IN the last month or so I've seen several buzzards, a red kite, a peregrine falcon, numerous kestrels, a barn owl and a short-eared owl around and about.

I watched the so-called bog owl hunting for breakfast on the tops for about ten minutes. It was a fantastic sight and the gamekeepers and landowners who are allowing this and the raptors to thrive in the Dales should be congratulated and given some kind of award. If awards aren't available, I'd be more than happy to write an article about their good work - if anyone wants their picture in the paper standing on a moor somewhere looking enlightened.

In other news, the fish bum bite boy has made the Wensleydale School year 9 (third year to older readers) pilgrimage to Bewerley Park for some outward bounds fun.

It was good to see that the kit list had not changed in the intervening 25 years since we went. Pupils are still recommended to take some tapes or CDs so I removed the boy's ipod and slipped my treasured copy of Now 17 and my old Sony Walkman into his bag.

Right now as they travel back on the bus he will be enjoying Paula Abdul's Opposites Attract and Phil Collins' I Wish It Would Rain Down while his friends listen to Flo Rida and Jason Derulo.

Either that, or the batteries will be dying and the boy will have to shake the cassette player to hear the end of Jam Tronik's version of Another Day in Paradise.

The kit list suggests that students take £10 in spending money. That £2 per day is not going to keep the boy in the level of fizzy drinks and crisps that he likes to consume when out of parental sight.

And the warning that jeans were not suitable for the activities was as unlikely to be heeded as the recommendation that clean underwear would be needed for all five days.

I wonder if they still have the outdoor swimming pool at Bewerley - everything shrinks when it gets cold okay. Presumably they still wake you up at 6am and make you do star jumps in the parade ground if you get caught in the girls' dormitory. I do hope so.