BIKING BIRDER VI Reasons To Be Cheerful part 2 The Children's Book Project

 

The Children's Book Project

My Biking Birder adventure for 2025, my seventh, has three aims :

People - meet & greet and help charities.

Birding - observe, record and share.

Literature - learn more about Laurie Lee.

When it comes to people I try to do as much as I can to make a smile, a laugh or a difference.

Reasons to be Cheerful Part 2  Helping a wonderful, well amazing actually, charity called The Children's Book Project.

Please read on and of you can make a donation to help The Children's Book Project by clicking on the link below to my Children's Book Project JustGiving page that would be absolutely fabulous.

   https://www.justgiving.com/page/gary-prescott-2025-childrensbookproject?newPage=true

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How things can change so dramatically! There I was trying to find out how I could get cuddly toys that were being thrown away saved and I found Toys4Life.

          Toys4Life save over 4 million toys a year and one of the way in which they receive so many toys, especially cuddly toys, is through their network of collecting bins across much of England.

          Well as well as large plastic bags full of toys arriving, some kind donors put other things into the collecting bins as well. Some of these things you wouldn't want to know about (!) but Toys4Life do receive a lot of books, mostly children's books. 

          Now on my first visit to meet everyone at Toys4Life I was shown around the facility, meeting the brilliant office staff and the wonderful ladies who do all of the toy sorting; how I would love that job!

          I was also told about the problem they have with the children's books. Cuddly toys, plastic toys, Toys4Life had outlets for these but not for children's books.

          I took six large boxes of these children's books with the intention of giving some of them to the excellent RSPB reserve at Sandwell Valley, where I am a volunteer, giving some to The fantastic Nature Play Centre in Lowestoft, Suffolk and the rest to charity shops. At that time I worked every Tuesday at the Acorns Children's Hospice shop in Bromsgrove.

            With the first six boxes of children's books from Toys4Life sorted I did just that; each received boxes of superb children's books, all in excellent condition.

            Doing another internet search using ECOSIA, the internet search engine that plants trees, trying to find another outlet for the books, after all I had about 400 children's books and I had said to Toys4Life that I would be taking them cuddly toys every Thursday and therefore able to collect six more boxes of books each week. My little Nissan Note, £900 off Ebay back in October 2018 and still going strong, couldn't fit any more. Well, using ECOSIA I found out about the super Children's Book Project.

          Taking text from their superb website :-

WHAT WE DO

One in three disadvantaged children across the UK has fewer than ten books of their own at home*, and one in ten has none.

The Children’s Book Project seeks to tackle book poverty and to give every child the opportunity to own their own book. We believe in empowering children to choose a book they are motivated to read and in the power of reading communities. We put on book gifting events that are inclusive, joyful and have a tangible impact on every family that participates.

Poverty is by no means the only reason for a lack of books in many homes. Lack of time, negative experiences as a child or lack of confidence about their own reading skills or book choices can all undermine a family’s propensity to own books.

          So now with a place for the children's books from Toys4Life to go to, I take boxes of books to this fabulous charity, the Children's Book Project.

          Please take a look and see if you can help by donating some children's books.

          You could also help by kindly giving a donation via my Children's Book Project JustGiving page for The Children's Book Project. 

Please click on the image below . .  .

          From April the first this year, seven years to the day from when I set off from Lima to cycle over The Andes in Peru, as you do, I will be cycling along the route Laurie Lee walked back in 1934. Laurie Lee's book; As I walked Out One Midsummer Morning, is the inspiration for my latest Biking Birder adventure and I hope you will enjoy following my adventures on here and if you could be so kind as to make a donation to one of the three charities I am doing all this for; Acorns Children's Hospice, The Children's Book Project and the RSPB, Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, then all the better.

          Giving a donation would give power to my peddling and definitely . . . 

Tickle my Feathers.

TMF!

BIKING BIRDER I March 24th & 25th 2010 To Slimbridge via The Old Severn Bridge

  On This Day - 2010    Biking Birder I

March 24th 2010    Severn Bridges to Slimbridge

Bridge over Troubled Water

Simon & Garfunkel

Off towards the Severn Estuary by following the Bristol Avon to Avonmouth and then cycling north, I saw both Severn Bridges. 

I found a Black Redstart at the older of the two bridges, whilst sitting on the wall where one could view the magnificent bridge and the expansive Severn Estuary. 

Many years ago I had brought a coachload of Secondary aged teenagers here, back in the days when this spot was a large M4 motorway café. The buildings here now are offices. The trip with the forty-plus students at Coppice High School, Ashmore Park, Wolverhampton was to Slimbridge of course but also to the Severn Estuary shoreline, near to where Offa’s Dyke ended or began depending on your point of view.

       I cycled out onto the old Severn Bridge, stopping half way over to enjoy the view, wind and drizzle. 

Barnaby Bear didn't enjoy the sensation of such delights and just sat on my bike shivering, silently complaining and waiting for me to GET OFF THE BRIDGE!

 

A phone call from Slimbridge and rain starting to fall, persuaded me to get to the WWT centre a day early. 

             Visit Slimbridge WWT website

I was met there by Sally Monroe and once I had stowed away my bike and belongings in an office, I was photographed with James Lees, the warden, in front of the Sir Peter Scott bust. 

Welcome to Slimbridge - Map & Day Planner

    Massive works were going on around the grounds, and parts of this favourite of birding places resembled a large building site. Down to the Holden Hide with James but only the Pink-footed Goose was on view. 

    An evening with the two Daves and Jane, Dave Paynter's wife was extremely enjoyable and the chilli was not ridiculously hot.

          My intention had been to camp somewhere near Slimbridge but on being about to leave, Dave Paynter had come up to me to say, "You're not camping tonight. My wife has made a curry for you with a pint!"

             The kindness of strangers, it was an absolutely fantastic evening with so many stories about my conservation hero, Sir Peter Scott and what it was like working at Slimbridge for decades.

March 25th 2010   A Day at Slimbridge

No More Heroes Anymore

The Stranglers

          A Peregrine had been the first bird seen, one from my bedroom window at Dave and Jane Paynter's house!

          Thanks so much to them both for their kindness and company. Wonderful couple. 

          Once at Slimbridge once more, I had the privilege of going around the reserve with James Lees in the morning at Slimbridge. There weren’t many birds to see, just a fall of Chiff Chaffs apparently but hearing James’ stories was the real delight. How can someone find six American waders in one day at Slimbridge? James did: Semipalmated Sandpiper and two Buff-breasted Sandpipers, as well as no less than three Pectoral Sandpipers! James also talked about his time on North Ronaldsay and of finding a Syke's Warbler, Calandra Lark and a Veery. A superbly talented birder, great company and a real inspiration, James was a delightful young man to meet.

               I was interviewed on the radio later in the morning, BBC radio WM with Louise Patterson of the RSPB,  given by phone whilst sitting on the top level of the Holden Tower. 

       A nice phone call from Ian Crutchley later, a birding friend from Wolverhampton, one of my ex-students from Coppice High School and probably one of the students on the Coppice Bird Club outing mentioned above. Ian had heard the interview and said that my Brummie accent sounded strong. Good job too! I am proud to say I am from that city. Proud to be a Brummie! World’s best city.

     Birds that James & I saw from the Holden Tower and whilst walking around Slimbridge’s grounds, included two Willow Warblers, two Wheatear; a male and a female, two Greenland Whitefronts, the lone Pink-footed Goose and a distant Great White Egret. Good list with twenty seven Swallows too. Barnaby Bear and I  has also given out stickers to children who had said hello to him.

            After being with James and had enjoyed a tour of the whole visitor's centre and grounds, I was escorted by an amazing young woman, Phoebe, who showed me the duckery at the far end of Rushy Lake, a place I had never visited before during the dozens of previous visits to Slimbridge.

             What a privilege to be shown around by the delightful Phoebe, her knowledge and enthusiasm for the process of getting so many rare duck species to hatch and survive was phenomenal.

             Phoebe. 

             Now there is a birdwatching name of note.

             Wikipedia can say it better than me!

Phoebe Snetsinger (née Burnett; June 9, 1931 – November 23, 1999) was an American birder famous for having seen and documented birds of 8,398 different species,^[1] more than anyone else in history at the time, and was the first person to see more than 8,000.^[2] Her memoir, Birding on Borrowed Time, explores this achievement. She traveled the world multiple times to find birds in their habitats. She was described as having had an excellent memory and a strong competitive spirit.^[1]

Phoebe's inspirational, incredible story is told in this amazing book.

After receiving a melanoma diagnosis at age 50, Snetsinger took up birding avidly, becoming known as a sharp observer who kept detailed notes. Her multiple expeditions around the world to often remote locations occasionally proved to be dangerous. Initially driven to join the competition of seeing the most birds by the prognosis that her cancer was fatal, she died in a vehicle accident while birding in Madagascar about 18 years after the diagnosis.

             Thanks Phoebe for the inspiration and thanks Phoebe for being such a wonderful guide.

              Back in the large Millennium visitor's centre, I met a classful of young children from Gracefield School.

            The children presented me with a cheque of money raised by them for Slimbridge and the WWT. Fabulous!

              A late afternoon cycle along the Gloucester Ship Canal was a struggle in places, with thick mud on the towpath and eventually I reached a secluded spot, where unseen from the path, I could put up my tent. It had views over some extensive wet  grasslands, scraped and pools toward the River Severn.

              

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              Back when I was a mere, get the pun? ten year old, I wrote a letter to Sir Peter Scott, probably asking him whether I could have his job!

              He wrote back!

              A wonderful, beautifully written in fountain pen ink on blue Basildon Bond paper, I remember it still, though sadly it has been lost for many years. I wonder if my teacher, Mrs Turley of Hob Green Primary School in Stourbridge kept it? I know the letter was made a fuss of in class.

          This a photograph of Mrs Turley with our class. I am the one with the right angle ears at the far right end of the back row.

           Like most small boys I loved my teacher and it was probably Mrs Turley who got me to write to the then most famous British TV Conservationist and Presenter.

Sir Peter Scott outside his home of the 1930s at Sutton Bridge, Norfolk.

Incredible how this special place became an important memory of my 2015 Biking Birder adventure, thanks to Dave and Sue Hilton.

linked to an article about the TV series, Survival; the programme where I most likely got to know about Sir Peter.

Peter Scott's Bird Sanctuary (1938) - Youtube

           I was always obsessed with anything natural; catching newts, bringing home dead birds, chasing butterflies and putting frogspawn into jam jars to watch how they developed. Normal stuff for most children back in the Sixties, I remember that catching Sticklebacks in streams; behind the garden of my Nan & Grandad Prescott's house, Dad's parents, in Yardley Wood, Birmingham and another just up the road from my Nan & Grandad Gormley's house, my Mum's parents, in Weoley Castle, also in the World's BEST city, Birmingham. This, together with catching newts, was my favourite childhood pastime; especially if one caught a red-bellied male!

              Sir Peter's letter cemented my love of nature and is a big reason why I do what I do for the RSPB (Together We Fly), Royal Society for The Protection of Birds; the WWT (Spotlight on Saltmarsh), the Wildfowl & Wetland Trust; the BTO (Support Our Surveys) British Trust for Ornithology and other nature charities, such as The Worcestershire Wildlife Trust (Saving Worcestershire's Rainforests). A visit to Slimbridge is like a pilgrimage to me and I always say thank you whenever I see any Sir Peter Scott bust at the WWT centres.

Click on the above WWT logo to find out more about the WWT on the WWT website.

Tickle My Feathers

TMF