Postcard from Bishkek

A few years ago, we had an enquiry from a tourist who wanted to come to Kyrgyzstan “to see the apples”. This caught me by surprise. Although I was  aware that we grow a lot of apples here in Kyrgyzstan, I was intrigued as to why someone would want to travel all this way to […]

The “Red Book” is a phrase used for a list of endangered species. The Red Data Book of the USSR (also known as the Krasnaya Kniga) was the Soviet Union’s contribution to the IUCN Red List maintained by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural resources (IUCN – www.redlist.org).  The book took […]

I was taken aback and intrigued by an email that arrived over the weekend.  It really grabbed my attention. A film crew are preparing a documentary film on camels and I was asked if I had any advice for them.

The wolf has a bad reputation throughout the world.  In modern times, this is probably due in part to the prevalence of Werewolf stories and films.

There are several different types of birds of prey found in the Kyrgyz Republic: eagles, vultures, hawks, bustards and so forth. The largest is the Golden Eagle – Berkut. The wings of a young Golden Eagle tend to be light coloured with a dark line along the edge – an older eagle will have a white […]

My father used to have a phrase he would use to say whenever he was astounded by something: “Well, I’ve got a bloody hell …!”. A friend of mine, Paul, had another phrase which he would use in similar circumstances: “The things you see when you haven’t a gun!”