• Welcome to BirdForum, the internet's largest birding community with thousands of members from all over the world. The forums are dedicated to wild birds, birding, binoculars and equipment and all that goes with it.

    Please register for an account to take part in the discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.
ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

My Outback 2005 / 05 (1 Viewer)

birdman

Орнитол&
Last trip outback for February, and another quiet one.

And by that, I mean very little birdsong, with just a couple of exceptions.

The first exception is the Skylarks, who have really begun to find their voice. Although cold, this morning was sunny, and this encouraged the Skylarks to take to the air, and engage in some territorial squabbling.

Yesterday my daughter pointed out how much she enjoys the Skylarks singing in the background. I totally agree with her... it's wonderful.

However, they can only be heard over about half of my outback, and once out of earshot, the air was very quiet indeed.

Didn't even hear the Little Grebe, although we did from the garden later on.

A look at the list will show that there were still a good few species to be seen, but relatively few numbers in total.

Even so, we added a couple of species to the year total. A rather distant small flock of Lapwing, and a reeling flock of Linnet. They were the other noisy exception.

The other bigger numbers were the Woodpigeons, who seemed rather flighty, and an extremely loose gathering of Black-headed Gulls, which (surprisingly), made them even more difficult to count than normal.

Other than that... well nothing much really, but if "nothing much" amounts to 24 species, I don't suppose I have room for complaint!

Plain text = Outback day tick
Bold text = Outback year tick
Bold text italic = Outback life tick
(Number in brackets is highest number of individuals identified at one time)


Mute Swan (Cygnus olor) : 2 (2)
Gadwall (Anas strepera) : 2 (2)
Mallard (Anas platyrhynchos) : 6 (5)
Tufted Duck (Aythya fuligula) : 3 (3)
Green Woodpecker (Picus viridis) : 2 (1)
Woodpigeon (Columba palumbus) : 246 (200)
Moorhen (Gallinula chloropus) : 5 (4)
Coot (Fulica atra) : 5 (2)
Lapwing (Vanellus vanellus) : 18 (18)
Black-Headed Gull (Larus ridibundus) : 40 (40)
Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus) : 2 (1)
Magpie (Pica pica) : 9 (4)
Jackdaw (Corvus monedula) : 6 (6)
Carrion Crow (Corvus corone) : 4 (2)
Blackbird (Turdus merula) : 2 (1)
Mistle Thrush (Turdus viscivorus) : 3 (2)
Robin (Erithacus rubecula) : 3 (1)
Starling (Sturnus vulgaris) : 9 (6)
Nuthatch (Sitta europaea) : 1 (1)
Great Tit (Parus major) : 7 (1)
Blue Tit (Parus caeruleus) : 5 (1)
Skylark (Alauda arvensis) : 10 (3)
Chaffinch (Fringilla coelebs) : 8 (2)
Linnet (Carduelis cannabina) : 40 (40)
 
Birdman,

I think that's a great outback 24 species is a lot to me. Only 4 in the garden today,but 1 was a Long Tailed Tit on the suet. Glad you saw all those Woodpigeons, I used to have 2 regulars, haven't seen them at all this winter, I miss them delicately picking their way through the flowerbed to see if there is better food under the window. I suppose (being a realist) they were probably shot by a farmer, about 5/10 miles up the road (not good on distances) there are many fields full of vegetables, can't remember the name of the firm Dayfresh or something similar.

Ann Chaplin
 
Warning! This thread is more than 19 years ago old.
It's likely that no further discussion is required, in which case we recommend starting a new thread. If however you feel your response is required you can still do so.

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top