Dilys Breese (born 2 June 1932,

Abergavenny Abergavenny (; cy, Y Fenni , archaically ''Abergafenni'' meaning "mouth of the River Gavenny") is a market town and community in Monmouthshire, Wales. Abergavenny is promoted as a ''Gateway to Wales''; it is approximately from the border wi ...

Monmouthshire Monmouthshire ( cy, Sir Fynwy) is a county in the south-east of Wales. The name derives from the historic county of the same name; the modern county covers the eastern three-fifths of the historic county. The largest town is Abergavenny, with ...

; died 22 August 2007) was a natural history

television producer A television producer is a person who oversees one or more aspects of video production on a television show, television program. Some producers take more of an executive role, in that they conceive new programs and pitch them to the television net ...

for the

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board ex ...

and an

ornithologist Ornithology is a branch of zoology that concerns the "methodological study and consequent knowledge of birds with all that relates to them." Several aspects of ornithology differ from related disciplines, due partly to the high visibility and th ...

with the

British Trust for Ornithology The British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) is an organisation founded in 1932 for the study of birds in the British Isles. The Prince of Wales has been patron since October 2020. History Beginnings In 1931 Max Nicholson wrote: In the United State ...

, who commemorate her contribution by awarding the

Dilys Breese Medal The Dilys Breese Medal is a medal awarded by the British Trust for Ornithology to recognise communicators who help to deliver ornithological science to new audiences. It is named in memory of film maker Dilys Breese, who died in 2007, and was in ...

, funded by her bequest to them. Breese was brought up in Wales, she was educated at Oswestry Girls' High School, then graduated from

St Andrews St Andrews ( la, S. Andrea(s); sco, Saunt Aundraes; gd, Cill Rìmhinn) is a town on the east coast of Fife in Scotland, southeast of Dundee and northeast of Edinburgh. St Andrews had a recorded population of 16,800 , making it Fife's fou ...

in 1954, with an MA in English Literature and Language.

Radio

After graduation, she applied for a position as a trainee studio manager with BBC radio. While working on shows like

Woman's Hour ''Woman's Hour'' is a radio magazine programme broadcast in the United Kingdom on the BBC Light Programme, BBC Radio 2, and later BBC Radio 4. It has been on the air since 1946. History Created by Norman Collins and originally presented by A ...

she developed an interest in natural history, and by 1970 was producing the majority of BBC Bristol's natural history output, with presenter Derek Jones. With Jones, she created the successful radio series

The Living World ''The Living World'' is a long-running natural history radio programme, made by the BBC and broadcast on its Radio 4. The series was created at the BBC Natural History Unit by Dilys Breese and Derek Jones, initially as a 52-week series, in 19 ...

and

Wildlife Wildlife refers to domestication, undomesticated animal species (biology), species, but has come to include all organisms that grow or live wilderness, wild in an area without being species, introduced by humans. Wildlife was also synonymous ...

Television

In 1970, Breese joined the

BBC Natural History Unit The BBC Studios Natural History Unit (NHU) is a department of BBC Studios that produces television, radio and online content with a natural history or wildlife theme. It is best known for its highly regarded nature documentaries, including '' ...

, where she produced television shows including

The World About Us ''The World About Us'' was a BBC Two television documentary series on natural history which ran from 3 December 1967 to 20 July 1986.''Encyclopedia of Television'' (2d ed.), ed. Horace Newcomb, p. 324, 620, 1363. The show was created by David At ...

Wildlife on One ''Wildlife on One'' was, for nearly three decades, the BBC's flagship natural history programme. First broadcast in 1977, each edition ran for half an hour. The narrator was Sir David Attenborough. When repeated on BBC2 BBC Two is a Bri ...

and The Natural World. She left the BBC in 1991 and set up her own company, Kestrel Productions, making several short programmes until deteriorating health prevented her from working.

Conservation work

Breese became a council member of the British Trust for Ornithology in 1973 and was its Honorary Secretary from 1998–2001. She chaired the working group developing 'Garden BirdWatch', which has since become the largest year-round

citizen science Citizen science (CS) (similar to community science, crowd science, crowd-sourced science, civic science, participatory monitoring, or volunteer monitoring) is scientific research conducted with participation from the public (who are sometimes re ...

project in the world. In 1983, she was the first recipient of the BTO's Golden Jubilee Medal for outstanding service to the Trust.

Notable films

*The Great Hedgehog Mystery (1982) - first film to show hedgehogs mating *In-Flight Movie (1987) - won at the New York International Film and TV Festival; and at the Wildscreen film festival in 1988 *Meerkats United (1987) - voted the best wildlife documentary of all time by BBC viewers *Trivial Pursuit: the Natural Mystery of Play (1988) - audience of 12 million

Bibliography

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References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Breese, Dilys British ornithologists Women ornithologists BBC people British television producers British women television producers British Trust for Ornithology people 1932 births 2007 deaths Alumni of the University of St Andrews British nature writers 20th-century British zoologists 20th-century British businesspeople