As regular CFZ-watchers will know, for some time Corinna has been doing a column for Animals & Men and a regular segment on On The Track... particularly about out-of-place birds and rare vagrants. There seem to be more and more bird stories from all over the world hitting the news these days so, to make room for them all - and to give them all equal and worthy coverage - she has set up this new blog to cover all things feathery and Fortean.

Wednesday 16 April 2014

Suffolk: Memories of emblematic stone-curlew sought to prevent species becoming nothing more than a distant memory

Monday, April 14, 2014 
1:24 PM

Recollections about one of East Anglia’s most emblematic birds are being sought in an innovative effort to prevent the species becoming just a distant memory in parts of one of its former strongholds.

The curious-looking, highly charismatic stone-curlew is now one of Britain’s rarest breeding bird species but was once a familiar sight for farm workers on the Suffolk Sandlings – the distinctive tract of light, sandy, stony soils east of the A12, stretching from Kessingland in the north to the River Orwell in the south.

With its wild, yellow eyes, long yellow legs and its eerie, other-worldly calls that pierce the night, the migratory, crow-sized species has several nicknames - such as the evocative “wailing heath chicken” and “Norfolk plover”, although Suffolk ornithologists may have something to say about the latter.

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