Profile

I was brought up in south London on the edge of Kent. I didn’t study biology at school but got interested in it at university while I was studying psychology. Then I discovered that studying animal behaviour was a real scientific thing – and I stuck with it. I’ve moved around quite a lot to keep working in the field. I live in Shrewsbury now – not far from where Charles Darwin was born and went to school – his school is now the town library.  I like to relax in the garden – we have great sunsets

On Sundays I bake cakes or bread.

I don’t have a TV but I do have a log fire which is cosy in the evening. Ok, I do watch some TV on my laptop – how I could I miss the amazing David Attenborough’s programmes?. I’m also a fan of Strictly and the Great British Bake Off. I used to do ballroom dancing but haven’t since I lived in Sweden – yes I lived there for 2 1/2 years and loved it! I still speak Swedish (it’s a bit rusty).  I’ve worked all over the place really, in Scotland, Wales, Germany, USA, Namibia & South Africa. As an animal behaviour scientist I follow the animals.

I teach Animal Behaviour in sunny Aberystwyth on the west coast of Wales . It’s a beautiful place:  you can see dolphins in the bay, there’s a family of otters under the bridge in the marina and even pine martens that live in nearby woodlands. I have some great students and especially enjoy our field course when we go away for a week to study animals in the wild

When teaching stops and summer starts I head to the sunny Scottish islands. Their beaches are amazing and the birds I study sing near the top of the dunes. One beach is even an airport!   I walk or drive around the coastal meadows listening out for my birds singing and then record them . When I record them I watch what they are singing. We call this “sound picture” a sonogram. It shows the very precise nature of a bird’s song

I ask questions about why birds sing, how they sing and what effect we humans are having. Some common birds like garden great tits sing at a higher pitch in noisy areas than in the quiet countryside. We think this is because they can’t hear their songs at low pitches because of all the noise. The odd thing is that now city birds don’t seem to answer the song of country birds – are they forgetting they are the same species? I aim to find out!

Scientists do more than just experiments. We teach, think, plan, supervise junior scientists like PhD students and read. And send lots of emails. My day starts on the train to work, reading scientific articles or marking student work on my laptop. It’s a nice time to get lots done without any interruptions. When I get to the office I’ll buy a coffee from a campus café – it has a clock with no numbers but the letters “Aberystwyth” instead.  Then head to the office to prepare for my first lecture. After the lecture I’ll chat with students before working in my office on student exchanges – I am in charge of our exchange programme which lets our students study abroad in their 2nd year and allows students from abroad come study with us. Sometimes I’ll be asked to do an interview for radio or very occasionally TV. In the afternoon I might meet with my final year students and talk about their research projects. I sometimes sneak a quick visit to the aquarium to visit the fish and any students I have working there.  And I’ll try to squeeze in some song analysis – songs are beautiful when you look at a picture of them. Eventually I’ll head back to the station and perhaps plan some new experiments on the way home.