Express & Star

Peter Rhodes on birds, washing machines and the joys of owning a comical cushion

The world’s largest garden wildlife survey returns next weekend with thousands of people joining the RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch. But at any time, and especially in this season, can we trust viewings recorded over a single weekend?

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Penguins in the garden?
Penguins in the garden?

The recent cold snap filled Britain with all sorts of atypical, hungry birds that are usually too timid for our bird tables and are driven here by extreme weather elsewhere: gulls, albatrosses, penguins and suchlike. Could your figures be skewed by a skua?

I am bewildered by the latest pronouncements by military experts warning that Britain cannot defend itself from the latest Russian missiles – as if we ever could.