Choosing the five bird species to save from the ecological end of days for this episode is Dawn Balmer. Dawn has worked at the British Trust for Ornithology since 1992, and her roles include fieldwork, organising ringing projects, BirdTrack Organiser, Coordinator for Bird Atlas 2007-11 and now Head of Surveys, overseeing long-term schemes and projects.
She has been a keen birdwatcher from a very young age and as a teenager volunteered at the Shropshire Wildlife Trust and meet John Tucker, the Conservation Officer at the Trust, who was a great influence in her early years. She went onto Plymouth Poly to do a degree in Environmental Science and for the first time met other birders her age. She has a passion for bird identification, migration and population trends, and particularly for local bird surveys, achieving over 30 years on her Breeding Bird Survey in Thetford Forest. She was also the first female to join the British Ornithologists Union Rarities Committee (term ended now) and the first female to join the British Birds Rarities Committee. She is chair of the Rare Breeding Birds Panel, secretary of the European Bird Census Council and is a volunteer director of British Birds and has long been involved in the editorial panel
Recorded 27th February 2025
