Mark Avery

A heads up on my forthcoming book: Where the Wild Things Live. Available: late November. A search for species, from lichens to mammals & from moths to fungi, in an ordinary garden. How many species would you find in your garden? More details markavery.info/my-new-book-...

#BirdingWales

A grey phalarope was found in the back car park at Samphire Hoe this afternoon. It was rescued from some unwanted magpie attention and was safely released, it flew off strongly. #kentbirding

Legend - and the Nutcracker

Memories… from my notebook, 1991. #Nutcracker #UKBirds

After spending several hours trying to track down the pod of six ORCAS that we'd seen over consecutive days here in Shetland we struck lucky and relocated them off Weisdale. Here's three of them - including the huge male - as they passed us heading south. #MarineLife #MarineMammals #UKWildlife

It’s getting harder to spot those wild blooms so it must be time to launch our challenge for the colder months - #thewinter10! Can you spot ten wild or naturalised blooms in time for #wildflowerhour next Sunday? Let’s meet again then to find out! 😀

Is this a vagrant emporer dragonfly? Seen today Pymoor, Cambridgeshire sheltering from the gales

A tenacious Clouded Yellow clinging onto the Valerian on a windy Worthing beach. #butterflies @savebutterflies.bsky.social @sussexwildlife.bsky.social

Two different window frames with Western Conifer Seed Bug this morning....

Flies are vital to ecosystems but remain under-recorded. Join David Brice and the @dipteristsforum.bsky.social on 27 October for a practical webinar exploring fly surveying methods, habitat assessment, identification and biological recording. Book: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/1989322708...

That last repost is a good excuse to share again Steven Falk's beautiful colour plate from Peter Chandler's Platypezidae monograph (The Flat-footed Flies of Europe, Fauna Entomologica Scandinavica, 2001).

First adult female Black and Yellow Argiope orbweaver I have seen this year. Today at Baker University Wetlands in Lawrence, Kansas, USA. #Arachtober #bugsky #bugwatching #spiders #arachnids

The Cornish Shieldbug Geotomus punctulatus at its only known UK site Sennen Cove, Cornwall. This small bug lives at the roots of its foodplant Lady's Bedstraw Galium verum. Thanks @willleohawkes.bsky.social

We took a walk down the valley this afternoon whilst the sun was shining. A few creatures out enjoying the weather, but best of them all was a cluster of Vernal Shieldbugs. 23 adults and 2 nymphs at least. Never seen so many in one place. All on nettles. #bugs #UKwildlife

This is the Famous Big bellied sessile Oak in Savernake forest estimated to be 1000 to 1100 years old

In light of the fact I'm presently conducting bird surveys in the pissing rain on the industrial Humber all day today, here's a reminder of how beautiful it was pre-sunrise from our place in York just as I hit the road. #livingthedream

Nut Disco, Hymenoscyphus fructigenus, on beechmast in woods near Cromer yesterday. (Also found on / in old acorn cups). #Fungi #FungiFriends

Orange Bonnet, Mycena acicula. Spotted on a woodchip pile by @vannabartlett.bsky.social on our walk from Roughton Road station to Felbrigg Hall yesterday. #Fungi #FungiFriends

This Bay Bolete, Imleria badia, was a lovely surprise in a local park this morning and a new species for the site. #Fungi #FungiFriends

It's a grim old day outside and the cat has sat on me. Giving me plenty of time to reflect on a fabulous few days on a fungal survey in Kent. What an amazing diversity!!

“An Autumn gale is stripping off the leaves and sweeping them along in the slanting squall of rain” Artist: CF Tunnicliffe Writer: EL Grant Watson (What to Look for in Autumn, 1960)

Leave the Leaves Fallen leaves are not waste, they are essential ecological infrastructure. www.naturespot.org/node/268638 Please share. #Leaves #Autumn #gardens #gardening #environment #nature #insects

Other work of the Ladybird artists. October (Shell Guide, 1957) Artist: SR Badmin

#fullmoon #badger #whenbeastsspoke #wildlifeart #mindfullness

Sunday book review: The Healing Heath by the SWLA Review: markavery.info/2026/10/25/s... Celebrating the #restoration to #heathland of a patch of #Norfolk #farmland. Wonderful #art and excellent words. 'drop-dead gorgeous' 'I was moved by the Foreword' @themarshtit.bsky.social #wildlife

Portraits of Mushrooms by Alexander Viazmensky has loads of reproductions of his fantastic fungi paintings. It is annoying to buy in the UK as postage costs more than the book #MycoBookClub

I’ve been writing by hand for 2.5hrs. I can’t remember the last time I did this. It was fun, but when did it get so painful to hold a pen for this long?

Three years ago, my dad said that all fish are the same shape. Out of spite, I decided to draw all 478 families of bony fish listed in Nelson 2016. There's still some stuff I need to edit and some fish I want to redraw but, after 985 days, I finished my big dumb fish project last night.

So I found out last week that this happened, which is very heartwarming - largely for my monthly columns this year in Gardens Illustrated magazine covering various societal, wildlife and climate issues related to gardening

My Birdscapes exhibition at Glandford, North Norfolk continues until November 1st. To view/ buy online see www.birdscapes.co.uk/artists/jona...

Lobster Moth larvae (see last repost) are featured in figures 1a-d in this plate from William Buckler's Larvae of the British Butterflies & Moths

Natural wood flooring is the best Lifetime guarantee, and a new layer added every year, free of charge

I bought these old RSPB magazines for their CF Tunnicliffe cover pictures. They look so good together

These greater horseshoe bats have two things on their minds at this time of year. Fattening up for winter and mating. Have fitted some with radiotags today to get insights into where they are going for both! @batconservation.bsky.social

Wow!

Don't forget to add your squirrel sightings from last week's #GreatScottishSquirrelSurvey to our map here: buff.ly/RG9XTLG 📷 Raymond Leinster

Please do...

This morning I added bird species 79 to my Northants garden list - a Woodcock flew past, close, at c08:15. Not a Nutcracker but a very pleasant surprise after 27? 28? years here.

The Mundesley Slender-billed Nutcracker was feeding on Wasps, which it picked off the gravel driveway. Many of the Dutch birds have been photographed eating wasps recently. Clearly a major autumnal food source. #NorfolkBirding

The Slender-billed Nutcracker at Mundesley this morning put on quite a show feeding within a metre of a very appreciative early crowd. What a bird! #NorfolkBirding

Very fortunate to be standing right next to someone when they relocated the Nutcracker this morning in Mundesley. Over the course of the morning, I managed a few more brief views of the bird although missed it when it was showing down to a couple of feet!

Spotted Sandpiper from Nostell Priory this morning. #wildlife #photography #naturephotography #birdsseenin2026 #ukbirding 🪶 @birdguides.bsky.social

Fabulous views of the long-staying Chestnut Bunting at Buness, Unst, Shetland this morning - a classic Shetland 'twitch' with just five of us enjoying what is currently only the second-ever accepted record for Britain. #BirdingScotland #UKbirding #RareBirdsUK #Birds #UKWildlife

Remarkable how confiding/settled the Chestnut Bunting gradually became through the wk, compared to views we were initially getting. Earlier in the week it was v mobile and working a full circuit of the various walled yards of the farm. Many thanks for everyones cooperation with site instructions 👍

A superb 5 day trip to Islay guiding with Nature Scotland, best of 112sp inc: finding this smart Richardson's Cackler and a Russian Whitefront. Plus Juv Snow Goose, Snow Buntings, GW Egret, Seaducks, waders and Geese galore!

I went for 2nd looks at the Isabelline Shrike at Kessingland. Enjoying the wasps, its warm Dijon mustard-coloured upperparts, subtly rufescent crown with retained juv feathers; pale ear coverts are features that would fit neatly in the trays of isabellinus at Tring... #suffolkbirding #ukbirding

Leach's Petrel west through Swannery just now, he who dares! ⛈️ @swannerysteve.bsky.social