Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.It took him until he was 81, but a veteran British birder has become the first person in the world officially to see 9,000 species.
Tom Gullick achieved the remarkable feat when he managed to see Wallace's fruit dove, Ptilinopus wallacii, on an expedition to Yamdena island in Indonesia.
This summer's sighting was the climax of a 40-year quest to see as many of the world's birds as possible, which began when the former naval officer left Britain in 1971 to become an expatriate birdwatching guide in Spain.
Mr Gullick is a "lister" rather than a "twitcher" – one of a group of dedicated birders who compile "life lists" of all the species they have seen. There are still 1,500 or so known species left for him to see, but speaking from his home near the town of Los Infantes in the Spanish province of Ciudad Real, Mr Gullick said he did not intend to try for the next big milestone of 10,000.
"Enough is enough," he said, laughing. But he said he was elated to have become the first person to break the 9,000-species barrier. "I'd been trying hard to get there over the years."
In the process of seeing more birds than any other person before him, Mr Gullick encountered many of the world's most legendary species – avian prizes which most keen birders can only dream about.
Near his Spanish home he can regularly see one of the most impressive and most endangered birds of prey, the Spanish imperial eagle, but he has seen everything from the bee hummingbird of Cuba – the smallest bird in the world, tinier than your thumb – to the blue bird-of-paradise of New Guinea, often said to be the most beautiful.
He has seen the hyacinth macaw in Brazil (the biggest and most stunning flying parrot) and the Gurney's pitta in Thailand, not only one of the world's most brilliantly coloured birds, but also one of its rarest. Mr Gullick was one of a small group of birders who in 1991 rediscovered a bird believed extinct – the Sao Tome grosbeak, a red finch from the island nation of Sao Tome and Principe.
His obsession began with the wartime evacuation of Mr Gullick's school to North Wales when he was eight. "I began by collecting birds' eggs," he said. "I can remember climbing up an old apple tree to find a hawfinch's nest, and swinging on a rope to take an egg out of the nest of a raven."
In being the first to break the 9,000 barrier Mr Gullick is elevated to a pinnacle of birding fame previously occupied by the "big lister" who first topped 8,000 – Phoebe Snetsinger, a middle-aged American woman who took up serious birding when diagnosed with fatal cancer.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments