birding-aus

Top Gear, birds and bears

To: "'Tim Dolby'" <>, <>
Subject: Top Gear, birds and bears
From: "Paul Dodd" <>
Date: Mon, 23 Jun 2008 23:09:56 +1000
I watched Top Gear too, Tim! (Although I did also record David
Attenborough!)

So I wonder how many other celebrity birdwatchers there are?

Bill Oddie, of course - but who else?

Wikipedia lists the following under the "List of Birdwatchers" page
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_notable_birdwatchers):

Alan Francis Brooke, 1st Viscount Alanbrooke: British Chief of the Imperial
General Staff during the Second World War
Jimmy Carter: President of the United States
Agatha Christie: Author and playwright
Jeremy Clarkson: Journalist, Television Presenter
Ian Fleming: Author
Meriwether Lewis: Explorer
Abraham Lincoln: President of the United States
Patrick O'Brian: Author
George Plimpton: Author
Teddy Roosevelt: President of the United States
James D. Watson: Nobel laureate, molecular biologist, and discoverer of the
structure of DNA
E. B. White: Author

Wikipedia also mentions that these celebrities are birdwatchers in separate
articles on each of them:

Vic Reeves (English comedian)
Eddie Lawrence (US TV personality)
Eric Morecambe (English comedian)
George Orwell (British author)

-----------------

Paul Dodd
Docklands, Melbourne


-----Original Message-----
From: 
 On Behalf Of Tim Dolby
Sent: Monday, 23 June 2008 9:35 PM
To: 
Subject: Top Gear, birds and bears

Hi all,

I've a confession to make. Rather than watch David Attenborough's show on
bears (except for the last 5 minutes on the Giant Panda, which was
fantastic!) I watched 'Top Gear'. Sorry about that.

The thing is that on Top Gear they drove across Botswana, over the
Makgadikgadi salt pans, through the Kalahari, and then onto the Okavango
Detla.

Also guess what!? Jeremy Clarkson, the show's main character, is a birder.
He was rarely seen without his binos (Leica from what I could see) around
his neck. In a similar vain to the Tour de France (which, by the way, starts
soon), there were many birding references. Mainly about hornbill: 'There's a
Southern Yellow-billed Hornbill!'. Botswana's known for its hornbill.

Also FYI the following article appeared in the Agence France-Presse (AFP),
see below. (That being said Clarkson once said: 'There will be no tree,
leaf, cloud, lawn, peat bog or environmental precious place that I won't
drive over.')

Now isn't this what birding-aus is all about! Good birding gossip,
intermixed with some other stuff.

Cheers,

Tim Dolby

________________________________________________


Botswana clears "Top Gear" of damaging salt pans

GABORONE (AFP) — Botswana's government came to the defence Friday of the
makers of "Top Gear" after the BBC motoring show was accused by
environmentalists of damaging the famed Makgadikgadi salt pans during
filming.

Jeremy Clarkson and his co-hosts had been widely criticised earlier this
month for driving an assortment of vehicles across the sun-baked salt flats,
home to one of the biggest populations of zebras in the whole of Africa.

But in an attempt to dampen the row, the government in Gaborone has issued a
report it commissioned into the filming, saying the producers went to great
lengths to ensure that there would be no damage to the wilderness. "Many
weeks of planning went into determining a suitable route for filming".







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