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What was your most memorable birding moment? (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter Warren F.
- Start date
Bird of Paradise lek
Mine was was standing under a Raggiana Bird of Paradise lek in Varieta PNG with 10 displaying male birds bringing in females.
David's was snorkelling with Penguins in the Galapagos.
Mine was was standing under a Raggiana Bird of Paradise lek in Varieta PNG with 10 displaying male birds bringing in females.
David's was snorkelling with Penguins in the Galapagos.
Mine was about 12 years ago seeing my first eagle and my first view of a lammergeier.
Was up in the Ossau just before the french/spanish border at Portalet. Came down so low above me then flew around nearby for long time , both awesome birds in awesome scenery
About an hour from where I live.
Was up in the Ossau just before the french/spanish border at Portalet. Came down so low above me then flew around nearby for long time , both awesome birds in awesome scenery
About an hour from where I live.
stuartvine
Well-known member
Far too many, but probably watching a fight between a Blue Magpie and a Common Magpie outside my bedroom window in Hong Kong when I was nine years old.
Richard Prior
Halfway up an Alp
Mine dates back to when I was nine years old too - my first Common Redstart, a spring male, luckily the species was illustrated in colour in my The Observer's Book of Birds (half the species were in black and white) so I could tell what it was :t:
Farnboro John
Well-known member
Raising my bins on a May morning at Fleet Pond, Hampshire, to look at what I thought was going to be a Grey Wagtail, to find it was actually a male Citrine!
John
John
string boozel
Well-known member
Watching a California Condor soaring over the Grand Canyon, a stunning bird in the most magnificent of settings, nature at its finest.
James.
James.
Telephoto Paul
Well-known member
Being alone on the top deck of a yacht in the Galápagos, as it sailed between islands. A glorious sunset was transitioning in to a purple sky. A gentle breeze blew. For about ten minutes, with barely a beat of the wings, ten or so Frigate Birds soared a couple of metres above my head. Occasionally they'd jostle for position. It was an amazingly calm and transcendence experiece.
There have been other sighting that were more 'get excited and squeal', others that were more satisfying due to the effort and planning, or satisfied my desire for photographs, but there was something moving about it that was hard to explain.
There have been other sighting that were more 'get excited and squeal', others that were more satisfying due to the effort and planning, or satisfied my desire for photographs, but there was something moving about it that was hard to explain.
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Mayo Corncrake
Well-known member
Listening to my Corncrake on my farm at night with the sea in the background.
https://clyp.it/ojptdaap
https://clyp.it/ojptdaap
Inspired by MC's post. Falling asleep to the sound of Common Loons on Lac Le Jeune in 2003. Spine tingling.
stuartvine
Well-known member
Some pretty inspiring moments here (but Dom's Cassowary is the funniest - sort of like being stalked by a small but angry dinosaur). Richard, I think most of us of a certain (ahem) age had the Observer's book - it made identification a bit tricky for the black and white ones.
What lovely memories some of you have. I've loads of memorable moments too, but the one that always comes to mind is from my very early days of birdwatching.
I'd gone for a walk with a friend in one of the glens when a Cuckoo shot across the path right in front of us, to be followed immediately by two Meadow Pipits. The Cuckoo landed on a fence post about 50 yards off and then the pipits started bringing it food. We managed to get the scope up and watch them for about 5 minutes.
That's the only (confirmed) sighting I've had of a young Cuckoo.
I'd gone for a walk with a friend in one of the glens when a Cuckoo shot across the path right in front of us, to be followed immediately by two Meadow Pipits. The Cuckoo landed on a fence post about 50 yards off and then the pipits started bringing it food. We managed to get the scope up and watch them for about 5 minutes.
That's the only (confirmed) sighting I've had of a young Cuckoo.
Valéry Schollaert
Respect animals, don't eat or wear their body or s
In 28 years of birding, often full time, I've many of great moments. However, if I stuck to Europe for now, I have an incredible two days in SW France in 2012 that I can't forget.
I was on a 10 weeks mission couting the migrants at Cap Ferret (2012) for LPO (French equivalent of RSPB). Early November, while I thought birds would decrease, a huge migration started again after a week of rain.
Sky was full of siskins, chaffinches, bramblings, thrushes, and so on.
I heard a call of a "strange wren", wondered what it was. The bird was hidden in a very low vegetation on the sand dune, behaving like a Dusky Warbler. And there it was, short but good views.
A few minutes later, I see a small bunting flying towards me. It stopped in a small bush. Excellent views of a Little Bunting...
Later on, I saw two birds fighting in the air, then suddenly dropping down to a small tree. If the Great Tit was obvious, the other one was unknown. When it perched in view, the wide eye brow made me think a half second of a late Whinchat with a long tail... no, of course. A beautiful male Rustic Bunting!
Sharing this online made several birders to join me the following day. It was still good, with noticeably a gorgeous White-tailed Sea Eagle flying low in the morning mist above the beach, a spectacular male Snow Bunting in a Chaffinch flock, or another Lapland Bunting (rare that far south) turning around us like to stop, but finally cross the Basin d'Arcachon to the Pyla Dune.
If I have to select ONE of those birds, Rustic Bunting on the top of the small tree, even if it didn't stay and I missed my photo, was the top of the top.
Cheers
I was on a 10 weeks mission couting the migrants at Cap Ferret (2012) for LPO (French equivalent of RSPB). Early November, while I thought birds would decrease, a huge migration started again after a week of rain.
Sky was full of siskins, chaffinches, bramblings, thrushes, and so on.
I heard a call of a "strange wren", wondered what it was. The bird was hidden in a very low vegetation on the sand dune, behaving like a Dusky Warbler. And there it was, short but good views.
A few minutes later, I see a small bunting flying towards me. It stopped in a small bush. Excellent views of a Little Bunting...
Later on, I saw two birds fighting in the air, then suddenly dropping down to a small tree. If the Great Tit was obvious, the other one was unknown. When it perched in view, the wide eye brow made me think a half second of a late Whinchat with a long tail... no, of course. A beautiful male Rustic Bunting!
Sharing this online made several birders to join me the following day. It was still good, with noticeably a gorgeous White-tailed Sea Eagle flying low in the morning mist above the beach, a spectacular male Snow Bunting in a Chaffinch flock, or another Lapland Bunting (rare that far south) turning around us like to stop, but finally cross the Basin d'Arcachon to the Pyla Dune.
If I have to select ONE of those birds, Rustic Bunting on the top of the small tree, even if it didn't stay and I missed my photo, was the top of the top.
Cheers
chris butterworth
aka The Person Named Above
Leaving aside my first ( or even all ) Pittas / Trogons / Quetzals the bird that sticks out more than any other is ......... Common Starling! I've seen huge flocks wheeling around before going to roost in quite a few places but tens of thousands outlined against a red winter sky as I drove across the Fens between Wisbech and Peterborough and, one morning in October, in the north hide at Snettisham, a constant river of migrant Starlings flew low down over the pits and swooped up over the hide a few feet from me for over an hour really stand out. The beauty of the first and the sheer wonder of an "in your face" (literally ) experience of migration for the second example will stay with me forever.
Mike Crawley
Emeritus President at Burnage Rugby Club
I twitched onto Scilly for the Lesser Kestrel in May 2002.
No sign of the bird so we went searching.
As we descended from Penninis a small hirundine passed -wrong Little Swift
There was a commotion in a bush on Old Town bay - Cuckoo being mobbed
Move up to the golf course, perched in gorse in the middle- Woodchat Shrike
Flying by - Montagu's Harrier
and finally Lesser Kestrel
All in a super day
No sign of the bird so we went searching.
As we descended from Penninis a small hirundine passed -wrong Little Swift
There was a commotion in a bush on Old Town bay - Cuckoo being mobbed
Move up to the golf course, perched in gorse in the middle- Woodchat Shrike
Flying by - Montagu's Harrier
and finally Lesser Kestrel
All in a super day
Technically I'm cheating, as this was long before I started birding - I was just out for a day out. Spring 1998 I visited one of the last white stork colonies in Belgium. The sight and sound of multiple birds doing their bill-clapping displays on their nests. Astonishing.
Boro Birder
Well-known member
Many but one which sticks in my mind was a trip to Scotland to look for my first Ospreys, being in the east of the country id not expected to see any BT Divers has I was told they could only be found in the west, however after watching a Osprey fishing on a certain loch which they were breeding, to my amazement 3 BT Divers came swimming in to view, the remote location, beautiful dawn morning, there was something very special about seeing these birds for the first time. Amazing nature at its best.
Damian
Damian
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