George, on left, outside Oxford University Museum of Natural History
Endowed with the title ‘Keeper of the Swifts’, I have been monitoring the 167 nesting boxes in the tower of the University Museum weekly, over the breeding season, for 28 years.
A ringer for 30 years, I have ringed over 1,000 swifts using rings supplied by the EGI (Edward Grey Institute for Field Ornithology) part of the Zoology Department of Oxford University.
My Ornithological interests range from surveys to behaviours. I spent 4 years in France helping with a migration study of Aquatic Warblers which breed in Eastern Europe but migrate along the Atlantic coast of France and Iberia.
My own projects include monitoring a sand martin colony and a population study of house sparrows, i also administrate a breeding study of over 250 barn owl nesting boxes in West Oxfordshire.