The Meteorological Office was established in 1854 originally as a department of the Board of Trade. It deals with the meteorology of the British Isles, including the service of weather forecasts and storm warnings for shipping. Research Meteorological Office
The Ordnance Survey is a British company producing maps of the British isles. The original work was carried out by the Royal Engineers under the direction of the Board of Ordnance and the survey was begun in 1747 for military purposes. The first map of Great Britain was ordered in 1797 and was published on a scale of 1 inch to the mile. In 1855 with the abolition of the Board of Ordnance the responsibility passed to the War Office and in 1870 was transferred to the Board of Works before in 1890 passing to the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries where the work was still none-the-less carried on by officers and men of the corps of Royal Engineers, before becoming a separate commercial organisation in the later 20th century.
The survey of Ireland, on a scale of 6 inches to the mile was ordered in 1824. In 1840 the survey of Scotland and of the six northern counties of England was begun on the same scale. In 1855 the surveys were ordered to be on the following scales: 1 inch to the mile or 6 inches to the mile for the whole U.K., with other scales for cultivated districts and towns of over 4,000 inhabitants. There were also surveys of the U.K. produced on scales of 2, 4, and 10 miles to the inch.
The department also had the duty of preparing maps for all military purposes, and of copying those
prepared by the intelligence division of the War Office. During the Great War it issued 32,872,000 maps, plans, and diagrams to the Army and Navy. Research Ordnance Survey
The Wildlife Trusts partnership is a royal society for nature conservation, comprising a network of 47 independent British wildlife charities and more than 100 urban wildlife groups, patroned by the Prince of Wales, which cares for more than 2400 nature reserves, covering an area of 76200 hectares in the British Isles ranging from remote islands off the Scottish coast to restored industrial sites in the heart of London. The Wildlife Trusts' President is Professor David Bellamy, and Vice Presidents are Sir David Attenborough, Professor Chris Baines (who is also President of the Urban Wildlife Partnership), Sir John Burnett, Professor GL Lucas, Professor David MacDonald, Julian Pettifer, Sir James Swaffield, Professor Robert Worcester and Dame Miriam Rothschild. Research Wildlife Trusts
The brown hare of Britain (Lepus europaeus occidentalis or Lepus capensis) is a native English hare distinguished from the typical continental hares by its darker and browner colour. It is larger than the other hares of the British Isles and can at once be distinguished from them by the colour of the tail, which is black on the upper surface; in the others it never is. The upper parts are a mixture of brown and grey, the sides and legs more buff-ish, and the underside white; the tips of the ears are black. There appear to be two moults a year, in spring and autumn, the latter being the more clear cut, the fonner protracted and gradual. The colour of the winter coat sometimes differs considerably from the summer one, the buff-ish colours of summer being replaced by a light grey, but usually the difference is less marked. The brown hare is now rare following persecution. Research Brown Hare
Dogfish is a name given to several species of small shark, common around the British isles. The rough skin of one of the species (Scyllium catulus), the lesser-spotted dogfish, is used by joiners and other artificers in polishing various substances, particularly wood. This species is rarely one metre long. Scyllium canicula, the greater dog-fish, is in length from one to one and a half metres. It is blackish-brown in colour, marked with numerous small dark spots. Both species are very voracious and destructive. Their flesh is hard, dry, and unpalatable. The common or picked dogfish (Acanthias vulgaris) is common in British and North American seas, and is sometimes used as food. It is fierce and voracious. Research Dogfish
Fritillaria (fritillary) is a genus of liliaceous plants including Crown Imperial (Fritillaria imperialis) and the Snake's-Head or Common Fritillary (Fritillaria Meleagris) both of which are found in moist meadows in northern temperate regions, including the British Isles. Research Fritillaria
Gorse (Ulex) also known as furze or whin is a genus of plants of the family Leguminosae, native to western Europe. They are low shrubby plants, the common gorse (Ulex europicus) having a stem generally 80 cm to one metre high, much branched and most of the leaves converted into spines. The flowers are solitary and yellow. The fruits are hairy pods. The common gorse is often very abundant in barren, heathy, sandy, and gravelly soils throughout the west of Europe. It often covers exclusively large tracts of country, and makes a splendid appearance when in flower. It was formerly used for fuel, and sometimes the tops of the branches were used (especially the young tops) as fodder for horses and cattle, after having been beaten or bruised to soften the prickles. The dwarf-furze (Ulex nanus) is found in many parts of the British Isles. Research Gorse
Hake is a popular name for several marine food fishes related to the cod, particularly Merlucius vulgaris of Europe which has a dark grey back, lighter underneath, and is fairly common around the British Isles, especially off the south-west coast where it feeds upon pilchards and herrings, and the Merlucius albidus of North America. The hake has a head much flattened, and two dorsal and one long analfin. The European hake is known in some places as king of the herrings, on which it preys. Research Hake
The lesser horseshoe-bat (Rhinolophus hipposideros) greatly resembles the Greater Horsehoe-bat but is smaller, with a wing span of about 22 cm. pointed and have a well-developed antitragus very similar to that of the greater horseshoe-bat on a smaller scale, but there are small differences from that species in the details of the form of the nose-leaf. The colour is a rather greyer brown without the yellowish or pinkish shade, and the fur is proportionately longer, silkier and less velvety. The underside tends to be lighter in colour and the fur extends on to the base of the wing membranes. As in the larger species there is a barepatch at the base of the tail on the upper surface. The upper incisors, and the first upper, and the first two lower premolars are very minute. The range extends from Ireland to the Himalayas and north Africa and includes all Europe south of the Baltic. In the British Isles it is common in the south and west from Kent to Cornwall, though scarcer in Sussex and Hampshire.
The lesser horshoe-bat is found throughout Wales and the border counties but not in east Anglia or north of Yorkshire. In Ireland it is confined to the west. The lesser horseshoe-bat is gregarious, the summer colonies occurring in house and church roofs and perhaps in hollow trees. The winter colonies are nearly always in caves, but the species is not then closely gregarious, individuals usually hanging up at some distance from their neighbours. They do not always hang in the roof of the cave and often choose the undersides of projecting points or boulders where they are only a few inches from the ground. The summer colonies show a segregation of the sexes and usually consist mainly of adult females, some immature bats of both sexes, and a few adult males.
The flight is rather fluttering with frequent glides, and usually fairly near to the ground. The food consists of the smaller insects; moths appear to form a large part of the diet. The single young is born in June or July, the breeding season being rather protracted. Hibernation lasts from early October to the beginning of April, but it is frequently interrupted, the bats shifting their quarters within the hibernating cave and perhaps feeding upon the gnats which are usually found in them; but they are not known to come out into the open in the winter. Wherever caves are used by the greater horseshoe-bat for hibernation this species is found too; but because its range in Britain is much wider, it is also found in many caves outside the range of that species. Research Lesser Horseshoe-Bat
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
Research Meteorological Office
