Category Archives: Website Updates

Information about recent changes to the website.

LAUNCH OF THE NEW WEBSITE DESIGN

You will have seen that we have made some changes to the appearance and structure of the MKNHS website. This is a consequence of the re-designing of the website that has been taking place over the past few months, which is now live. Our thanks are due to Jagoda, in particular, whose work and expertise have been absolutely invaluable. We hope you like the new layout.

The main changes are the following:

1.     Navigation around the website: This is now most easily done by clicking on the ‘tiles’ – that is, the boxes you will see further down the Homepage. Each of these takes you to a landing page for that section of the website. There are 8 main landing pages– Home, Programme, News, Recent Sightings, Resources, Photo Gallery, MK Wildlife and About Us.

2.     Drop-down menu: There is still a drop-down menu across the top of the home page, but the structure has been modified from the earlier version. You can also access each of the 8 sections this way.

3.     News updates: There is a rolling ‘banner’ on the Home page where the 4 most recent news items are highlighted. Just click on this for the latest Society and Members news.

4.     Forthcoming Events: To see details of the forthcoming events, just click on the Event Calendar button. The sidebar now appears only on the News pages.

If you have any difficulties, or would like to give the webeditors any feedback – positive or negative – please let us know, by emailing webeditor@mknhs.org.uk

Stop Press: We have discovered that the new website format does not work well on older versions of the iPad. If you have this problem, please let us know asap via webeditor@mknhs.org.uk

Martin Ferns, Jagoda Zajac and Linda Murphy
MKNHS Webeditors

 

Website update – and an invitation

The MKNHS website is run by a small group of members. Rebecca Hiorns has had to drop out at the beginning of 2024 from her ‘webmaster’ role due to her work commitments, but we are lucky that Jagoda Zajac has stepped in as webmaster, joining Linda Murphy and Martin Ferns on the editorial team. In addition, Bob Phillips looks after the Recent Sightings page.

We are now working on redesigning the website to make it more attractive and improve its useability both on computer and mobile devices. This should be ready to switch to in the next few weeks.

We would still welcome any members with an interest in the website to join the team. No website experience is necessary – though it is welcome, of course.

Specific tasks which we are looking for help with are:

  1. Adding and classifying members photos for the Photo Gallery, so they can be easily searchable.
  2. Updating a new monthly calendar of MKNHS and other local events of interest to members
  3. preparing/editing the bi-annual Magpie Digest of website articles, for circulation to members without easy access to the website.

If you are interested, please get in touch with any of the editorial team at one of the weekly meetings, or by email to webeditor@mknhs.org.uk

Martin, Linda and Jagoda
1 March 2024

Identification Resources: A survey – Please help

Where do you look for help in identifying or finding out about species?

Did you know the MKNHS website has a page listing a range of ID resources? Identification Guides | Milton Keynes Natural History Society (mknhs.org.uk)

Have you used this page over the last year?

Recently, another range of ID resources was added – a list of Apps which can be used as identification aids. You can find this list here: Apps used for ID and Recording by MKNHS members

The website team have been looking at the ID resources page on the website with a view to up-dating/refreshing the content. We would find it very helpful to know what members find useful and can recommend to others.

In order to do this we would appreciate your answers to the following questions:

  1. Have you looked at the Identification Guides page on the website? (Identification Guides | Milton Keynes Natural History Society (mknhs.org.uk) ) Once? Several times? Regularly?
  2. Have you used any of the resources listed after seeing them on the website? If so, which ones?
  3. Have you dowloaded any of the Apps listed on the website? mknhs.org.uk/identification-recording-apps/
  4. More generally, which resources (not only from the website) do you usually use if you want to find out about or identify a particular species that you are interested in? Please list what you use.
    1. Books?
    2. Other printed guides, such as Identification Charts?
    3. Websites?
    4. Other online sources, such as YouTube videos?
    5. Apps? (including any of those listed through the link above)
  5. Which would you recommend (or definitely not recommend) to others? And why?

Please email your answers to the above questions, to let us know your views/preferences to: webeditor@mknhs.org.uk
Please do so by 15 May 2023.

Thank you!

The MKNHS website team

Would you like to write an article for our website?

If there is anything you would like to share with other society members about your wild summer then please send it in to webeditor@mknhs.org.uk

It could be an interesting wildlife sighting or a special place you have visited, with a photo or two if you have them , though that’s not essential.  It doesn’t need to be a long article so please don’t be reticent. We would love to hear from you.

Thank you.
MKNHS web editors

PROPOSED CHANGES TO THE WEBSITE SIGHTINGS PAGE

The Sightings page is one of the most popular pages on the Society’s website. We think we can add to its interest, but it is changing and we need your help to do this.

The Sightings page is not only for experts to add their amazing sightings but for any MKNHS member, whether experienced naturalist or new member of the Society to submit their ordinary sightings.

Please look at the Sightings page every week to see what’s about. From time to time we will be adding new information about what to look for.

What we want to see on the sightings page

Up to now our website editor has laboriously transferred many individual bird records every day to the MKNHS Sightings page from the Bucks Bird Club website. To these he added any other sightings submitted direct to the MKNHS website, but there have been fewer of those. This has meant that those of you more interested in flowers, mammals or insects have seen less of interest on the Sightings page.

Bird sightings remain important and we would like you to submit those for the Milton Keynes area direct to the MKNHS website, as we will transfer very few from the Bucks Bird Club website ourselves. We explain later how you can find those elsewhere.

What to look for

Some of you may feel that what you see is hardly special enough to send in as an MKNHS website Sighting. But we want to widen what we all see on our Sightings page, so here are the kinds of sightings we will welcome:

  • Your local wildlife around where you live
  • Birds and insects in your garden
  • The first of the season (first bluebell seen, first swallow to arrive, first butterflies of the year, which tree leaves are opening first)
  • Birds, insects, flowers & fungi (wherever you see them in MK area)
  • Indoor sightings (which house spiders? Oak bush-crickets in late summer)
  • Plants or animals in unexpected places
  • Animals not often seen (such as an Otter or a Weasel, or simply a Hedgehog in your garden)
  • Road kill (such as badger, fox, hedgehog, owl)
  • Animals or plants that especially interest you (but local sightings please)
  • Interesting photos.

Photos

Sightings are enhanced when they come with a photo. It doesn’t need to be competition standard, just clear and in focus. So send these in, but sightings without a photo are equally welcome.

How to be sure of the identification of what you have seen

We don’t offer an online species identification service, but there are other ways you can check. When MKNHS meetings are running it is worth asking other members to find out who can help. If you have a few natural history field guides you may be able to work out possible options. Why not submit your sighting with what you think the species is but saying you aren’t sure or with two alternatives? But there is an online way of finding out through citizen science. Register for free with iSpot:

https://www.ispotnature.org/. You can then put a photo on the iSpot website and there’s a good chance other people will respond with the right identification. You can then submit your sighting to our website.

What information is needed for a sighting?

The basic information we need is: what, where, when, by whom. To which you can add a photo and a brief observation about what you have seen:

  • What species?
  • Where did you see it? Name of location, preferably with a grid reference.
  • When did you see it? Simply the date.
  • By whom? Your name
  • A photo (format?)
  • A brief observation. Such as how many you saw or what it was doing.

How to submit a sighting

All you need to do is e-mail this information to: sightings@mknhs.org.uk

Bird sightings and the Bucks Bird Club

It is easy for you to view any bird sightings for Buckinghamshire simply by searching on Bucks Bird Club website. The quick route to the day’s sightings is: https://bucksbirdclub.co.uk/ then click on the drop-down in the top bar for Latest Sightings which is headed Buckinghamshire Bird News. Some of our MKNHS members are also signed up members of Bucks Bird Club and have registered to submit sightings to it. For example, on 1st April 2020 Harry Appleyard submitted 37 different sightings. Several other MKNHS members add their bird sightings to the Bucks Bird Club website. Joining fee for Bucks Bird Club is excellent value, as little as £15 a year.

 

 

 

 

100,000 page views on 18 July 2018

Our website reaches a new record

Top 10 countries viewing website 18 July 2018

Top 10 countries viewing website 18 July 2018

Today we achieved 100,000 page views. That’s right, people have now viewed the website 100,000 times since it was launched on 17 March 2015.

Although we mainly publish articles about wildlife in the United Kingdom, our website has been accessed by over 100 different countries. Our top 10 countries are shown on the right

If you have any comments on the website,  wildlife related article or local wildlife events that you would like to be published, please let me know at webmaster@mknhs.org.uk

If you enjoy reading the website, have you considered joining the Society? See our membership page for more information.

Thank you for your support

Peter

Identification Guides and Recording pages added MKNHS website

New Menus April 2017One of the Society’s initiatives this year is to encourage more people to report their sightings to create biological records.

To help people we have produced a list of recommended Identification Guides covering:
Birds
Fungi and Lichen
Insects
Mammals
Millipedes and Centipedes
Plants
Reptiles and Amphibians
Slugs and Snails
Spiders and Harvestmen
Woodlice
Miscellaneous

There is also a new page on Recording and our indoor meeting on 25th April 2017 is entitles “How to Record”

You can find the new pages under the  menu.

We will put our new found knowledge into practice by recording our sightings in our outdoor meetings which you can view here.