Pete Burness

I first met Pete when I was standing on the banks of the moat that surrounds Dungeness Bird Observatory - it would have been around 1981. I knew that he was one of the 'old time' DBO regulars and up until that point our paths had not crossed. It was like ticking off a new species of bird, as most of his contemporaries had made it onto my 'seen and met' list. We immediately hit it off. What struck me was his great sense of humour which was mostly aimed at himself - self-deprecation had rarely been so expertly showcased!

Over the years we would meet up, always at Dungeness, and bird away whilst guffawing at the latest gossip, mishap or balls-up (mostly at our expenses) and reminisce about the places and people that we shared in common. Pete was a modest man. You could be forgiven in believing that he had only just picked up a pair of binoculars such was his modesty, but here was a man who had been birding since his youth in north-west Kent and was part of the pioneering team that put the Isles of Scilly firmly on the map in the 1960s. You will find his name against many of the eye-watering rarities of that time. His DBO debut occurred in 1957 when he travelled down to the shingle with his father (from Crayford), in later years swapping parental lifts for hitch-hiking before graduating onto a motor bike and then a small van. Dungeness was his place of choice and remained that way for the rest of his life.

In retirement he could be regularly found, with partner Pam, at the RSPB reserve, where he would sit in the visitor centre with a gang of similarly aged (or similarly minded) birders - Mark Hollingworth and Steve Broyd spring to mind - drinking tea, conversing about anything & everything and scanning Burrowe's Pit through the picture window - the birding wasn't forgotten! This place of meeting was christened 'Old Fart's Corner'. I was regularly ushered in to their number when staying at the observatory. I was able to repay him for the cups of tea he bought me when he stopped by the observatory - kettle on, garden chairs in the obs garden readied - where we would start again the chat that never ended.

In recent years Pete's health took a hit and his visits to the shingle tailed off. We maintained a regular communication by phone which seemed to be a case of him quietly listening while I off-loaded about something or other before we would then turn to our non-birding shared interests - the reading of books and listening to early 70s music. How many recommendations we shared over the years I have lost count of, but very few of them turned out to be anything other than inspired. I have one book in my possession that I hold dear, and was given to me by Pete - a copy of 'Island Going' by Robert Atkinson, an account of young ornithologists in search of breeding Leach's Petrels on remote west-Scottish Islands in the 1930s and 40s. Like most of Pete's book choices, it was well chosen. We would wax lyrical about the albums of artists like Kevin Ayers and Caravan and then immediately put them on when we both got off the phone.

On Monday, Pete passed away at home. My sadness is tempered by the recollection of those good times in his company, of his happiness in a life shared with the birds and the many cultural references that litter my surroundings and are firmly linked to him. My condolences go to his partner Pam.

The Dungeness old guard are leaving us. They had seen and experienced a special time in the evolution of ornithological field craft and have left behind them a knowledge from which we are privileged to benefit from. Pete was very much a part of that pioneering spirit. When DBO recently published a 'memories' book, Pete was a contributor and ended his highly entertaining chapter with the following TS Eliot quote (only Pete...)

"All this was a long time ago, I remember, and I would do it again..."