Another Bird Blog: White Wagtail

Showing posts with label White Wagtail. Show all posts

Thursday, October 4, 2012

Restricted Birding

With a touch of a gammy toe today was gentle birding only, with no slogging along the sea wall at Pilling or tramping endlessly around the net rides at Rawcliffe.

But it was Niger filling time on the Moss where I disturbed 40 or more Goldfinch hanging around the feeders along with the usual assortment of Chaffinch and Blue, Great and Coal Tits. As I left the plantation I just caught sight of a Marsh Harrier heading off south and towards the river; perhaps it didn’t go too far and it could be the same gold top which has been around here for some weeks, but by October harriers should be contemplating migration.

Marsh Harrier

Chaffinch

Also about the woodland, 12 Blackbird, 2 Jay, 4 Siskin flying over, 14 Chaffinch, 2 Great-spotted Woodpecker, 2 Reed Bunting, 15 Tree Sparrow, 1 Kestrel and 2 Buzzard.

Buzzard

After more downpours yesterday the farm is still very flooded as shown by a count of 400+ Black-headed Gull, with around the edges of various floods, at least 15 Pied/White Wagtails. These wagtails are a problem to identify in the autumn, more especially now we are told that a large proportion of the supposed two species Motacilla alba and Motacilla yarelli are found together in the breeding season. Perhaps it’s time to lump alba and yarelli together? I took this photograph today and reckon it is a White Wagtail but stand to be corrected.

White Wagtail

Looks like feet up and a few painkillers tonight, then hopefully I’ll be fit for more birding tomorrow. If so read about it on Another Bird Blog soon.

Friday, February 18, 2011

Red, White, and Blue

Red for Red-throated Pipit, White for White Wagtail and Blue for Bluethroat, a trio from the Egypt holiday. If I had to say which was the most abundant in the area of Makadi Bay, Hurghada it would be a close run thing between White Wagtail and Bluethroat whereby on a walk of a couple of hours I could tot up 40 of each, but maybe only ten or so red-throats. Whilst I took lots of pictures of Bluethroat and Red-throated Pipit, the much more familiar to me White Wagtail obviously induced a touch of commonbirditis, an affliction I criticise in others.

Red-throated Pipit

White Wagtail

Bluethroat

If we were to believe some field guides Red-throated Pipit is potentially difficult to separate from Meadow Pipit, but the jizz of the birds is completely different. In 2 weeks of watching Red-throated Pipits I hardly saw one lift its searching, feeding, crouching, slightly tail wagging body a few centimetres above the grassy spots they always fed on. Never did one perch at anything above a blade of grass height and the only sound emitted was a single or double short, thin note as they flew quickly away from whatever disturbed them. But of course the “tramline” plumage of red-throats gives them away every time.

Red-throated Pipit

There are possibly 4 races of Bluethroat that occur in the Middle East, suffice to say I was happy to see and photograph plenty of them without worrying too much about their origins. Of course any birds that lack colour on the throat and chest are more likely to be juveniles and females. I witnessed a few territorial squabbles when birds made lots of threatening noises to each other and also employed their colourful tails in both sideways and upwards movements.

Bluethroat

As we’re doing a walk around Makadi Bay I might as well chuck in a couple more common birds of the area, Laughing Dove which really does have a laughing call, and Kestrel, a species that blends in so easily with the local palm trees where they sit waiting for innocents below.

Kestrel

Laughing Dove

A good place to find Bluethroats was the grounds of a hotel half a mile from our own. The Head Gardener there described himself in broken English as a “Garden Chef”, and his creations were superb garden artistry where Bluethroats made full use of his designs. The gardens held lots of Sardinian Warblers and Lesser Whitethroats, both very unaccommodating to photographers, with my one photo of Sardinian Warbler a not very good one.

Scary Topiary

Funny Topiary

Bluethroat

Sardinian Warbler

Monday, December 6, 2010

More Mediterranean

No not the weather, but in the absence of birding or ringing today here are more pictures from the recent Cyprus holiday. Maybe the blue sky in the pictures will cheer us all up. The idea of our holiday was a relaxing, sunny break, a bit of exploration and walking, a chance to inject a dose of warmth into creaking bones before the British winter set in. Alright it cost a few quid, but as the sayings goes, “you can’t take it with you”, and anyway we are fully paid up members of the SKI Club.

I know the island of Cyprus is a good place to bird during spring and autumn situated as it is in the Mediterranean Sea halfway between Europe and Africa. In the winter it appears that bird variety is much more predictable, seemingly dominated by larks, chats and finches, with for instance very small numbers of gulls and waders. I couldn’t find any information on the Internet about winter birding on Cyprus and although birding wasn’t the holiday objective, no birder goes on holiday without bins and camera.

Blue Rock Thrush

Stonechat

Crested Lark

I got a handful of the local specialties, Black Francolin, Cyprus Warbler and Greater Sand Plover, all so distant and unapproachable that pictures were out of the question. Otherwise on the outskirts of towns and away from the tourist areas, it was the common and numerous winterers everywhere, Crested Lark and Skylark, Black Redstart, Linnet, Goldfinch, Chaffinch and Greenfinch, Stonechat and White Wagtail. A couple of coastal Kingfishers brightened up other days, plus Common Sandpiper near the hotel and what may have been a pretty good bird for the island, a Barn Owl that we watched from our balcony whilst taking a sun downer.