422 BB eye Ian Carter
427 News and comment Adrian Pitches
431 The migrations of British Common Sandpipers Ron Summers, Brian Bates, Louise de Raad, Norman Elkins and Brian Etheridge
444 Report on scarce migrant birds in Britain in 2017: non-passerines Steve White and Chris Kehoe
469 Some observations of nesting Grasshopper Warblers in west Cumbria, with particular reference to double-brooding John Callion
473 The Carl Zeiss Award 2019 Paul French and Chas Holt
482 Reviews
483 Recent reports
Each year the British Birds Charitable Trust gives grants to bird conservation, education and research projects, both at home and abroad. It is able to do this from surpluses generated by sales of BB as well as through donations from subscribers and even legacies. The Trust’s grants programme started in 2011, once the magazine was back in calmer waters after a turbulent period around the turn of the century – and by 2019 over £75,000 had been awarded to worthwhile, bird-related projects, mostly in small chunks – see https://britishbirds.co.uk/about/british-birds-charitable-trust/
It’s a pleasure to include a paper in this issue from one of those projects, written by Ron Summers, one of Britain’s most respected ornithologists, and his colleagues in the north of Scotland. It comes as no surprise that the authors used tagged birds to discover more about their migration ecology, and this will surely continue to be a fertile hunting ground for new ornithological research in the coming years. In contrast, the short paper by John Callion uses that old-fashioned but – as he shows – still highly effective technique of careful observation in a long-term study to add to our knowledge of the Grasshopper Warbler.
Roger Riddington
