Hi and welcome to my Blog, my name is Paul Riddle and I live in south Leicestershire, UK. Back in August 2007 my quest began to locate as many local Little Owl territories as possible. The driving force was a reported decline in the uk numbers so I thought I would do my bit and conduct a study in my area. After 7 years and countless hours out in the field I have detected over 200 different sites. With a thirst for a greater understanding of the owls a more comprehensive monitoring and nest box programme then commenced. This also now includes monitoring the local and very sparse population of Barn Owls, please pop back occasionally and catch up with the life and times of my owls and any other wildlife that I come across. I hope you enjoy your visit!!!

Thursday, 6 October 2011

Disaster!

Ever since my owl study began (over 3 years ago) I have amassed an amazing amount of data, so much in fact that I have filled my 160GB external hard drive with it! There is my very impressive bespoke database which holds all the specific info on each individual owl site so far located, along with this there is a record of every individual sighting I have ever made (thousands of them). There is also all my breeding locations, contacts, meeting notes, maps etc etc....... Oh and not to forget all of my images, over 17,000 of them!!!

Last weekend my hard drive died, taking all my info with it!!!!!

I have since taken it in to a couple of local computer outlets to see if the data is retrievable but the story was the same, "sorry there is nothing we can do, the hard drive has failed,  I should have backed it all up".

I have now sent it off to an expert who specialises in this type of data recovery, they can't guarantee they can help, the data could all be lost forever! If they can help  I know it's going to cost me an arm and a leg, the initial quote was at least £300.00................WHAT!!! 

I now have my fingers crossed they can help, I hope you have too!
Posted by at

4 comments:

  1. Mike Randall Bird Photography6 October 2011 at 19:49

    Very sorry to hear this Paul. I am always astounded at the number of sites you have found and can only imagine the detail you have amassed.
    I hope that the information can be retreived and the wallet is not too sore.
    Your images are fantastic I sincerely hope these are not lost.
    Regards
    Mike

    ReplyDelete
  2. Millhouse Photography6 October 2011 at 22:06

    I wish to you the very best of luck Paul. It would be a disaster to lose such incredible images.

    ReplyDelete
  3. sunsetpoker7 October 2011 at 10:00

    Oh that is terrible luck Paul. All the best to you, I really hope you can get your data and photos back.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Unknown9 October 2011 at 08:57

    What rotten luck, I hope you get it back. There is a lot of data and many pics tucked away on Blogger, though.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)