10 months ago
Matthew Dixon
I also learned a bit about birds from Doug. One day (in the late 1950s?) when we were walking together on the beach at Thorpe Bay in the Thames Estuary, I saw something that looked like a plimsoll... When we got closer it turned out to be a bird... Doug was intrigued - not immediately recognising it. He picked it up, and later checked with his reference book(s), and it looked as though it might be a little auk. This would be exciting, since they are, it seems, pretty rare (and the great auk was already extinct!). With his parents' help he contacted an ornithologist, and this gentleman came to have a look, and confirmed that it was indeed a little auk!