I thought it would be a good plan to go and have a look around Highnam Woods, the nearest RSPB reserve to where I live. Very nice it is too - not too busy, and with plenty of well-maintained (if a little muddy) trails through the woods.
Quite pleased with what I managed to find, too - amongst the usual suspects of Blue Tits, Great Tits and Woodpigeon I found a number of Long-Tailed Tits (a first for me - bearing in mind that I've only really been paying attention since last weekend!!), a...
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Spent the morning being a big sleepyhead. After quashing any hope of an ambitious outing with a lazy morning, I went out on Road R to do more botanizing, collect more photos, and perhaps clear up the identity of the mystery tree. (unsuccessful on that point) I finally got a wide-angle photo of the whole mat of cyanea platyphylla. Found a lot of new pilo kea clumps here and there. Found some more stenogyne scrophularioides, one of which may flower soon! I checked the colony of embelia...
Today I went on the SBSG raptor-watching field trip to Windy Corner near Howden Dams. Despite the weather forecast, and my fear of a total drenching, it was actually fine for most of the morning, with only a few showers which didn’t last very long. And, despite its name, Windy Corner proved to actually be quite sheltered.
The main lure today was goshawks, a lifer that I actually got very early in the morning. They were tantalisingly brief views of a hunting bird, which sent a massive flock...
Anyone else sensing it? Yesterday I had some sort of small tree blooming neon yellow flowers already, and today I spotted my year Brown-headed Cowbird among the masses of blackbirds moving around. In the past I've noticed the House Finches to sing first, but perhaps not this year - it seems the cardinals beat them out!
Last night I had one of those dreams in which I have an impossibly successful birding session. In it, I found fieldfares, a species that would be a lifer for me.
Before setting off for college I equipped myself with some binoculars, knowing that on the way home I would be going via a place where last year I found hundreds of sand martins. It was quickly evident that the sand martins hadn't arrived yet. I did, however, manage to count no less than 5 gull species: Herring, Common, Black...
A couple of weeks ago I decided to go on my first expedition to hunt for a specific bird - the Firecrest.
I'd never seen one before. It was only a few weeks prior that I had seen my first Goldcrest, which was a real lesson in the advantages of just staying still, waiting, and watching.
From reading the latest news section of the London Birders website, there seemed to be regular January sightings of Firecrests in Tower Hamlets Cemetery, in East London. It was an area I wasn't familiar...
There were almost the same species present during February with the addition of the early arrials.
Red-brested Geese and Lesser White-fronts were around in small numbers, as were Wallcreeper and Alpine Accentor at their wintering sites.
A nice adult Greater Black-headed or Pallas's Gull in breeding plumage was present for a few days in the south.
The first Skylarks, Woodlarks, Lapwings, Golden Plovers, Spoonbills appeared with the warm front last week followed by flocks of Garganeys...
Novices who visit Pu'u Maka'ala NAR for the first time must wonder, "Where's the dang pu'u??? This place is flat as a cookie sheet! Is there even a Pu'u Maka'ala at all?" Well, yes Virginia, there IS a Pu'u Maka'ala, and today I climbed it!
Unfortunately, although the area of the NAR near the roads is fairly nice to nearly pristine, as soon as you leave the road you get into the muddy pig devastation, and Pu'u Maka'ala itself is covered by a very very nasty double infestation of palm...
Heard the first red billed leiothrix I've ever noticed at Halepohaku. Not sure what it would be eating around here, as I haven't seen any naio nearby. Perhaps there's some naio on the other side of the line of pu'us?
On the way up to the summit, after obtaining my morning ice cream, I went looking for a mountain pilo individual that grows just above Halepohaku, because I need a wide-angle photo of one of these attractive trees. Along the way I snapped a photo of the oddly spherical large pukiawe. Before I could get to my pilo I encountered a tree-sized specimen of dubautia arborea, which I've been looking for for a long time. There are a couple small individuals growing along the road which I had ID'd...
All too often I have been the subject of ignorant mockery from passers-by while I stand looking optimistically up into a tree in the park, with a pair of binoculars. "Eeee there's nothing up there", they might say. PAH!
Once the clouds cleared this morning, the sun came out and it was a brilliant Spring Sunday morning. I was returning from town, from playing the piano in my friend's church service, and had decided to arm myself with a pair of binoculars, so I could get a good look at the...
I have had a hectic weekend, but it has not been without it's birding highlights. Our local RSPB group has become incolved with a village birdlife garden project and the primary school that is linked to it so this necessitated a trip up the Tyne valley for me on Saturday. As I have found before birding from a train can be quite rewarding. Two highlights on this trip were 2 male Goosanders flying up the Tyne and a Grey Heron. After our work at the project, where I have to say I was inspired...
Yes I’m back! Having had a very hectic weekend I have not had time to keep my birding reports up to date, but feel I must record the one I did on 28th Feb as this was my first chance at birding for a little while and I returned to one of my favourite walks, the pond, woods and coast walk that some of you will remember. The day was a sunny one and the wind a little calmer than of late so off I went.
In the village before reaching the pond we were greeted by amongst others Mistle Thrushes...
It's been a great birding weekend with my guests from US visiting a newly discovered bird watching site in a paddy field.
I managed to bagged 2 LIFERS!
1. baillon's crake
2. ruddy-breasted crake
These 2 crakes are among the 30 birds seen in the morning. For the whole list, read my blog at http://www.nature2pixel.com/blog/?p=178
Picked up some camo-like fabric at the local fabric store in the clearance section. $8.81.
After building a frame for a new blind that I plan to use in the backyard, my awesome wife agreed to help me stitch up the edges and camera spy/openings for each side of the blind. Then she made a cover out of some remaining scrap for my white lens. Yeah, I know, the lens "coat" is one of those things that might be overkill from a cmoflage perspective. But at the very least it will add a small...
I edited the last few entries to include links to the photos in my photo pages. Should have thought of that earlier...
Seems my blog post, a few weeks ago, was the 'kiss of death' for the web site photo-tech.co.uk as the owner has decided to knock it on the head.
He'd always intended to run the site as a means to provide his photos to anyone who wanted them, and being as he was such a good wildlife photographer it seemed he'd get a decent level of support. Sadly this was not the case, so it has to go.
The good thing is he's going to spread his work around a number of gallery sites so it will still be...
Wasted another lazy morning in low gear before getting outside. It was far too late in the day (10:30) for a big adventure, so I just went to Road R. I was hoping to get a photo of the pit of cyanea platyphylla while the light was good, but of course today our drought broke and I was rained on for most of the day.
OK, on to Plan B: I wandered in the forest, looking for rare plants. I was rewarded with a full adult 8 foot tall cyanea tritomantha! It's the tallest I've ever seen...
I briefly thought about following the blue flagged transect from the end of the diagonal road down to Road R. However, I lost the blue flagging fairly quickly, and with a late start I just settled on wandering around that section of forest in a loop. I eventually found the blue flags again, and followed them back. Checking the path I took on the GPS, the blue flagging would have not intersected any of the Road R trails anyhow.
The pig damage was heavy as soon as I got away from the road...
I gave the diagonal trail North of Army Road another try for the first time since July. (About the 14 mile point on Stainback Highway) At the time I thought it was dull, due to the lack of scenery and abundance of 'uluhe and 'ohi'a scrub along the trail, and the low native bird diversity. I was far more impressed this time, now that I'm more familiar with the native plants. It has a reasonably good species diversity of the more common native plants, though not as much as on Road R. The...
Today I went around the paths between Exeter and a village on the western boundary of Exeter called Ide. Not a lot to report though. The only point of interest was the regular chaffinch charm in a newly sown field, which today just happened to fly up right above my head into some trees. Apart from that and a few great tits, there wasn't a lot.
Usually this walk is excellent for turning up buzzard, pheasant, grey wagtail (in the stream by the Twisted Oak pub) sometimes kestrel and last year...
I went to local patch to meet up with some new birders. The weather was not very good though. Almost come back with an empty list.
1. white-throated kingfisher
2. magpie robin
3. black-and-red broadbill
4. black-headed bulbul
5. orange-bellied flowerpecker
6. yellow-vented bulbul
7. greater green leafbird
8. gold-whiskered barbet
9. greater racket-tailed drongo
10. peaceful dove
prepared by wengchun (www.nature2pixel.com)
Well, I have not posted anything on my homestead lately, so I figure I'll do it now. As far as the house goes, not much happening there, still in the foundation phase, but we had so much rain lately that we couldn't pour the concrete. Maybe next week!!!
On the bird front its a whole different story!!
The way it is looking, I'll have a chance of breaking my record of 52 species at my present home, because I have 35 already. Of course, in the next few weeks some (like the flickers...
Firstly
...to anyone who has been following my blog, my apologies because I've been so busy clicking away, as you can see from my gallery, that I've neglected the blog - for nigh on a couple of months |:$|
Anyhow, I've had Coal Tits, Blue Tits Great Tits, Collared Doves, Siskins and Starlings amongst my feathered visitors lately and I think I'm finally getting to grips with my D40.
My bird photography is still very much restricted to the garden - due to a long-term leg injury, but I'm happy...
I finally found my missing adapter for my scope to the cp4500. yes. i am still using my first digiscoping equipment after all these years. Went our for a digiscoping field outing and manage to see a hornbill at the end of the trip.
I can't resist switching my camera to movie mode and start shooting at the hornbill on the ground.
You may click on the link below to watch the video hosted on youtube.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=AjRaDDl991g;)
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