TRISTAN SANDERSON-DUCKETT: He's back...

Are you seeing a pattern developing here: long hair; boyish good looks? And we are not just talking about Jon. We have Max; Dave has grown his hair; and now Tristan, who writes: "Hello, I'm a fifteen-year-old animal and rock freak, that loves being outoors, observing nature! I'm home-educated so I have plenty of time to do stuff that most people wouldn't consider 'education,' even though I've learnt far more from being outdoors and thinking for myself (instead of being cooped up in a classroom, being taught instead of learning). I hope one day to be finding new beasties and conserving known ones so I thought it might be a good idea to blog for the CFZ!"

Having recently been away in my dream world - a bird rescue centre - feeding and caring for various forms of avian life, and catching quite a few forms of bird parasite life (all gone now, luckily), I havent been able to blog. I apologise to my regular reader, whoever you are (if I have one) for slacking, but during my time at this bird rescue centre I was not slacking.

How do I know this? Because from 10 pm to about 7.30 am I was out cold like a stone. This is very rare for me as I'm a teenager. We normally have nocturnal habits, creeping around dark, dank places, and waiting to pounce upon and frighten O.A.P s ... that's according to the newspapers anyway!

But despite the change of my normal routine I have to say that I had a great time while I was staying there. I had the privilege of holding a cormarant, learning how to feed a gannet, and getting covered in bird mites. Plus I now have seven pigeons, including two racers and a young wood pigeon. I'm quite grateful for a few more birds as at the moment my barn owl Boedicia is moulting, and therefore I am unable to fly her. Also, shortly before I went away, I spotted an article about a strange, three-toed, cloven-hooved footprint in the local paper, which certainly does intrigue the mind. But more on that next week.

But apart from that all has been very quiet; all I can say is I hope I've spoken too soon....