Frequently asked questions:
Who are you?
- John Girdley, once a Science Teacher, (Environmental Science,
Electronics, Physics etc.) but now National Executive
Member for a large teaching trade Union (the NASUWT - which keeps me very busy), birder, moth enthusiast, rock climber (I had climbed South Stack
cliffs long before I knew there were Choughs there), and last of all, amateur Web-Page designer.
Are you a Dot.Com millionaire?
- I wish! I'm not even a dot.com!
www.birdtours.co.uk started in Jan
2000 (after I got a cheque for £13.40
from Amazon.co.uk) The simple aim, still, was to break even. It was always
my intention to provide free information for travelling birders around
the world. Visitor numbers have soared over the years and we now pull in
well over 3000 visitors a day, with significantly more than two million
pages of information viewed each year. Birdtours will become a limited company
from June 2003 (purely to keep me on the right side of the tax man!). A recent addition is our sister site www.worldbirder.com
which now displays, in their full glory, some of the 5000+ images that
I have been sent over the years.
Why call yourself Birdtours.co.uk?
- I knew that I had something useful to offer the birding
world, but nobody could remember my old domain name. Birdtours.co.uk
was available and so I bought it. I had a six fold increase in visitors
overnight. Catchy domain names really do work.
Can I send you a report?
- It's surprising how many people ask this. Yes!
e-mail me
Do you have a report from.....?
- Just follow the links on the menu bar, I usually manage to get reports on-line
within a month (can be busy with real work!). Sometimes in holiday times within a couple of days.
What made you get started?
- My son, then aged fourteen, said "why don't you
write a web-page dad?"
"But I don't know how" I protested.
"Don't worry, I'll teach you" he replied.
A steep learning curve led to my Sunderland
Point pages, by then I was hooked...
Your world list must be enormous?
- Just over 630 actually, although reading all of these
reports is giving me itchy feet. Countries visited: California, Florida,
Canada, Southern Spain (several times), Fuerteventura, Tenerife, Menorca,
France, the Pyrenees, Ibiza and Crete.
What was your luckiest ever sighting?
- Whilst climbing in the Alps, (non-birder at the time)
a Wall-creeper flew between my legs when "bridging" up a corner
in a 1000m cliff face just outside Chamonix. (range -six inches) I identified
it later from a field guide! My only thought at the time was, "they have
pretty birds here in France." The image lives on and it is still the
only one I have ever seen.
Are you a twitcher?
- Not really, well, ok, every now and again! I
only ever go for world ticks ( though I was tempted by the Sora, and the little
Swift and the......). Primarily I'm a local patch birder, based in North Lancs.
I do take part in BTO surveys like the CBC and WeBS. Within 10 miles
of my home in Morecambe I have seen just over 270 species!
Do you fancy going birding?
- I thought you would never ask!
Ask me a question?
Why not send
us a report, or an update to one of your current reports?
