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7 Oct 2017 Hulk Hogan

No blogs in nearly a month then three in four days? The reason is simple: during September, grindstone was chafing nose as I worked zealously to complete my forthcoming travel guide 52 European Wildlife Weekends before the end September deadline. I managed it and thereby was granted time this week to process a backlog of photos and to deploy them in these recent blogs. Some of these images relate to a favourite bird - one I never tire of seeing and one about which I wrote briefly in the October issue of BBC Wildlife magazine. In it, I describe the Bearded Tit as recalling wrestler Hulk Hogan on account of the male's moustache.

An apt species for Features Editor Ben Hoare to have selected this month, as I have enjoyed several encounters with Bearded Tits in north Norfolk over the past fortnight or so. This is the time of year when family groups get the urge to discover pastures anew, and so leap into the air en masse - ostensibly to tower to a great height before bouncing west... but usually to lose their bottle and plummet back down into their home reed bed.

With a bit of patience, several birds showed well - and two adult males apparently took a particular liking to my Canon lens, if only for a few wonderful seconds.