During 25-30 October 2015 the youth committee of BirdLife Sweden visited Azerbaijan to study bird migration at Besh Barmag but also to meet with local young naturalists and initiate further co-operation. The trip was a great success ...
A guest blog by Bart de Schutter In November/December 2012 a friend of mine visited Oman on a birding and photographing trip. Looked like a nice country for birding to me, but I was not really inspired. Not yet....
Turkey is one of the most fascinating countries in the Western Palearctic for birdwatchers. The location of the country at the crossroads of continents resulted in diverse habitat and bird species. Specialties and rarities include Yelkouan Shearwater,...
There have been numerous taxonomic and related developments since v3.1. Several former Puffinus taxa have been transferred to a restored genus, Ardenna, making most groups monophyletic (Christides & Boles 2008). Purple Swamphen has been split (IOC5.3) pretty well as ORL3.1...
A three-year project in Iraq has significantly contributed to knowledge of the country’s flora and fauna – including five previously unknown plant species – as well as improving the prospects for future conservation efforts in the country....
Conservation is a huge challenge around the globe. Habitats continue to disappear and the number of species at risk of extinction continues to increase. In 2015, 40 more bird species were classified as having a higher risk...
Many OSME members will be subscribers to British Birds or may have taken up recent trial offers. British Birds also produce a free e-newsletter every month which is available to non-subscribers. This newsletter offers a nice flavour of what has been published recently...
OSME sends its best wishes to Trevor Poyser who is celebrating his 90th birthday on 21 November. Trevor – of the renowned publishers T&AD Poyser – has been a good supporter of OSME projects as well as publishing...
OSME, like many organisations in the ornithological world, are saddened to hear of the recent death of Mick Carroll, one of our staunchest supporters. Sal Cooke, an OSME Council Member, reflects here on the life and work...
In the latest (November) issue of British Birds, Guy Kirwan, Richard Porter & Derek Scott examine all the historical claims and records of Slender-billed Curlew in the Middle East. It is suggested that many of the published records, especially...
On the 21st November, OSME are teaming up with British Ornithologists’ Club and the Natural History Museum to hold our first joint winter meeting. The meeting will be held at the Flett Theatre at the prestigious Natural...
The taxonomy in del Hoyo, J and NJ Collar. 2014. HBW and BirdLife International Illustrated Checklist of the Birds of the World Volume 1: Non-passerines. (Lynx Edicions, Barcelona. 903 pages, hundreds of colour plates) employs the Tobias et al 2010 system...
This November we are teaming up with the British Ornithologists’ Club and the Natural History Museum for a joint winter meeting focussing on “Bird monitoring within the OSME region”. It will be held at the Flett Theatre,...
As readers of this blog will know there has been much concern over the scientific claims made in a paper published in the journal Zoology in the Middle East. The manuscript and follow up publications can be...