i.e. once again, the BBC takes great interest in the kingdom of bird.
or rather
TWICE again, because:
1. this morning, Radio 4's frequently excellent and informative Woman's Hour ran a feature about female falconers, who have borrowed this sport from medieval princes and, along with Hawkforce UK, are dragging it into the modern age. Have a listen:
2. this evening, BBC 1's The One Show - which I actually dislike extremely - discussed how the technology and structure of an owl's wings, which allow him to fly silently, can be used to make aeroplanes quieter. Planes can also learn a thing or two from the angle of an owl's landing (25 degrees). This means that the owl can catch eg a vole before the vole has noticed a thing. Not that an aeroplane would be catching a vole, of course, but this steep angle means that the owl stays far away from the vole for as long as possible, and in a similar manner, the plane could stay away from the houses below and therefore not disturb them so much.
They also had a real live barn owl on the show. Don't get too excited though because the owl was called Barney, which is crashingly unimaginative. Worse still, he was quite boring and refused to turn his head 360 degrees. (A finer show than The One Show would not have stood for it, that's for sure.)
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