Uploaded March 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
As a youth Len Hill rode to work with a pigeon on the handlebars of his bicycle. Now he keeps hundreds of exotic birds in the grounds of his Cotswolds house. His success as a former builder has enabled him to concentrate on breeding birds - everything from parakeets to humming birds.
Len also has a stake in the West Indies, he takes birds back there that have vanished from the wild, but which he has managed to breed in Gloucestershire. On his trips to the Caribbean he usually goes in search of other exotic creatures - like the fabulous Scarlet Ibis, found deep in the swamps of Trinidad.
Len's most extraordinary act was to buy two remote islands in the South Atlantic. There in the Falklands, 8,000 miles from home, Len has his own postage stamp and sole charge of a host of albatrosses, seals, and over a million penguins.
Clip taken from The World About Us, originally broadcast on BBC Two, 9 June, 1974.
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As a youth Len Hill rode to work with a pigeon on the handlebars of his bicycle. Now he keeps hundreds of exotic birds in the grounds of his Cotswolds house. His success as a former builder has enabled him to concentrate on breeding birds - everything from parakeets to humming birds.
Len also has a stake in the West Indies, he takes birds back there that have vanished from the wild, but which he has managed to breed in Gloucestershire. On his trips to the Caribbean he usually goes in search of other exotic creatures - like the fabulous Scarlet Ibis, found deep in the swamps of Trinidad.
Len's most extraordinary act was to buy two remote islands in the South Atlantic. There in the Falklands, 8,000 miles from home, Len has his own postage stamp and sole charge of a host of albatrosses, seals, and over a million penguins.
Clip taken from The World About Us, originally broadcast on BBC Two, 9 June, 1974.
You have now entered the BBC Archive, a time machine that will transport you back to the golden age of TV to educate, entertain and enlighten you with classic clips from the BBC vaults.
Make sure you subscribe so that you never miss a single stop on our amazing journey through the BBC Archive - youtube.com/c/BBCArchive?sub_confirmation=1
You can also dive into plenty more BBC Archive on our website - bbc.co.uk/archive
