Bedfordshire

• Blow's Downs

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  Famous for its migrant Ring Ousels in spring, as well as several other scarce migrant species, the details of which can be found regularly updated on the site's own website.

• Harrold/Odell Country Park

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  for a variety of water birds and migrants.

• Priory Country Park

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  where sightings in past years include Ferruginous Duck, Radde's Warbler and Yellow-browed Warbler…

• The Marston Vale Brick Pits

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  (from Brogborough to Elstow) which hold large numbers of roosting gulls, often including several white-winged gulls, in winter.

• Additional Material

  | pipit@globalnet.co.uk

• Andy Banthorpe

  | webmaster@bedsbirdclub.org.uk

• Vacant - Temp Peter Nash

  5 Coopers Close, Sandy SG19 1NQ

  recorder@bedsbirdclub.org.uk

  07753 411786

• Number of bird species: 291

  County Bird - Hobby Falco subbuteo

• The Bedfordshire Bird Report

  | Published by The Bedfordshire Natural History Society, the annual bird report forms part 2 of The Bedfordshire Naturalist which has documented the wildlife of Bedfordshire annually since 1946. Copies of the bird report are distributed free to members of the Society and the Bedfordshire Bird Club and may be purchased from:- Mrs Mary Sheridan, 28, Chestnut Hill, Linslade, Leighton Buzzard, Beds, LU7 7TR. Full details of cost and postage at http://www.bedsbirdclub.org.uk ISBN: Buy this book from NHBS.com

• The Birds of Bedfordshire

  | By Paul Trodd & David Kramer | Castlemead Publications | 1991 | Hardback | 376 pages, Illustrations | with 8 colour plates, line drawings and 113 distribution maps | ISBN: 9780948555152 Buy this book from NHBS.com

• Where to Watch Birds in Bedfordshire, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire & Oxfordshire

  | By Brian Clews, Andrew Herget & Paul Trodd | Christopher Helm | 2002 | Paperback | 320 pages, 69 maps, 30 line drawings | ISBN: 9780713640021 Buy this book from NHBS.com

• Ringing Group

  Observatory WebsiteSatellite View
  W Kirby 01767 680551

• BCNP - Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Northamptonshire Wildlife Trust

  Website
  We are the largest charity working for the conservation of wildlife and wild spaces within the three counties (including Beds). Based in five offices, the Trust campaigns for the sensitive and sustainable management of wildlife in the countryside and the urban landscape, manages thousands of hectares of land for wildlife and people, and carries out extensive educational work…

• Bedfordshire Bird Club

  Website
  The Bedfordshire Bird Club was set up in 1992 by birdwatchers, from both inside and outside The Bedfordshire Natural History Society, to cater for their specialist needs. Its main functions are to record and document the avifauna within the County and to provide a forum for local birdwatchers

• Bedfordshire Natural History Society

  Website
  he BNHS was founded in 1946, its main function to record the fauna and flora of Bedfordshire. The society is here to help, encourage and support those with an interest in wildlife. We endeavour to cover all branches of natural history particularly in relation to Bedfordshire

Abbreviations Key

• Barton Hills National Nature Reserve

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  Barton Hills are situated southeast of the village of Barton-le-Clay in the English county of Bedfordshire. They are part of the Chilterns and hiking routes are marked on maps at the entrance to the hills. From the foot of the hillside, a spring (Barton Springs) marks the start of a chalk stream river. During the summer, Dartmoor ponies roam the hills.

• Bird and Nature Reserves in Bedfordshire

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  The Wildlife Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire manages 126 nature reserves and 95% of our population lives less than five miles away from their nearest reserve. Use their interactive map to find a Wildlife Trust BCN nature reserve (shown with a badger flag) near you. Click on a number (indicating a cluster of reserves) to zoom in to show individual sites in this area.

• Blow's Down Nature Reserve

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  Blow's Downs is now a well-known birdwatching site, particularly renowned for the regular appearance of Ring Ouzel on spring passage. Despite this species traditional use of the site many people visit Blow's but go away having not seen this elusive thrush. These notes aim to pass on some of the expertise that the locals have gained in locating them.

• Flitwick Moor

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  An important wetland with an mix of fen, meadow, wet woodland and fragile peaty soils. In the heart of the Flit Valley, this wetland was left behind when peat was cut from the site as recently as the 1960s. The peat was used in the purification of natural gas. Long before that, the naturally iron-rich groundwater that bubbled up to the surface from springs was bottled and sold as a tonic for the blood.

• Forest of Marston Vale (Marston Vale Millennium Park)

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  In the early 1990s, the government designated the 61 square mile area between Bedford and Milton Keynes a community forest and the forest of Marston Vale was born…

• Great Bramingham Wood

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  Bramingham Wood is an area of natural woodland, located immediately to the north of the town of Luton in the County of Bedfordshire. In 1985, the Woodland Trust, a nation-wide charity now with in excess of 100,000 members, took over the management and subsequently the ownership of Bramingham Wood from the then private owners. Consisting of approximately 45 acres, the wood is classified as an ancient woodland in that it has known to have been in existence for at least 400 years and has probably been a woodland for much longer.

• Pegsdon Hills

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  Steep hills and tranquil valleys in the Chilterns, with magnificent views of the countryside. One of the jewels of the Chilterns Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, Pegsdon Hills’ steep chalk hills offer some of the best views in the county. In spring, moschatel, or town-hallclock, named after the arrangement of its flowers, can be found in the woodland, while dingy and grizzled skipper butterflies flutter around in the grassland.

• Priory Country Park

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  Priory Country Park is an established green area, of around 360 acres, made up of lakes, meadows and woodland, partially enclosed within a bend in the river Great Ouse.

• RSPB Reserve - The Lodge

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  This reserve is a mixture of woodland, heathland and includes the formal gardens of the RSPB's UK headquarters…

• BedsBirds

  Mailing List
  Birding in Bedfordshire, England. - Register here: https://groups.io/register

• Birding Pal

  Information
  Local birders willing to show visiting birders around their area

• Birdline East Anglia

  Website
  Birdline East Anglia What's about? Simply phone 09068 700245Please report your bird sightings to phone/text 07941333970 or e birdnews@birdlineeastanglia.co.uk - Calls to 09068 700245 cost 60p/min from a BT landline other networks may vary

• Naturenet - Bedfordshire

  Website
  Articles on reserves etc.

• Opticron

  Website
  OPTICRON - P.O Box 370, Unit 21, Titan Court, Laporte Way, Luton, Bedfordshire, LU4 8YR, UK Telephone 01582 726522 Fax : 01582 723559 Email: info@opticron.co.uk

• Lee G R Evans - Bedfordshire Birding Blog

  BLOG
  BEDFORDSHIRE BIRDING is a new site created by Lee G R Evans to cater for birders both within and outside this inland county.

• Steve Blain - Bedsbirds Images

  BLOG
  Photoblog from a whole raft of good Beds photographer/birders…

• Bedfordshire Birds

  Flickr Gallery
  Collecting together photographs of all wild bird species taken in Bedfordshire, England.

• Photographer

  Gallery
  Chris

• Photographer - Nigel Blake

  Gallery
  (Nothing posted for several years) Welcome to my website! I have been photographing wildlife for about 25 years. I have traveled extensively throughout Europe and Africa in search of subjects to photograph. Whilst birds are my preferred quarry I am attracted to anything that catches my eye, be that people, landscapes or anything with exceptional aesthetic appeal.

• Photographer - Steve Blain

  Flickr Gallery
  Bird Porn - Steve Blain lives in Bedfordshire, loves digiscoping, local patching and county birding. Also enjoys the odd trip to far away lands to seek out mystical forest dwellers.