Exactly a year ago, bored with television and having eaten all the Christmas Quality Street I decided to take a night time walk to the top of our farm here in West Wales with a teenage relative to introduce him to woodcock ringing. Sadly earlier last year this young lad had lost his mother after a sudden illness and this was his first Christmas without her.

He was completely captivated when I managed to catch the only woodcock we saw that night and was thrilled to be able to ring it with me.

A short while after this he decided that he wanted to write an article for the junior section of the RSPB magazine about this experience, it was accepted and will be published in their January issue. He comes from a literary background and we all hope that he will be inspired by this early success to follow in his mother's footsteps and like her become a journalist.

How nice it was to be able to complete this story by calling him on Christmas day this year to tell him that I had received an email from Tony Cross informing me that this ring had been recovered from near to Saint Petersburg in Russia.