birdgirl: 2016

Saturday, 31 December 2016

Video of my preloved clothes and the impact of fashion

In June 2016 I wrote an article for New Internationalist Magazine about the impact of fashion on the environment. Greenpeace shared my article on their website, which got 500 likes. The link to my blog post ishttp://birdgirluk.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/my-article-in-new-internationalist.html

I have made a fun video montage of my pre-loved clothes to raise awareness of the impact of fashion on the environment and people in places like Bangladesh including deforestation of ancient rainforest for rayon and why our throw away clothes culture must change.

The link to my YouTube video is youtu.be/CJphNeRN27U

Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

About the Author

Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig in Antarctica
Photograph copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

Mya-Rose Craig is a 14 year old young British Bangladeshi birder, naturalist, conservationist, environmentalist, activist, writer and speaker. She is based near Bristol and writes the successful Birdgirl Blog, with posts about birding and conservation from around the world. She loved seeing Mountain Gorillas in East Africa and Penguins in Antarctica over Christmas 2015, her 7th continent.

Mya-Rose was a Bristol European Green Capital Ambassador along with Kevin McCloud, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Tony Juniper, Simon King, Miranda Krestovnikoff and Shaun the Sheep! See the full list of Bristol Ambassadors. She has also been listed with the singer songwriter George Ezra and actress Maisie Williams from Game of Thrones as one of Bristol's most influential young people. She organised a conference in June 2016 aiming to increase the ethnic diversity in nature. Please connect with her on LinkedIn (Mya-Rose Birdgirl Craig) so that she can invite you to join the Race Equality in Nature LinkedIn Group and be part of the change. Please like her Birdgirl Facebook Page and follow her on Birdgirl Twitter

Friday, 30 December 2016

White-tailed Eagle - An incredible Garden Bird

Friday 28th October 2016 was the most amazing day for me as a Compton Martin birder in the Chew Valley.

It was the half-term school holidays and I was hanging around at home hoping for a rare bird to turn up somewhere in the country. Little did I know that the bird would turn up, but much closer to home....

This is the article that I wrote for the Chew Valley Gazette about seeing a White-tailed Eagle from my garden http://bit.ly/2iy6ggQ on page 62.

Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig watching a rare White-tailed Eagle
Photograph taken by and copyright Helena Craig

Record shot of the White-tailed Eagle with a much smaller Buzard
Taken by and copyright Chris Craig taken from garden

About the Author

Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig in Antarctica
Photograph copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

Wednesday, 28 December 2016

Blue Rock Thrush

Yesterday, as we were visiting a relative, news came over of a Blue Rock Thrush which is widespread in Europe and Asia. As soon as we were in the car, I got as much information as possible. As sometimes can happen, twitchers can turn against a bird. First it had a droopy wing, then the wing was OK but a foot was deformed.

My parents and older sister Ayesha had seen the one on he Isles of Scilly in 1999, a twitch which I had heard about many times! The last twitchable bird was in 2000, which was before I was born.

Looking at the images en-route, the bird looked fine and so we decided to twitch it the next day. We arrived home at 1 am and so were not up at dawn. It was in Stow-on-the-Wold in Gloucestershire, which was only 1 1/2 hours from home. A very short journey compared to some others we'd made in the past.

Blue Rock Thrush Stow-in-the-Wold
Taken by young birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

It was a cold but sunny morning and we watched the first year male Blue Rock Thrush for a couple of hours and it was a lovely bird and looked in good condition. There was nothing at all wrong with the wing and certainly I couldn't see anything wrong with the foot. They occur in Asia and as it had arrived with other Asian birds and was fly-catching both added to its credentials.

It was really nice to see another new bird in Britain and my British list is now at 466.

Blue Rock Thrush Stow-in-the-Wold
Taken by young birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

About the Author

Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig in Antarctica
Photograph copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

Saturday, 24 December 2016

Eastern Black Redstart - A Christmas Twitch

The best kind of twitches are when you get to see a really good bird close to where you are going anyway.

On 24th December 2016 I saw an Eastern Black Redstart on Christmas Eve close to my grandmother's house in North Yorkshire at Skinningrove on the coast. The bird had been there since October and been twitched by lots of people. We had held off from twitching it on the basis that we would be visiting my Gran for Christmas and hoping it would stay all winter.

It's a subspecies at the moment but is a stunning bird which stayed near the water-line whilst we watched. It's very distinctively different from other Black Redstart's and so is ripe for splitting.

Eastern Black Redstart Skinningrove, Teeside
Photograph taken by and copyright Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

About the Author

Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig in Antarctica
Photograph copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

Thursday, 22 December 2016

A local rarity - Blyth's Pipit at Blagdon Lake

On 21 December 2016 a bird that had been around a day or two locally was identified as a very rare Blyth's Pipit. They can be confused wth juvenile Tawny or Richard's pipits so had taken couple of days to pin down the identification. It was already dark when we heard the news and so too late to go and see the bird even though it was at Blagdon Lake, which we can see from our house and is only 3 miles away. The next 2 days I frustratingly wasn't able to go see it because of other commitments and a family wedding.

On 22nd December 2016 I was finally able to see this rare bird and get good but flighty views. I managed to get a few record shots but nothing good. It was fantastic to be seeing it especially so close to home.

Blyth's Pipit is a medium sized passerine bird which breeds all the way in Mongolia and then migrates to Southern Asia. It was another fantastic Asian bird to arrive here this autumn. This was also the second rare bird at Blagdon Lake in 2 months which was amazing. They were both found by Nigel Milbourne, our friend who birds there every day.

Blyth's Pipit Blagdon Lake, Somerset
Photograph taken by and copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

About the Author

Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig in Antarctica
Photograph copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

Saturday, 3 December 2016

White Wagtail in Pembrokeshire

On Saturday 3rd December we travelled to the small village of Camrose in Pembrokeshire to see the UK's first Masked Wagtail from Central Asia. It is a split from White Wagtail, is a small passerine bird with a white face and is usually found in Kazakstan, Iran and Afghanistan - hardly places that are easy to birdwatch in!

It was a really stunning bird that we managed to get great views of on the rooftops and also feeding on mealworm put out for it by birders. Another fabulous bird of the autumn.

It was also lovely to see and chat to lots of birding friends, which makes it a sociable hobby.

Masked Wagtail Camrose Pembrokeshire
Photograph taken by and copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

About the Author

Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig in Antarctica
Photograph copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

Thursday, 1 December 2016

Interview on BBC Points West News

On Thursday 1st December 2016 I did a live interview on BBC Radio Bristol breakfast show about Black2Nature, my Race Equality in Nature Conference and getting ethnic Minority people out into nature.

That morning and evening, BBC1 Points West News also showed an interview with with me about Black2Nature, Camp Avalon and why getting Minority ethnic people outside into nature was important.

This is my interview on BBC West Local News, Points West https://youtu.be/9kR_BCEMU5c with Hamza Khandker who attended both Camps Avalon for young people and Dr Richard Benwell from WWT who spoke at my Race Equality in Nature Conference in June about the citizen's right to access Nature.

Lots of people at school saw my interview, even though I didn't tell anyone about it, which made me realise that the piece reached out to a large audience on this topic, which is great news.

Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig and Mike Bailey in filming

Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig on BBC1 Points West News

About the Author

Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig in Antarctica
Photograph copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

Sunday, 20 November 2016

Forster's Tern, Essex

On Sunday 20 November 2016 we travelled to Mistley Quay in Essex to see a Forster's Tern. The bird had been seen the afternoon before, but we were due to see Mike Dilger speak at the Somerset Wildlife Trust AGM and so had to wait.

We turned up to the site to hear that the bird had been seen further along the river. We then drove past Mistley Quay, to where the bird had been seen. Unfortunately it had flown off 10 minutes before and so we headed back. This was what happened for the first few hours, chasing the bird up and down the river.

Finally, we decided to stay put at Mistely Quay itself and hope the bird flies past us. It was now afternoon and it was cold standing there by the riverside.

Eventually, the first winter Forster's Tern flew up river from the right, coming in pretty close and giving us a good scope view. After a few minutes, the tern carried on flying and so I didn't get a photograph because of the fence between me and the bird.

This was another good bird for the autumn, which was a new bird for me. Apparently, this was my sister Ayesha's 400th bird on her British list.

Forster's Tern twitch

About the Author

Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig in Antarctica
Photograph copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

Friday, 11 November 2016

RSPB & Cairngorms Nature Young Presenter Competition 2016

In October 2016, I entered a competition run by the RSPB and Cairngorms Nature which was a young presenter competition. This is my film http://bit.ly/2eftRmj

I wanted to be different from the usual films on badgers and foxes and also wanted to do something educational about birds. When 24 rare Great White Egrets turned up at my local patch Chew Valley Lake, I had the perfect choice. For me, that was more important than choosing something that would be popular with the general public.

On the day I was filming, all my ideas for camera angles and heights I was going to stand, sit and crouch at had to be forgotten. We managed to find tiny spot in an enclosed area where I could stand with the lake behind. I had the microphone tucked under my coat but you could still hear the wind blowing. It was only after I borrowed my Dad's scarf and put that over the microphone that we could do any filming. By this point were starting to lose light, so we didn't have long to get the filming done. I learnt a lot from the experience and in a way was glad that we didn't do lots of takes as I'm sure the professional nature TV presenters don't have that luxury and it makes you more able to speak on live TV.

I watched lots of the other videos only after mine was done, as I didn't want to be influenced by others. It was a real shame that I was the only ethnic minority young person to enter, especially as lots I know are into film-making. I will be contacting Cairngorms Nature and RSPB about the competition after the result as I think that they need to advertise and promote the competition where Minority Ethnic young people will see it and then encourage them to enter. When the results recently came out I was delighted to be in the final eight, but was disappointed that there was only myself and one other girl in the final eight. I did not understand this as I saw some excellent girls who entered. It would be interesting to know whether there were more men than women on the judging panel, as people tend to like kids like themselves.

Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig

It was interesting because the voting for this competition is meant to be about who will inspire young people to like nature. I think that this should be someone who will inspire boys and girls and all ethnicities. However, by having a winner chosen by public vote only, where most birders are men who are likely to choose a boy who reminds them of themselves as a child or of the male presenters already on TV, I wonder if we'll ever get a girl winning. I am certainly interested in how myself and the other girl will do, though unless one of us wins, we'll never know how we got on.

One option for next year might be to have a public vote but then for the judging panel (made up of men, women and Minority Ethnic people) choose the winner from the top 3 voted by the public. So long as they chose who would inspire everyone this would overcome the problems and ensure a fairer and more diverse outcome.

Thank you to Alice Owen, Omar Badr, Nardine Groch & Olivia Frost from the UWE MA Wildlife Film-making Course for their help with the filming.

Vote for me if you think I will mot inspire the widest rage of young people. Thank you.

About the Author

Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig in Antarctica
Photograph copyright Young Birder Birdgirl Mya-Rose Craig