Why a good nature book is forever

SURELY everyone who has a child in the house should have a book on the natural history of Ireland if they can afford it.

A good new year’s resolution would be to buy one.

A bird book is an obvious choice and there are many guides on the market. Birds are the most visible wildlife, the most numerous, most colourful and most diverse. Irish species range from semi-domesticated robins and blue tits to very undomesticated ravens, from common-or-garden blackbirds to migrants that arrive from the Arctic ice or the Siberian steppe and are wild as the mist and the snow.