Erwain
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erwain.bsky.social
Erwain
@erwain.bsky.social
Ecologist, Welsh (a dysgu Cymraeg), serial hobbyist, intermittent ultra runner, druid-ish, parent to human offspring, collector of bones, feathers and odd bits. Averagely weird in an AuDHD way while mostly surviving off carbs, coffee, and cuddles.
Pinned
Thought I'd pin an intro - hello😊 I'm a consultant ecologist, general naturalist, and chair of the Pembrokeshire Bat Group. Late diagnosed (in my early 40s) Autistic ADHD. I sometimes run/walk ultras, write bad poetry, read books less than I'd like, and enjoy bothering castles & prehistoric sites :)
Moths can be temporarily kept in a fridge for later ID. Two points however:
1. Ensure fridge is cold enough.
2. Keep them in a box without a moth sized hole in the lid.
Ignore & you may later open the fridge to get milk for a cuppa & immediately be assaulted by a face full of moths... 🙈 #moths
July 10, 2025 at 10:28 AM
The swallows are busy nest building in the toilet block at Martin's Haven. They return every year - I remember them nesting there in the early 90s when I used to go to Skokholm as a teen. #Wales #Pembrokeshire #Birding #Spring #Wildlife #Nature #PembrokeshireCoast
May 18, 2025 at 7:43 PM
Today's chough looking for lunch. Bit of a hard call as to whether choughs or ravens are my favourite corvid #birding #nature #Wales #PembrokeshireCoast
May 16, 2025 at 7:36 PM
Perfect weather for Skomer today (and I'm back over on Sunday) and as always the puffins were very obliging. However, before I got on the boat I had an even more obliging chough feeding right next to me on the mainland. Usually I just get them calling overhead when on a run. #birding #Wales #nature
May 16, 2025 at 7:25 PM
Here is not a bad part of the world to live. Skylarks sang the sun to sleep this evening and the cliffs are blooming with thrift, sea campion and spring squill #nature #sunset #Wales #thrift
May 14, 2025 at 8:34 PM
Accurate representation of my morning today, during my BTO breeding bird survey. 😉😆 #birdwatching #nature #wildlife #ecologist
May 9, 2025 at 6:44 PM
@btobirds.bsky.social I've just seen my first swift of the year while at the #NationalBotanicGardenOfWales It's scimitar wings stood out wonderfully compared to adjacent swallows and martins. Looking forward to the screaming sound of summer! #nature #BritishWildlife
April 25, 2025 at 1:29 PM
Mental health hasn't been great for a while but often a run gives me a brief boost. Today was not one of those days though and it was a grey tinged slog. Sun shone though, & I was serenaded by willow warblers & skylarks, & was shouted at by a chough, the campest of corvids. #trailrun #mentalhealth
April 20, 2025 at 11:06 AM
A selection of today's #ADHD ( #AuDHD) moments... superglued myself to the glue tube, forgot to eat til 4pm, started task A then got distracted by Task B & forgot Task A existed, sent MIL texts meant for husband, removed Pyrex dish from cupboard but forgot I was meant to hold it so...photo. #tired
April 18, 2025 at 8:41 PM
As an ecologist who's spent my entire life by the coast my knowledge makes an embarrassingly rapid halt well before the high tide mark. Fortunately my nudibranch loving 16yo makes up for it & we recently shared a fab training day run by the Pembrokeshire Coastal Forum. #MarineBiology #Rockpooling
April 16, 2025 at 9:42 PM
Morning run internal chat was me wondering why everything felt difficult & that clearly I'm an unfit waste of space, everything is awful, & that rabbit that just sprinted across my path was clearly mocking me.

Then I remembered the two glasses of wine last night. Oops.
#Running #TrailRunning
April 16, 2025 at 9:21 AM
Donated another pint of the good stuff today after a 4 year hiatus, in exchange for a pack of 3 gingernuts and two club biscuits. Winning at life. Hopefully my rather boring A+ blood will help three other people win at life too. #BloodDonor #WelshBloodService #GwasanaethGwaedCymru #GiveBlood
April 14, 2025 at 8:50 PM
Inland for today's #trailrun. The cattle haven't been let out after winter yet so safe for now. Lots of signs of badger activity & birdsong include chaffinch, bullfinch, greenfinch, blackbird, songthursh, robin & goldcrest. Buzzard (Buteo buteo) overhead too #ecologist #nature #birds #outdoors
March 16, 2025 at 11:17 AM
A short coastpath run today. Skylarks singing, a pair of choughs calling, the fulmurs are gathering in their cliff-ledge colonies - and I'm making the most of my favourite places before the tourists arrive in a couple of months and I retreat. #Nature #TrailRunning #PembrokeshireCoast #Home
March 13, 2025 at 8:27 PM
It's my youngest's birthday today & she requested a nature themed/cottage core cake with owls. I've always made my kids' birthday cakes with varying levels of decorating "success", but this one I'm proud of. Much like an excited 5yo with a painting they did - Look! Look at it! 😂 #nature #cake
February 9, 2025 at 10:09 AM
Aww, look at that greater tussock sedge, being all great and tussocky. It's like the Cousin It of the plant world.

#nature #plants #botany
February 7, 2025 at 9:57 PM
Catching up with the news, a thing I normally avoid for my own mental health. However, today I learnt that a good way to enrage Trump and his supporters is to publicly ask them to be kind?

I think I'll go back to avoidance, and stick with the birds and botany (and being kind).
January 22, 2025 at 10:15 PM
All about the #birds atm. I've been seeing (and hearing) so many more bullfinches recently - more than I usually see in winter. I found a couple of goldfinch feathers yesterday too, tiny golden treasures. #nature
January 12, 2025 at 8:47 PM
Coastpath run this morning accompanied by all the usual - chough, wheatear, skylark, linnet, stonechat...There's a lot of redwing about at the moment as well. Also managed not to fall down any remnants of Pembrokeshire's C19th coal mining past, which is always nice 😉 #trailrunning #nature #history
January 12, 2025 at 3:55 PM
Had the Night Nobbler trail event tonight - the state of my shoes *after* I'd "run" through a stream near the finish 😂 always a bonkers event - woods, Estuary, calf deep mud, fallen trees, samba band, powder paint, mid-wood rave, fire poi, & prosecco half a mile from the finish. #TrailRunning
January 4, 2025 at 8:55 PM
Cold, crisp night tonight for a late night bimble with the two idiot spaniels. Jupiter, Saturn, Mars & Venus all bright and clear in the sky at once (Jupiter & Venus very much so, Mars pinky-orange, & Saturn a star-like point at 10 o'clock to Venus). Saw a shooting star speed by and fade away too. 😍
January 2, 2025 at 8:37 PM
@bsbibotany.bsky.social (and boranists of Bluesky). Just going through my photos - would this Briza media be too far over to count as in flower? Unfortunately don't have any other/better photos #NewYearPlantHunt
January 1, 2025 at 6:18 PM
A little unexpected for New Year's Day @bsbibotany.bsky.social #NewYearPlantHunt
January 1, 2025 at 3:10 PM
"You are what you eat"

In which case I'm currently mostly bombay mix and trifle.
December 27, 2024 at 3:06 PM
Not been too perky this week (both me and the weather) but at least the gorse always has a cheerful golden greeting for me #WildflowerHour #GivePeasAChance
December 22, 2024 at 8:14 PM