a reception for regional media at 10 Downing Street, hosted by Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, at the end of March, 2025.
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The curious little landhopper was the subject of my February Guardian Country Diary, and Dartmoor emperor moths featured in April 2025.
Meanwhile, my Bloomsbury wildlife guide, the RSPB Everyday Guide to British Wildlife, has been printed, and goes on sale in May. |
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The Western Morning News celebrated its 165th anniversary on January 3 2025. A special 16-page supplement was produced, telling the story of its history under various Editors - typically long-serving, given I am only the 15th since its launch in 1860. Fascinating details from its early days include the fact that football scores from away matches were once transported to lofts above the Western Morning News Plymouth offices by carrier pigeon. With a foot in three centuries, the paper has faced many challenges and changes throughout its history, and continues to champion the counties and communities it serves. The special supplement was a chance to celebrate the past, look to the future, thank our loyal readers and pay tribute to staff down the decades.
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My latest Bloomsbury title - the RSPB Everyday Guide to British Wildlife is due out in May 2025 as a companion title to the RSPB Everyday Guide to British Birds.
Also pleased that a selection of a few of my Guardian Country Diary nature columns feature in a new book published in September 2024 called Under The Changing Skies - The Best of the Guardian's Country Diary, 2018-2024. |
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Managed to photograph a nuthatch 'admiring' the front cover of the new second edition of my
RSPB/ Bloomsbury book The Everyday Guide To British Birds. (Click on any images on this and other pages of the website for close-up views) |
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Joining a conservation project working to save Devon populations of Britain's native white-clawed crayfish was my July 2024 Guardian Country Diary. To read this and other diaries click here.
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A new BBC book, Countryfile: A Year in the Countryside, published in April 2024 and edited by John Craven and Fergus Collins, included a four-page section I had written on dormice. Honoured to be a part of this excellent hardback title.
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Delighted that my RSPB/Bloomsbury book for nature enthusiasts and birdwatching beginners, The Everyday Guide To British Birds, went into a second edition. The updated new edition was published in Spring 2024 and includes new photos and feature sections.
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In January 2024, the Western Morning News was shortlisted in the UK Regional Press Awards for Campaign of the Year for our stance over the threatened closure of railway station ticket offices.
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In March 2023, I was appointed Editor of the regional daily newspaper the Western Morning News - apparently only the 15th editor since the newspaper was founded in 1860. Pleased and honoured to take on the role, having worked as a production editor on the paper and its Plymouth sister title The Herald for many years. Read the newspaper's Wikipedia page here.
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My close-up photo of a dock bug navigating the ups and downs of life in the undergrowth was picked as one of the finalists for the British Wildlife Photography Awards 2023.
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In August 2022, an unexpected local find of a large and rare death's-head hawk-moth caterpillar resulted in local and national coverage - including The Independent online and The Sun (left).
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I was chuffed to learn that my close-up photo of a rather bizarre looking moth, called the canary-shouldered thorn, was chosen by the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee to illustrate its 2021 report on Biodiversity & Ecosystems.
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Delighted to have made the National Poetry Prize longlist in the National Poetry Competition 2020 run by the Poetry Society, which attracted more than 18,100 entries, with results announced in March 2021. My poem was a tongue-in-cheek re-imagining of a typical ode to moorland using the modern day language of environmentalism. No joyful flowers and inspiring skylarks, instead carbon sequestration and keystone species etc. A necessity from a conservation and campaigning point of view, but perhaps we have lost something along the way...
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My visit to see dancing cranes at Lake Hornborga in West Sweden was a main travel feature with trip photos on Guardian Travel online in February 2020 (read here).
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New species discovered on 2018 citizen science Borneo expedition I took part in included a semi-slug (left) - a kind of slug with a vestigial shell - found by turning over leaves on a rainforest night walk, and a colourful type of sticky frog (right) on a mountain trek, which experts have been unable to identify from photographs and is likely new to science.
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Delighted to be among those named on an Oxford University Press scientific paper after our group of citizen scientists discovered a new species - the first semi-slug of its kind in Borneo since the 1890s - on a pioneering expedition with Taxon Expeditions and DNA barcoded in the field. Scientific paper in the Journal of Molluscan Studies (introduction here).
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Got the chance to chat with BBC Radio Devon presenter David Fitzgerald all about birds and my new book on his morning show.
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Bird Watching magazine's 2018 March edition and Birdwatch magazine's April edition included a review of The Everyday Guide To British Birds (see Books page).
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Spring 2018 saw the release of my new book The Everyday Guide To British Birds, a Bloomsbury/RSPB title for birdwatching beginners and nature enthusiasts. My blog for Bloomsbury on enjoying everyday birds can be found here.
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The findings of the RSPB's annual Big Garden Birdwatch, the world's largest wildlife survey, was the subject of my feature in the Spring 2018 edition of RSPB's Nature's Home magazine, making the cover story and seven pages inside.
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The conservation work of individuals and organisations behind national State of Nature reports was the topic of my five-page feature in the Autumn 2017 edition of the RSPB's Nature's Home magazine.
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My feature for the RSPB on Priority Species was a lead article in the winter 2016 edition of Nature's Home magazine
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National Geographic included a photo taken on my trip with the Manx Basking Shark Watch team, tagging a shark off the Isle of Man, in its book for children: Mission Shark Rescue.
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The paperback edition of Few And Far Between was chosen as a Daily Mail 'Must Read' in April, and also featured in the World Travel Guide top ten April reads
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Few And Far Between was included in The Guardian list of Best Nature Books of 2015, and described as 'entertaining' by Stephen Moss. Also great to get positive feedback from naturalist and TV presenter Chris Packham and leading conservationist and Wildlife Trusts president Tony Juniper (see 'Books' quotes). |
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The new UK Birds of Conservation Concern 'red list' was published in December 2015 - up once again since my While Flocks Last travels and now totalling more than a quarter of British birds.
Few And Far Between made the Christmas Books selection in the Daily Mail (right). |
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A double-page feature on While Flocks Last by Simon Parker made the Saturday Westcountry Life section in the Western Morning News, and Plymouth Waterstones branches also stocked up on a few copies in the run-up to Christmas. |
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Well worth the drive to give a talk at the North West Bird Watching Festival, November 21 2015, at WWT Martin Mere Wetland Centre - with time to enjoy the reserve's great birdlife
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It has been a few years since I last gave a talk at the Appledore Book Festival, but 2015's event was as excellent as ever, with a great audience and a book signing session afterwards.
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Enjoyed giving a talk on my Few And Far Between travels to a good crowd in a wonderful gallery setting at the Plymouth Museum as part of its Lunchtime Talks series.
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A feature describing my trip to find dormice on the Isle of Wight appeared in the September edition of BBC Countryfile magazine, covering five pages and including photos from the visit.
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Had a great day at the popular Birdfair event in Rutland on August 22 2015, giving a talk, signing a few copies of Few And Far Between and meeting up with the Bloomsbury team and conservation contacts who helped on my wildlife travels.
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The Autumn edition of RSPB magazine Nature's Home included Few And Far Between among its pick of the new nature books, and a Bloomsbury quarter-page advert. Also pleased to get positive reviews from conservation charities such as Buglife and Froglife, as well as various online book bloggers, and a feature in the Countryside Management Association's Ranger magazine.
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A couple of chance wildlife encounters led to articles in The Herald in Plymouth and South West regional daily newspaper the Western Morning News - and even a live drive-time interview on BBC Radio Devon. The first was a huge, scarce Tanner beetle which crash- landed in the garden at dusk. The second, a white red deer spotted with its mother near Dartmoor.
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Pleased to get a good review in the Times Literary Supplement, July 31, by literary editor and consultant Janette Currie, who described Few And Far Between as "an engaging, thoroughly researched and informative study of contemporary conservation".
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My review of former RSPB conservation director Mark Avery's Bloomsbury book Inglorious, on banning grouse shooting, appeared in BBC Wildlife magazine's August edition.
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Enjoyed an excellent day at the Telegraph Way With Words book festival at Dartington, with a talk to a great audience in The Barn and book signing session.
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Delighted to get the cover story in the July 2015 edition of BBC Wildlife magazine on wildlife predictions for 2050, with ten pages of coverage inside.
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Extracts from Few And Far Between were printed weekly throughout July as the Saturday centre page spread in South West daily regional paper the Western Morning News. The serialised sections described my searches for Scottish wildcat, endangered European eel, dormouse and golden oriole.
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A summary piece on my wildlife travels, angled on summer species, was the mid-June 'Big Read' feature in The Independent, spanning three pages. The 2015 article was posted as the top home page story on the paper's website. To read in full click here. |
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Few And Far Between was picked as Book of the Month in the June edition of BBC Countryfile magazine, with a review (see Books page) by Environment Editor James Fair. It also featured in the academic journal Fish Biology in 2016.
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Really pleased with this very generous full page review in the Daily Mail, May 22, 2015 by writer, broadcaster and columnist Bel Mooney. 'A terrific book that's very easy to love... his adventures are as strange and engaging as the wonderful creatures he sees... this delightful book is a triumph.' (Click here to read in full) |
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Thanks to everyone who attended my talk on Few And Far Between at the Fowey Festival. An excellently organised event on a lovely sunny day.
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Delighted my article on why out of sight
shouldn't mean out of mind for our 'invisible' species was published by the Guardian online. The piece, which made the top ten most popular environment stories and was shared over 1,000 times, was angled on a tiny rare spider (left) that lives at Radford Quarry, near Plymouth. Click here to read in full |
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A six-page feature on my travels in search of Britain's rarest species for my book Few And Far Between appeared in the Spring 2015 edition of the RSPB magazine Nature's Home - really pleased it got such good coverage, and the layout and additional photos looked excellent.
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Few And Far Between has been featured in The Herald, Western Morning News and North London's Ham&High, among other local publications, and on a number of BBC regional radio stations, including BBC Scotland, Jersey, Wiltshire, Sheffield, Devon Berkshire and Cumbria, following ten back-to-back live interviews.
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Here is a small selection of photos from my travels around Britain for Few And Far Between. They include encountering a common skate, accompanying the BBC Coast crew in the Hebrides, joining a puffin ringing session, sunset at Lakenheath Fen, handling a smooth snake, getting a close-up view of a corncrake, the remote Shiant isles off Scotland and, below, Loch Garten in the Cairngorms. 
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