Tribute to Bill Oddie

Very, very sad to hear this moring of the passing of Bill Oddie. Bill Oddie was a colossus on the birding scene almost single handedly promoting the hooby of birding and widlife watching from the 1970s onwards. I was a big fan of the series the Goodies that ran for 10 years on the BBC and he would often bring his love of birds into that series. Together with the late Tim Brooke Taylor and Graeme Garden this trio were a mad cap comedy genius's in my mind as funny as Monty Python with their slapstick comedy often comapred to an update of Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd. After the Goodies had finished, Bill diversified into wildlife documentaries with one of the first being about 'Bird about Town' on the life of the urban Black redstart, other series followed such Bird in the Nest which morphed into Springwatch which became phenomally successful. I particularly liked his teaming up with producer Stephen Moss and they produced some wonderful series such as 'Birding with Bill Oddie', 'Bill Oddie Goes Wild' and 'Bill Oddie Back in the USA.' Bill became Britain's favourite birdwatcher or birder. He wrote a series of best selling books including the all time classic 'Bill Oddie's Little Black Bird Book', 'Bill Oddie's Gone Birding', 'Follow that Bird!', "Bill Oddie Unplucked and 'Tales of Ludicrous Gardener', all all time classics. Bill didn't court fame and was often perceived as grumpy but that masked his bi-polar disorder which he suffered from. I met Bill Oddie 4X, firstly at the "Stop the Massacre' campaign in the Sparrow's Nest Theatre in 1980, where he gave a brilliant and impassionbed talk about the whole liming and netting of birds in Cyprus. In the break I tracked him down and he kindly signed my book with the words "Cheers Bill Oddie." I next met him at Minsmere when I was walking with Ricky between the West Hide and South Hide and Bill Oddie rushed by saying 'I've just found a Blue-winged Teal at the South Hide', we ran to the hide and saw the bird a female Blue- winged Teal, a lifer for us both, thanks Bill! Next time was in London at the Natural History Museum in London when there was a Birder's Quiz and the audeience wrote questions on a card, I asked a question famously putting my name as Peter J. Ransome and Bill hilariously riffed on my name before asking the question! TBC