We've had some very sad news (via David Astins) which I (Bob) cannot quite take in, that Ian Bullock (a former RSPB warden of Ramsey, a great naturalist and all round decent bloke) has died.
My first contact with Ian was back in the late 1970s when I was managing NNRs in Breconshire and he was looking after the South Stack area on Anglesey for the RSPB if I recall. We were both interested in choughs and we did a short joint note of our individual observations of choughs being attracted to burnt heathland habitat for food (his observations on Anglesey and mine on the Calf of Man). The note was published in British Birds.
I got to know Ian well when I moved to Pembs and he moved to Ramsey. Ian was a member (as was I) of the then Wildlife Trusts grandly-titled Pembrokeshire Ornithological Research Committee (PORC). His contributions to PORC and to knowledge about choughs, to aid their conservation, were immense. He was organiser of the 1982 national chough survey (see Bullock et al. 1983. The chough in Britain and Ireland, British Birds 76 (9) pp 377-401.
During the Sea Empress (1996) Ian myself and others were at the coal face. I'll never forget those flights over Carmarthen Bay and elsewhere looking for scoters and other seabirds that were likely to be affected by the oil spill. Ian came into his own navigating us along transects to count the scoter flocks in his own measured, calm, confident and inimitable way.
There is so much more that could be said about Ian. His loss to natural history in Pembs is considerable. Our thoughts right now go to his partner Gill at this very sad time.