We have had some quite special weather since Friday….. summer at last. Yesterday was spent at the Devon County Show which was interesting and an eye opener. I was frankly, quite amazed at the the way the Hunting and Shooting fraternity  were given the opportunity to appear "main stream" and politically acceptable. It's the 21st Century and yet there are still thousands of British people shooting and hunting which is in complete contrast to the majority of the rest of the population. Live and let live springs to mind, but you can hardly use that cliché when your MO is not in the least about letting things live! I did enjoy my discussions with the  British Association for Shooting and Conservation have a look at their website here and you will see that they are a massive group of people dedicated to shooting and hunting all the wildlife that we happy to observe and photograph.  I found them to be knowledgeable and informed but also extremely bigoted and not in the least bit receptive to a contrary opinion. You will see when you are on their site that there is a call for a change in the law to ban the shooting of Golden Plover in Northern Ireland. You are asked to send an email to the newly appointed minister to tell him that you want to carry on killing this beautiful bird. Apparently at the moment, this is a species that can be legally "taken" as they put it. Can you imagine, honestly! I ask you, what kind of sad person would want to shoot Golden Plover and for what reason???????  Ranting is not the reason for my site but it makes me really angry that in the 21st century, honest intelligent people are walking around the countrysid, legally shooting wildlife such as Goldeneye Duck and Golden Plover…….. that just can not be right. 

The bird above is a Fulmar and today we went on to the cliffs of Budleigh Salterton and took a few photographs perched on the cliff tops. The weather was glorious and the light perfect but it was still hard to get some acceptable shots. As well as Fulmar we saw Linnet, Kestrel, Rock Pipit, Skylark and all the usual common species.