ALTHOUGH Basil Fawlty made Torquay famous, he wasn’t the South Devon seaside resort’s most important resident. That distinction goes to someone who lived a very long time ago.

ABAR-HEADED goose visits our local estuary. It hangs out with swans, gorging itself on stale bread offered by local children.

THE solstice is a time to take stock and make new resolutions.

BOOKS make excellent Christmas gifts and last Monday’s Examiner carried recommendations from the crime-thriller, vampire and general fiction genres.

WARSAW Zoo has a pair of Indian rhinos.

A CONFERENCE commemorating John Tyndall was held in Dublin last month.

IT’S a sentiment which another Harry, the regal male gorilla at Dublin Zoo, would no doubt endorse.

A CONSERVATION milestone was reached last week; two coveys of partridges, raised in captivity at Boora Bog in County Offaly, were released at a secret location in north county Dublin.

THREE-TOES, one of South Dakota’s most notorious outlaws, was easily tracked; having lost toes to a metal trap his footprint was recognisable.

IT’S ‘maths week,’ the festival of numbers.