Cute little white and grey bird standing on a sign post

Little black headed gull being cute as heck at Pennington Flash in the rain this morning

The performances come thick and fast this time of year. Next up - Handel’s Messiah. A tradition for us to perform this in the lead up to Christmas, it usually sells well so grab your tickets quick!

Next month we will be performing a night of Italian music with a group of great soloists. Please come along if you can. Tickets are now available from Burnley Mechanics Theatre.

Oystercatcher (black and white bird with long red/orange bill) with two babies (small, fluffy, brown and white) on rocks.

Oystercatcher (black and white bird with long red/orange bill) with two babies (small, fluffy, brown and white) on rocks.

Oystercatcher and babies by Discovery Hide at @wwtworldwide.bsky.social Martin Mere today ❤️ #birds

I love how they cropped off most of the men when they published it 😂

Look, Ma, we’re in the paper!

New music day!

Slavonian grebe on water

Two black necked grebes on water

Absolutely. I don’t get over very often as it’s a fair drive for me, but it’s such a great reserve. I didn’t get particularly good pics last time but always great to see these birds.

Is the Slavonian still there? I went a few weeks back and was lucky to time it for both black necked and Slavonian grebes (and GC). Such beautiful birds.

Poster - Burnley Municipal Choir - Elgar The Dream of Gerontius. With East Lancs Sinfonia conducted by Nigel Wilkinson. Soloists: Kathleen Wilkinson, Paul Nilon, James Cleverton. Sunday 18th May 2025 7pm. Burnley Mechanics Theatre. Tickets available online or from the theatre box office. 01282 664400.

If anybody is in the Burnley area on Sunday, please come along to hear @burnleychoir.bsky.social perform this magnificent work. We are a charity and rely on ticket sales to keep us going. If anybody can share this poster too, that would be greatly appreciated. #music #choir #elgar

Just over a week to go! Grab your tickets online or at the Mechanics theatre box office. We’ve been working our musical socks off and this promises to be a great night!

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Petition: Make the arts part of UK National Renewal | Campaign for the Arts The Chancellor is reviewing all public spending from scratch. The arts make our lives happier and our communities stronger. Now is the moment to invest in them.

🚨🌱 The Chancellor is reviewing all public spending from scratch. Please join me in signing the @campaignforthearts.org petition to remind the UK Govt: the arts make our lives happier & our communities stronger. Now is the moment to invest in them. www.campaignforthearts.org/petitions/sp...

Curlew on the stage at the memorial hall in Pateley Bridge.

Bush with green leaves and orange flowers

The Darwin’s Barberry looking particularly beautiful this morning at Gawthorpe Hall

It just annoys me that laptops don’t come with cd drives anymore.

If I had a cd drive for my laptop I could quite probably save it and get it on the OneDrive but I don’t. Might need to buy one at some point for that purpose.

It’s interesting. I quite like it but it does rather spoil the mood when you’ve just had Sam reading the death of Sykes in Oliver Twist and then the next track is plinky plonky music.

CD cover. Charles Dickens readings by Prunella Scales and Samuel West with mechanical music of the 19th century. National Trust.

This evening’s listen. Charles Dickens readings by Prunella Scales and Samuel West. A recording from 1998. It’s as good as you would expect. Both such excellent readers.

If I go up Bempton or Flamborough, when I’m on the east coast, skylarks and linnets are pretty much all I can hear! The oystercatchers are actually pretty noisy here at the moment.

We are definitely into ‘chiffchaffs and wrens make it nigh on impossible to hear any other birds’ season. Brockholes was a cacophony of their calls this morning, despite the rain.

It’s a really helpful app for birdsong and also photo identification, as a continually learning birder. There are occasions when it throws up some ‘interesting’ results but mostly it seems pretty accurate.

Merlin screenshot with chiffchaff circled

They’re back! First proper chiffchaff call of the year for me. At Gawthorpe Hall. #birds

I want the UK to invest in nature friendly farming To grow food, we need nature. The UK Government must increase investment in nature friendly farming. Sign and share the petition.

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Two black and white photos of women standing by doors to buildings

The backs of the previous photos. One simply says “July 1931”. The other gives a name and address in Earlestown, Lancashire, and ‘age 23’.

Best ‘unexpected bonus in a second hand book’ I’ve ever had, I think. These were in an old book of Keats poetry which I bought this morning. I wish I had more information.

Three white farmyard geese, with orange bills, walking towards the camera on a country lane, in frankly quite aggressive fashion. One is very close to the camera, the other two are behind it with necks outstretched. Grass verge and hedge behind.

“Hello. We’d like to talk to you about Geesus.”

Could well be! Been there since 1978.

Post a pic of when your pet was little.

Kono after her first trip out in the rain:

The tree sparrows at Bempton (and also Filey Dams) are amazing. There are so few tree sparrows around these days anywhere else it’s a joy to see them in such good numbers.