Friday, June 22, 2012

Soggy Post And Menorca Returns

Two days of solid rain, no birding and no news for Another Bird Blog readers. Unless of course they are interested in photographs of newly painted garden benches drying off in the garage, a prĂ©cis of a letter to long-lost aunts in Uxbridge, or a recipe for freshly made tomato soup? I thought not. 

So in place of non-existent news and after tidying up picture files in Photoshop here are a few pictures left over from May in Menorca, with minimal comments from me. 

The Bee Eaters in Menorca are difficult to approach, keeping watchers to what seems a measured distance before they fly off, usually close to the usable limits of a 400mm lens. A 1000mm would be ideal. 

Bee Eater

Here’s a Cattle Egret, a species which still hasn’t managed to colonise the UK to any meaningful extent, despite showing all the signs for a good few years. 

Cattle Egret

The European or Common Shag (Phalacrocorax aristotelis) is fairly common around the rocky Balearic coasts. If anyone wants to learn more about this bird, beware of bizarre outcomes if Googling the word “Shag”. 

European Shag

Garden birds from Menorca - Kestrel, Scops Owl, Hoopoe, Yellow-legged Gull and Audouin’s Gull, the latter a bird ringed as a nestling on Illa de L’Aire, an island off the south coast of Menorca, and a different ringed individual to the one I recorded in 2011. 

Kestrel

Scops Owl

Audouin's Gull

Audouin's Gull

Yellow-legged Gull

Hoopoe

For more Hoopoe pictures see Another Bird Blog here. For more birds from Menorca, click on the "Menorca" or "Menorca Birds" tags in the right hand lower column of the blog page.

Perhaps strangely to our jaded British palates, Menorcan cheese doesn’t stick your teeth together and the island’s sausages actually taste of meat. 

Menorcan sausage and cheese

My rough translation of the street sign in Es Migjorn would be “If you clean up after your dog the whole environment benefits” 

Street sign - Es Migjorn, Menorca

Alaior - Menorca

Mahon - Menorca 

Fingers crossed for less rain this weekend, but Wimbledon begins on Monday.

13 comments:

  1. I enjoyed your Menorca post. The birds are just wonderful. My favorites are the Bee-eater, Scops owl and the Hoopoe. I hope you weather is great this weekend, happy birding.

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  2. Menorca looks like a great place, I went to Majorca on a boozy holiday after my A levels, didn't see many birds and came back with a suntan, some humorous drinking stories and only 4 or 5 lifers.......

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  3. Those bee eaters are amazing! And the hoopoe is so unusual and one I didn't even know existed. I had to laugh at your Shag comment. Hee. Your European Shag looks like our Cormorant. Is it the same? Enjoyed the post and the photos. :)

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  4. Oh no, Phil, I would enjoy hearing all about the homemade tomato soup recipe;'),truly.
    These images, all so beautiful and yet, oh my Phil, those Bee Eaters, what a superbly glorious capture. Well done on all counts, including painting those benches.
    Now, will you please do me a huge favor? Send us your rain. I am thinking that it is about to be a very long, hot and dry summer season for us~

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  5. beautiful birds :-) especially the first picture :-) beautiful shots :-) Dropping by from Camera Critters.

    http://www.kidsnpet.com/2012/06/have-seen-jerry/

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  6. Great shots! Loved all the photos but was particularly taken with the birds. Those bee eaters have such pretty coloring.

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  7. oh my word, those bee eaters are spectacular, as are the seagulls!

    brilliant photography, i am really impressed:)



    i love your blog!!

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  8. those bee eaters are so beautiful! really neat looking 'hoopoe' too!

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  9. So nice Menorca impressions... hm for cheese an sausages. But yor bird photos are really stunning!

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  10. fantastic photos; but my favourite is the hoopoe; never seen them before; it's so quaint!

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  11. Wow!!! Hoopoe, Bee Eaters, and Owl....it doesn't get better than this:) Menorca looks like a really interesting place to visit.

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  12. Seems a great place for holiday with a really nice sign! I have to say that the European Bee-eater looks so much better than the ones we have in Asia....

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