The Magpie's Hoard

Britain's Best Seaside Escapes

Ten of my landscape photographs appear in Britain's Best Seaside Escapes, a travel guide from New Holland Publishers.

"Britain's Best Seaside Escapes is a beautifully photographed guide to 38 seaside holiday locations as well as lesser- known but outstanding coastal spots around Britain. With an emphasis on natural landscapes and outdoor activities rather than coastal resorts, this book includes not just great beaches but also areas of stunning coastal scenery, fishing villages, wildlife, nature hotspots and locations for sports."

Available now from Amazon, priced £7.94 (price correct at the time of posting).

[Please note: All of the images that I publish on the web are copyrighted: © Roger Butterfield, all rights reserved. Please do not download or use my pictures in publications, presentations, websites or blogs without first obtaining my express permission. If you do wish to use a picture, please contact me and I will respond as quickly as I can.]

Bugs Britannica

Following the success of Flora Britannica and Birds Britannica, Richard Mabey and Peter Marren have begun compiling Bugs Britannica:

"Bugs Britannica will be a nationwide chronicle of bug life in the 21st century. It will look at why bugs matter to us and why we care about them. It will record our continuing love-hate relationship with small life and how it influences our life and times, in a word, our culture. We want to find out what meaning we attach to bugs, what uses and entertainments we have made of them, how they inspire us whether in poetry, prose, film or song, and what we do to attract and conserve them."

The authors are appealing for people to send in examples of bug-lore:

"We want to know about your encounters with bug life. Do you garden with bugs in mind, perhaps with bee-friendly flowers or a pond? Are there local names or customs involving particular insects or other invertebrates? Have you ever been inspired by bug activity, whether by a spider spinning its web, or a grasshopper chirping in the long grass, or the homely shape and colours of a bumblebee?"

You can contribute by leaving a comment on the Bugs Britannica blog. There's also an article about the project in the August 2007 edition of BBC Wildlife Magazine.

The Modern Boy

I spent yesterday afternoon helping my mother with the daunting task of sorting out my late father's papers and paraphernalia. We started with the small mountain of stuff that he had amassed in the corner of their house he used as an office-cum-studio. Amongst other things we found dozens of notebooks crammed with notes and sketches on sundry topics: church architecture, anatomy, calligraphy, archaeology, etc.

It soon became apparent that my father had been reluctant to throw things away throughout his 86 years. I even came across a letter dated 8th November 1933 from offices of The Modern Boy. It seems that my father had sent them a photograph of a model biplane he had built (I hasten to add that this was long before the advent of the Airfix kit).

Dad was just 13 when he built the model plane. Within three years he had graduated from model-making to stone-carving. He was inspired by the work of sculptor Henri Gaudier-Brzeska, a prodigious talent who died aged just 23 in the trenches at Neuville St. Vaast.

Earlier this year I visited an exhibition at the Graves Art Gallery titled 'We the Moderns', which features a selection of pieces by Gaudier-Brzeska.  I was amazed by the quality and quantity of work that he produced during his brief but remarkable career - no wonder my father found him an inspiration!

I plan to write more about my dad's life and work when I have time.