Author Archives: Amanda Tuke
Thirty-minute birder column: Learn all about it
I’ve always been fascinated by how beginners learn about birds, or plants, or any other aspect of the natural world, and in this month’s column I had the opportunity to really explore this.
Thirty-minute birder column: Birders, deployed
What I love most about writing this column, as well as the ever-present excuse to pop out birdwatching (“It’s work love!”) is the fascinating people I meet from the birdwatching community. And these particular folk had some amazing stories to tell, as well as some great photos…
Wild Pavements Diary – a NYD hunt for flowers on the Thames Path
As new year’s eve celebrations ramp up, I find myself questioning the wisdom of arranging to meet plant-loving folk the following morning, but by the time it is morning, it’s great to have something to hop out of bed for. This is the first year I’ve plant-hunted on NYD with others and I’m really looking […]
Thirty-minute birder column: Avon Calling
Always nice to squeeze in some birding when I’m visiting family in the West Country, & the Bristol birders were a very welcoming bunch.
Thirty-minute birder column: Tractor Birdwatching
A visit to my brother’s dairy farm inspired this feature in which I could showcase the amazing things bird-loving farmers do for our wildlife and share my concerns about the fate of agri-environment incentives.
Thirty-minute birder series: urge for going
Know that feeling when our summer visitors are long gone, winter visitors are arriving, and you just need to get away? So that was how I ended up in Southend-on-Sea, having a wader-tastic time and making new birding friends.
Wild Pavements Diary – Fun-guy. It’s so predictable.
It’s so predictable isn’t it. Mention fungi and you can guarantee that someone will produce the usual pun. My mate Daniel was leading a fungi walk in the park for a local society and I tweeted about it, sure to be really interesting and funny as Daniel himself is. Damn it – I walked right […]
Wild Pavements Diary – a trip to Greenland (Dock)
The area to the south of Canada Water station is one big car park. Literally. I skirt the stretch of water in front of Decathlon and pick my way through car park bays to some green I can see in front of Surrey Quays station. In a patch about the size of a couple of […]
Wild Pavements diary – [Evil laugh] My cunning plan to infect as many people as possible with an interest in urban botany is working…
It’s a sparkling autumn morning and eight people join me for a Wild Pavements walk. Mimicking the Crystal Palace walk I led earlier in the week, I’ve planned to follow the road triangle and to duck into as many side roads and alleyways as possible as we walk. We find many of the same flowers […]
Wild Pavements diary – plant-hunting in Crystal Palace
I’m standing outside Sainsbury’s wondering which, if any, of the people here might be waiting to join my pavement plant walk this overcast October afternoon. I wasn’t sure how popular an urban plant walk would be at five on a weekday, so I’m delighted when six others do arrive. I start by explaining that this […]
The Urban Naturalist 