Picture A Year

The New Year, and as is customary here’s a selection of favourite pictures which best depict the four seasons of birds and birding on Another Bird Blog during 2014. This is my entry to Jim M Goldstein's Best Photos 2014, a project with over 300 participants from all over the world in 2013.

It was quite difficult to choose a single representative picture taken in the actual month concerned, the problem being that some of those 30 day periods lacked much photography action. Often the birds chose not to join in with my camera quest and I went without pictures for weeks at a time. Here goes with the photographs and I hope that the few words accompanying each picture might help others who wish to photograph birds, that most difficult of subjects. Don't forget to "click the pics" for a light box show.

January. A picture of a Little Egret from my Lanzarote sunshine holiday, away from the cold, grey days of a Lancashire winter. Photographing white birds is to me quite perplexing. Often the bird’s image ends up looking either washed out with no detail in the white feathers or drastically under-exposed, making the bird appear grey instead of white. While not perfect this picture is about as good as I can get until I resolve the mysteries of my Canon camera’s exposure values. 

Little Egret

 

February provided opportunities for taking pictures of Goldeneye, a shy diving duck which visits the UK in the winter months only. The golden eye and the two-tone bill of this female remain in focus as the camera captured the water droplets on her plumage as she emerged from a lengthy dive in the depths below. The picture was taken from a car window following a careful approach as a truly wild Goldeneye is highly unlikely to stay around if approached directly. 

Goldeneye

March hints at Spring but more often than not it feels like the depths of Winter. The arrival of Wheatears from Africa tells us not to worry, Summer isn’t too far away. Finding the first Wheatear of the season is something of a ritual for most birders. The yearly custom is often subject to mockery from others who claim to be above such trivial pursuits. But there’s nothing quite like close contact with a Wheatear newly arrived from Africa to make one appreciate the phenomenon of bird migration. Below, a fine looking male, the first of a number caught during the year. 

Wheatear

April and there was a stroke of luck with a Black-tailed Godwit intent on feeding, so not noticing my presence. Like most waders Black-tailed Godwits are normally shy, so I rattled off dozens of similar pictures to clog up the hard drive and then chose just one that captures the bird with its bill open.

Black-tailed Godwit

May’s photo is easy to pick from the many sunshine shots of Menorca, a Mediterranean island which beckons each year. A colony of Bee Eaters is hard to resist. The birds live in an unlikely looking spot where they burrow into the sandy soil to lay their eggs and raise a family. Staying in the car and waiting for a Bee Eater to perch close by is far more successful than trying to approach this shy bird on foot. 

Bee Eater

June is a good month for early morning starts where even the shy Grey Heron might feel unthreatened by a single person in a slowly approaching car. This heron used a boat from which to watch the shallow water below but quickly flew off at the first person approaching on foot. 

Grey Heron

July rarely goes by without a chance of photographing Swallows. An adult’s summer plumage makes for the most photogenic but juveniles are much more willing to stay around for a picture. 

Barn Swallow

August.  A young Tufted Duck has yet to learn the ways of man. The expression in the bird’s eye combined with its body language said that while it was happy with the initial approach, if I moved closer it would depart the scene, taking the accompanying Tufted Ducks with it.

Tufted Duck

September in Skiathos where a Red-backed Shrike resident in the hotel gardens was somewhat unapproachable but had a regular beat, as many species do. After a week or more of relaxing in the garden while at the same time noting the bird’s habits, I used the cover provided by a chain link fence to obtain a number of reasonable shots without scaring the bird away. 

Red-backed Shrike

October is the month that Whooper Swans fresh in from a non-stop flight from Iceland settle on a traditional part of our coastal marsh. It’s best to try for pictures before the swans get uneasy from the regular wildfowl shoots which start in October, activities which increase their wariness. Take a close look at the picture and how each swan is looking in a different direction in case of predators, a 360° early warning system. It’s part of the reason that birds form flocks - many pairs of eyes and ears are better than one and at the first sign of trouble the herd will have the earliest possible warning. 

Whooper Swans

November seemed to involve a good number of sightings of Buzzards, a hopeful sign perhaps? The trials and tribulations of our UK Buzzards at the hands of the less responsible devotees of shooting became a regular feature throughout the year on Another Bird Blog. It culminated in November with the conviction of a gamekeeper for the intentional killing of nine Buzzards; the court issued a suspended sentence but no financial penalty other than to pay court costs of £930 plus a “victim surcharge” of £80. In the eyes of our UK justice system the value of a single Buzzard is less than £10.

As if Buzzards hadn’t enough to contend with in being constantly harassed by the ever expanding corvid population?

Buzzard and Carrion Crows

December. A far from perfect picture of a Kestrel displaying “fuzzy” focus, into the light of a watery morning, parts of the bird hidden by the fence line on which it sat. I like this picture because there is something of a detached look about this bird’s expression as it ignores the camera and concentrates on finding that essential early breakfast. 

Kestrel

It just remains for me to thank everyone who visited the blog in 2014. Happy New Year to all.

I hope to meet up with everyone again in 2015.

Linking today to id-rather-b-birdin.,  Dawn's Critters and Eileen's Saturday Blog.

Steady If Unremarkable

Tuesday morning I met up with Andy and Craig for a ringing session at Oakenclough. Recent weather and other setbacks delayed the opportunity but at last everything came good in a way best summed up by today’s headline. 

Things were quieter than of late in both numbers and species however we managed to catch 54 birds, 24 new ones, 29 recaptures from recent weeks and a single “control”. 

Control is the terminology ringers use to describe a bird bearing a ring from elsewhere, in this case a first winter male Goldfinch with a standard British ring but inscribed with a letter/number combination we don’t own. In due course, and once the record is submitted to and analysed by the BTO database, the original ringing data of who, when and where will be sent to us. In return the original ringer will find out when and where “their” Goldfinch was recaptured and who captured it on 30th December 2014. 

Our new birds comprised 7 Goldfinch, 4 Chaffinch, 7 Blue Tit, 4 Great Tit and 2 Goldcrest. Recaptures materialised as 13 Coal Tit, 12 Blue Tit, 3 Goldfinch, 1 Dunnock. No new Coal Tits and 13 recaptures of the same species suggest that we may have caught a good proportion of those wintering in the immediate area. 

Coal Tit

Goldcrest

Chaffinch

In between our bursts of ringing activity a little bird watching in the immediate area found 2 Grey Wagtail, 2 Pied Wagtail, 3 Jay, 1 Buzzard, 1 Kestrel, 1 Sparrowhawk and 1 Raven.

Craig located a small flock of 12 Siskin and 6 Goldfinch feeding in the alder trees. We are hoping that the regular catches of Goldfinches will soon be augmented by their two near relatives once they decide to add niger seed to their diet.

Siskin

Pied Wagtail

Further to the problems of last week when some miserable sod stole bird feeders from this site, a kind blogger friend in Kentucky sent me a link to read how others have tackled equally selfish thieves. 

Read about the remarkable things that some folk will steal and have a good laugh about the victims’ understandable outrage and subsequent responses at www.dontbeamiserablesod.com

More birds soon from Another Bird Blog. 

Do Birds Smell?

It’s a question I asked myself a number of years ago when noting how long it took for birds to discover new sources of food, in particular the introduction of bird feeders where none had been used previously. 

Birds were always thought to have a very poor sense of smell. But most vultures and many scavenging seabirds locate their food by smell. Any birder who has been on a pelagic trip to see seabirds up close will be familiar with the practice of chucking overboard buckets of “chum” or “rubby dubby”, to lure shearwaters and petrels close to the boat. Scientists believe that other birds, e.g. homing pigeons, may use familiar odours in finding their way home or use their sense of smell during migratory journeys. Think about the various odours given off to overflying birds by different places, e.g. pine forest or ancient deciduous woodland, saline or fresh water, the urban jungle or the countryside. 

Egyptian Vulture

Manx Shearwater

A recent Dutch study determined that Great Tits found and located apple trees with winter moth infestations and big concentrations of caterpillars larvae by smell rather than sight. Tit species eat large numbers of insect larvae particularly during their breeding seasons when they feed them to their young, timing their breeding to do so. Trees benefit from the protection offered by birds removing larvae that would otherwise go on to eat the leaves and perhaps impact on tree growth and productivity. 

Great Tit

The Dutch experiments were designed to remove other possible ways in which the Great Tits might detect the winter moth larvae. The researchers removed the caterpillars, removed leaves with holes and even took away signs of ‘caterpillar poo’, ensuring no visual clues were left for the birds to locate the infested trees. Despite these measures the Great Tits repeatedly found the trees with larvae infestations. The results were clear, even when they couldn’t see the trees, the Great Tits homed in on trees with winter moth infestations when they could smell them. 

The researchers believe the trees gave off chemicals which birds can detect by smell to alert them to infestation. It has long been known that many plants attract insects using smells and benefit from the relationships as a result, but this is the first time they have been shown to attract birds in the same way. More research is needed to determine which chemicals are involved but infested trees were found to release more of a chemical responsible for the “green” smell of apples. 

Most bird feeders use metal/plastic tubes or wire mesh to make the food highly visible to birds and we naturally assume that birds start to use our bird feeders because they locate food via their keen eyesight. My new niger seed feeders arrived today, replacements for ones recently stolen from a ringing site. At first glance the design looks improbable and unlikely to work as the feeding holes are tiny. When the stainless steel cylinder is filled with niger, the seed is virtually invisible with just the tiniest point of an individual seed poking through odd holes. 

Niger feeders

Nevertheless I experimented with this design of feeder a number of years ago and found them to be highly successful in attracting Goldfinches very quickly and I attributed this to the birds’ ability to smell the niger. 

At lunchtime I took the new feeders to Oakenclough with fingers crossed that Scrooge doesn’t sniff them out before our ringing session which may well be tomorrow.

Goldfinch

Here’s an experiment anyone can try at home. Buy a sealed bag of niger seed, Guizotia abyssinica, open the bag and stick your nose in it. Then inhale and enjoy the sweet, oily, nutty fragrance which brings in those Goldfinches. 

No, there’s is no doubt in my mind that birds and in particular Goldfinches have well developed olfactory senses, probably as good as our own. 

Now you must excuse me. I’m sure that from the kitchen I can detect the unmistakable aroma of a curry cooking in the oven and I'm ready for a bite to eat. 

Linking today to Stewart's World Bird Wednesday.

Scrooge In Birdland

Christmas doesn’t last too long at our house. We both like to get back into a normal routine. For me that’s birding and in fact I went out early yesterday to top up the feeding station near Oakenclough in readiness for a ringing session soon. 

Our ringing site is quite remote and theoretically private. Scrooge must live nearby as here almost in the middle of nowhere, on or just before Christmas Day, he stole three bird feeders. Four other feeders were left untouched so held the usual array of finches albeit in reduced numbers. I topped the remaining feeders up and then chucked seed on the ground so hopefully the birds will be able to find their usual ration. Back home and online I ordered a couple of new feeders which should arrive Monday and in time for the next top up day. Andy is getting a couple more feeders plus making laminated notices advising Scrooge to leave the feeders alone. 

Goldfinch

Today I set off early for Pilling where as usual I found a Kestrel atop telegraph pole along Head Dyke Lane. Not far away was the usual Barn Owl which once again did its now customary trick of heading indoors. It looks like Barn Owls are finding food at the moment and so have no need to spend too many daylight hours hunting. 

At Damside was the resident Kestrel pair watching over the now very wet fields. We’ve had a lot of rain recently with the result that on these few fields were approximately 900 Pink-footed Geese, 290 Curlew, 200+ Lapwing, 160 Redshank, 45 Golden Plover and 120 Starlings. I spent some time grilling the geese but couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary amongst the multitude of pink-feet. That’s my Christmas story and I’m sticking to it. 

Pink-footed Geese

Pink-footed Geese

I checked out Fluke Hall to find a calling Nuthatch and a singing Song Thrush, both drowned out by the sound of gunfire from a shoot in progress across the fields behind. Along the marsh and on the inland fields: 1 Kestrel, 52 Whooper Swan, 35+ Shelduck, 2 Little Egret, 48 Redshank, 125+ Lapwing and 80+ Wood Pigeon. 

In the maize stubble were a couple of Reed Buntings and 11 Skylarks searching through the vehicle tracks where the shooters carry in sacks of food for their tame mallards. 

I guess I’d best join in the Season of Goodwill, so here’s a message from my Christmas Robin to  Scrooge. "Enjoy your bird feeders you miserable sod!"

Robin

Back soon with more bird news on Another Bird Blog.

Linking today to Anni's Blog. Anni would rather be birding too.

Better Than Shopping

After a five-day Atlantic conveyor belt of rain, wind and grey skies hit our region I was ready to bin my bins and instead take up a pastime less weather dependent. This morning the sky turned a whiter shade of grey and as an alternative to Christmas shopping I plucked up the courage to go birding. The wind hadn’t dropped though and the morning was both cold and very blustery. 

I stopped at Pilling expecting to see a Barn Owl after the poor hunting weather of the last week. Although one appeared on cue I was slightly disappointed with mostly distant views of it quartering the fields and then briefly fence hopping. After just a minute or two the owl had departed over the fields and towards its daytime roost, this individual’s usual trick. 

Barn Owl

Barn Owl - off to roost

In a field close to Lane Ends I counted 14 Little Egrets. They had clearly just vacated the roost but chosen to feed in a wet field rather than head out to the extremely windy shore. There seemed to be lots of waders on the same fields and when I returned this way later as the tide rose and into better light I counted in excess of 2500 Lapwings, 650 Curlew and 240 Redshank, not to mention hundreds of Black-headed Gulls.

Lapwing

At Thurnham was a Kestrel, hovering at the roadside but an awkward spot to stop a car when others were speeding by on their way to work. As I arrived at Conder Green, another Kestrel, this one hovering over the marsh before trying its luck further away. I lost interest in the unhelpful Kestrel and looked on the choppy waters of the pool and in the more sheltered creeks.

While many species abandon the windswept pool and the vagaries of the tidal channels the tiny but hardy Little Grebes stick it out in most weathers. Ten Little Grebes today, along with 90+ Teal, 26 Wigeon,2 Tufted Duck, 2 Little Egrets, 1 Grey Heron, 1 Spotted Redshank and 1 Common Sandpiper, all equally determined to spend Christmas at Conder Green.

Little Grebe

 
At Glasson Dock the Tufted Duck numbers have inexplicably dropped from 70/80 to something like 25 today, less than double the count of 14 Goldeneye, and not forgetting singles of Little Grebe and Grey Heron.

I hung around watching the antics of the male Goldeneye trying to impress the females with their head bobbing and stretching displays. Go easy boys, you’ll end up Christmas shopping if you’re not careful.
  

I note there are a few things on the bird listers circuit this holiday week. There’s a long suffering Shore Lark at Rossall which now has more portraits on the Internet than Angelina Jolie. Alternatively there’s an equally tormented Snow Bunting at Fleetwood, the little bird currently experiencing flashbacks of humans carrying large instruments of torture.

And now suddenly everyone is bursting to see a couple of Canada Geese, a bird they don’t normally touch with a bargepole and certainly not a telescope. But in this case as a sub-species of Branta canadensis and therefore only half a tick maybe it is preferable to being dragged Christmas shopping with the other half?

Enjoy your Christmas everyone.

Linking today to Eileen's Blog,  Theresa's Christmas Ranch and Christmas Birds in Australia.

Golden Times

The weather doesn’t improve. After writing off Wednesday and Thursday’s plans for birding due to almost constant rain and solid grey skies, Friday’s strong winds were also not designed to help birders, ringers, or anyone else really. Luckily there was a vital job for me that would pass a couple of hours - a trip to Oakenclough where the ringing and feeding station would need a top-up. 

The journey would take the long way round. From home the coastal road through Pilling and Cockerham to Conder Green and Glasson. After that a drive inland over the raised mosses of Pilling, Cockerham and Winmarleigh, skirting alongside the ancient market town of Garstang before heading east and into the foothills of Bowland. Yes, this part of Lancashire is a superb part of the world in which to live and in which to enjoy birds, away from the noise, fumes, expense and stress of city and urban living. 

The week’s rain coupled with the incoming 9 o’clock tide meant that Conder Creek was almost full alongside the road - not the best way to see feeding waders with no shallow water to survey. I’d made an elementary mistake in not keeping abreast of tide times in recent days. Never mind, there was a fine flotilla of 90+ Teal, a dozen or more Wigeon and even a few Little Grebes in the brimming channels. On the pool, a Red-breasted Merganser, 5 more Little Grebe, a couple of Cormorants and a lone Curlew sharing the windswept island with a gang of Mallards. 

Curlew

I drove to Glasson hoping that diving ducks might be feeding close to the more sheltered margins of the yacht basin as they often do on strong windy days. Bingo - 24 Goldeneye and 22 Tufted Duck at times coming reasonably close to the edge until the steady plod-plod of early but oblivious walkers sent the ducks steaming back to the choppy middle water. Some people just don’t notice the stunning looks of a male Goldeneye, even less do they mind disturbing the birds from their search for food. 

Goldeneye

Glasson Dock

The feeding station was busy, the feeders now just a quarter full after Tuesday’s top-up. I watched from the car as 8 or 10 Goldfinch crowded each one, squabbling as they went and sending the bigger Greenfinches flying off. In the hawthorns and on the ground below I counted 20 or more Chaffinch, Dunnocks, Robins and a constant stream of raiding Coal Tits. When next the weather allows we will surely have another good catch of birds with Goldfinch to the fore. 

Goldfinch

Some of our UK Goldfinches migrate to south-western Europe, e.g. France and Spain. Interestingly, many more of these birds are females than males, and birds that migrate one year will not necessarily migrate in others. The weather this winter has been wet and mild which means that many Goldfinches will stay around for the time being, especially since part of our feeding regime includes niger seed and sunflower hearts, both of which are high energy foods that Goldfinches love. 

Goldfinch

Goldfinches have recovered well from a serious decline in the 1970s and 80s possibly caused by increased use of herbicides. The comeback has been so strong that the Goldfinch may well be our commonest garden bird, but changing agricultural practices in the future might still threaten the species. 

While birders most often use the term “flock” to describe a number of birds feeding or flying together, an old and now unused collective name for a gathering of Goldfinches is a “charm”. That seems an eminently fitting term to describe our beautiful UK Goldfinch.

There was a Kestrel, a Mistle Thrush in the wood and overhead 40+ Fieldfares heading north, but little else of note on such a windy morning.

No, problem, we'll try again soon. In the meantime linking to Anni's Birding and Eileen's Saturday Blog .
 

Tuesday’s Ringing

Tuesday morning promised a window of half decent weather so I met up with Andy and Craig for a ringing session near Oakenclough. Craig is back from University until January so is able to join us occasionally only. He takes well the banter he receives as the youngest member of the group, giving us ancient ones in return as good as he gets. Whilst our four hour ringing session was hard, concentrated and serious work it was also good fun when a lull in proceedings allowed time to talk. 

We caught a total of 79 birds, 44 new ones together with 35 recaptures from our previous four visits of November and December. Today’s high proportion of recaptures to new ones is quite high but left us at a loss to explain why, unless it is simply that more birds are adding this relatively new site to their established feeding circuit. 

After previous visits resulted in catches of more finches than members of the tit family, the situation was reversed today with the finch family finding themselves lower down the pecking order of 44 birds - 12 Blue Tit, 9 Goldfinch, 7 Coal Tit, 5 Great Tit, 3 Chaffinch, 2 Robin, 2 Greenfinch, 2 Dunnock, 2 Redwing. 

35 Recaptures - 14 Blue Tit, 9 Coal Tit, 6 Great Tit, 5 Goldfinch, 1 Greenfinch. Soon after dawn there was a movement of approximately 60 Redwing and 30+ Fieldfares, probably birds leaving a local roost. 

We caught two of the Redwing, both first winter birds - note the rather worn plumage and the tail fault bars on the bird below. 

Redwing - first winter

Redwing

Goldfinch - male

 

Blue Tit - first winter

Chaffinch - first winter female

Otherwise the resident Bullfinches continue to evade us, as do the Lesser Redpolls which fly over and through the site with regularity. 

On the way home, a Stoat dashed from the roadside into hedgerow vegetation and then at Out Rawcliffe I had brief views of a Mistle Thrush plus 40+ Fieldfares.

Linking today to Stewart's World Bird Wednesday .