Author Mark Cocker, who won critical acclaim for his Birds Brittanica book, is not only celebrating the book’s relaunch but is also releasing a new title on Swifts, as well as working on his garden at his new Derbyshire home
Back in 2005, we saw the launch of a true landmark among bird books. Birds Brittanica, by Mark Cocker, covered the UK’s breeding birds, most passage migrants, and a few more besides. But not as a field guide – this looked at their history and folklore, as well as being packed full of anecdotes of encounters with the birds from the public at large.
It won praise around the country, with reviews saying things like “vast and amazingly beautiful”, “the book is a triumph”, “this book made me feel I’d been waiting for it all my life”, and “a national monument”. The publishers claimed that Birds Britannica was a bird book like no other, and for once the hype was justified.
Fifteen years later, Birds Britannica has been relaunched, giving a new generation of birders and general readers the chance to enjoy it. I interviewed Mark back in 2018, after his acclaimed book Our Place – Can We Save Britain’s Wildlife Before It Is Too Late?, described by the New Statesman as “a radical examination of
Britain’s relationship with the land by one of our greatest nature writers”. At the time, he was busy working in his five-acre fenland plot, deep in the heart of the Norfolk Broads.
During the interview, one of the things that came out was that he was wanting to leave Norfolk and move back to his native Derbyshire, and when I spoke to him about this relaunch, I found this had happened.
“Our new place is in Buxton, in Derbyshire,” said Mark. “It is on the street where I was born! I am rediscovering an old landscape and exploring known and new places which have been incredibly fruitful so far in terms of writing, and in terms of planning for new books. It is partly the reason I wanted to get this house.”
In fact he was just about to leave and return to Norfolk from his new house in Buxton when the coronavirus lockdown happened, preventing Mark from driving south to his old house, as yet unsold.
Like most people ‘locked down’ in Britain (and the world!) Mark has been
itching to get out in his new Derbyshire playground. From reedbeds, he now has eyes on the moorland birds he saw in his youth. He wants to work with species like Twite, Red Grouse, Ring Ouzel and Curlew (Oystercatcher is a new breeding bird for him here!).
Mark wants to walk through woods of Redstarts and Pied Flycatchers, although, sadly, Wood Warbler is now missing. He wants to check up on Derbyshire’s exciting list of bumblebees and solitary bees again, with new species here since he was a lad; not forgetting the flowers they feed on in all those amazing limestone valleys. Mark has a vision of 360° when looking at wildlife, trying to ID everything that moves and grows.
When talking about Derbyshire, of course, the Peak District springs to mind. It has a high volume of people living on its boundaries, with Manchester, Sheffield, Nottingham, Leicester and Derby helping make up the 20 million within an hour’s drive. It claims 13.25 million visitors a year, with only 38,000 living locally within it. Mark wants to share his knowledge with many of them in a very quiet structured way, trying not to use too much travelling, and walking if possible, in locations where wildlife abounds.
Breeding Spoonbill
Mark talked about the 15 years since the book was first published, with some amazing changes having taken place, especially in new breeding birds in Britain. Spoonbills were mentioned on page 59, with the first breeding bird for 330 years described as being in Eastern England, as it was such a rare occurrence then. Now they breed in several counties, even inland at Fairburn Ings in Yorkshire, and an amazing record in Orkney, in 2018!
The same goes for Great White, Little and even Cattle Egrets, now breeding well away from the heron stronghold of the Somerset Levels. But what about declines like Turtle Dove and especially Nightingale, which appeared on the front cover of the 2005 edition (now replaced by a male Barn Owl)?
Well of course there have been projects such as on the Knepp Castle Estate, where the habitat is just what both these species have been crying out for. We know what is missing for these two species to be successful elsewhere in the future.
We talked about the famous Ossoms Eyrie Cave in the Manifold valley south of Buxton, which has remains of prey, plus Roman remains, which date them. A staggering 63 species of bird have been identified from the cave, many being prey to everything from Golden Eagle to Barn Owl. We talked about reintroductions, too, but maybe Golden Eagle is not one for Derbyshire for the near future (it last nested in the county in 1668)!
The one species Mark would like to see brought back to Derbyshire is not a bird, but the Pine Marten. The area is full of Grey Squirrels, and research has shown that this mammal can make a big difference to the numbers of Greys, allowing Red Squirrels to recolonise from areas where they are found. This would save millions of pounds on schemes like Red Alert, where Grey Squirrels are trapped and killed. This money could then go into other conservation work.