Lapsed research ecologist, environmental, social and economic policy, and naturalist.

Generalist recorder (much of it within the boundaries of Crown Estate Glenlivet, Cairngorms National Park) with a research side-hustle on the abundance of all plant-eating insects, and how changes in host-plant status and wider habitat affect this. (How long the host plant has been present in the local area affects insect species numbers and individual abundance? How big is the local patch size? How far is the local patch from other patches, and host-plant aubundance in the wider area? How are decreases or increases in local plant abundance (managed or natural) affecting the insects? Are there differences in trends between specialist and generalist insect insects feeding on the plants? How are wider habitat changes affecting insect species and numerical abundance (is the host plant surrounded by near natural, agricultural, or other habitat, and any trends)?

Apart from the theoretical interest, these interactions can give a rapid response and insight into the impact of management measures, such as habitat restoration, as well as emerging problems.

I aim for all my records go onto iRecord directly or indirectly to increase prospects of getting them into national databaseses. iNaturalist doesn't do this, which has put me off in the past, but is of increasing importance for seeing species ranges beyond the UK, improving AI ID and sometimes faster/alternative human expert assistance with ID in conjunction with iSpot and iRecord. The good and attractive user interface of iNaturalist is good for stimulating engagement. So, from 2024, I am increasingly also posting to iNaturalist, taking care not to change dates and location data so that, if iNaturalist does eventually contribute records to UK databases, the duplication can be automatically filtered out.

Some of the photos of more general interest go onto our local wildlife Facebook group, 'Tomintoul & Glenlivet Wildlife Group'.

If you see me following you, it's likely because you have posted a significant number of records within the Glenlivet estate or near environs. Always happy to chat.

Much of my professional work is listed at
https://orcid.org/my-orcid?orcid=0009-0008-7193-9281