Obviously lots happened in 2023, but looking back over the year a few things stick in my mind as moments of peak joy - or sorrow.

Gannets at Bempton Cliff. Last June I found a dead gannet on the beach at Bamburgh. It was my first sighting of a victim of avian flu, which in the months to come would rip through the seabird colonies of northern England. This year, slightly panicked by the news of last year’s mass die-off of gannets, I decided to drive to the RSPB reserve at Bempton Cliffs in Yorkshire. It was an extraordinary sight – and sound. Gannets were nesting on every possible cliffside ledge, squabbling over territory; gannets cruised along the clifftop, carrying grasses and mosses for nest repair; and gannets soared overhead, effortlessly riding the updrafts. Not for the first time, I wished I could fly. Mostly, I was just grateful that the birds were there, in abundance.

Golden Plovers in the North Pennines. Also in June, I spent time hiking in Weardale and Teesdale, where I’m slowly learning the different habitats of the waders that come up to the Dales to breed. This summer, up on the tops, high amongst the peat and the heather, I became familiar with the flute-like call of the golden plover. Exotically spangled in gold and black, standing on rocks to proclaim territory, they look almost like Christmas tree ornaments. Then, in a second, they vanish into the moorland vegetation, their mournful call the only sign of their presence.

(Re-)discovering Teesside. When I was a child, industrial Teesside – with its belching smokestacks and noxious smells – was not a place to visit, at least not if you wanted to enjoy nature. But in the past few years I’ve been drawn there in winter, to look for the curlews and godwits that haunt its muddy shores. This year, lured by reports of a vagrant Brown Booby, I was drawn to its southern edge, the South Gare, and discovered a whole other world: expansive mudflats and miles of sand dunes offer habitat to an array of birds, while residents frolic on the beaches. There’s even a tiny fishing port. I know I’ll be back in 2024!

Summer drought. I grew up with floods, so it’s hard to get used to drought. But this summer, walking along Bollihope Burn, I saw the future, in the form of a stream so dry that it was a Burn in name only. I walk there most days when I’m here, looking for the dipper and the heron – but they were nowhere to be seen. In the uplands, the wet scrapes that curlews depend on as a source of food for their chicks went dry. On winter days, when it seems the rain will never cease, I think back to those desiccated places; be careful what you wish for.