What's your Spark Bird? (1 Viewer)

C

cormera

~birding on a budget~

• Jul 18, 2016

• #1

Hello there,

On my very first birding trip my friend introduced me to the term "sparking bird", well, I discover now the phrase is actually "spark bird", but English is not our first language. :-O

His was a Cinereous Vulture, and it was so much fun to watch his face light up when we saw two of them on our 3rd trip. So much so that I wished I could feel the same while I was birding.

It's been a year almost since then, and I only sparingly go birding. But the other day I saw a Double-crested Cormorant looking back at me and it just took me away.

So now I wonder what sort of birds sparked other people. It was such a great feeling and it'd be nice to know that other people experienced it too.

 

Last edited: Jul 18, 2016

Ratal

Well-known member

• Jul 18, 2016

• #2

First time I ever saw a summer plumage Black Throated Diver.

Honestly, the rain was horizontal, the wind had me gasping for breath, and then out the rain it came. Was a near religious experience such was the joy. Made my three days wild camping joyous indeed.

 

C

cormera

~birding on a budget~

• Jul 18, 2016

• #3

Sad to say I haven't seen a black throated diver yet.

From the pictures on the opus here it looks so sleek- especially the breeding plumage. It's calls are very cute as well, made me smile.|:$|

 

M

markspirito

Well-known member

• Jul 18, 2016

• #4

Finally Identifying a Male Linnet aged 10....I am now 55 !!

Mark

 

delia todd

If I said the wrong thing it was a Senior Moment

Staff member

Opus Editor

Supporter

• Jul 18, 2016

• #5

It was the first time I watched a Dipper in action.

 

KC Foggin

Very, very long time member

Supporter

• Jul 18, 2016

• #6

Mine would be Pheasants as my younger brother and I restocked our county with a nearly extinct bird.

 

stuartvine

Well-known member

• Jul 18, 2016

• #7

Hoopoes; watching them probing busily always does it for me.

 

CalvinFold

Well-known member

• Jul 18, 2016

• #8

White-Tailed Kites that visited a very particular spot at very predictable times in a very peaceful location.

They were over 50m away and tricky to photograph that far away with the gear I had at the time, but the fact that I could spend up to 2 hours at a time watching a raptor preen, eat, and even sometimes hunt was something I won't forget.

 

Jeff Hopkins

Just another...observer

• Jul 19, 2016

• #9

stuartvine said:

Hoopoes; watching them probing busily always does it for me.

Click to expand...

Hoopoe was the bird that turned me into a birder and I do love seeing them.

But my favorite bird is a peregrine.

 

S

string boozel

Well-known member

• Jul 19, 2016

• #10

I think that mine may have been Moorhen, that red and yellow bill and those lurid green legs not to mention the fact that it looked just like the picture in my Ladybird Pond and River Birds. I'm pretty sure that if had been subjected to any gull watching at this early stage I'd be typing on a plane, tank or Deep Purple forum round about now!

James.

 

Paul Chapman

Well-known member

• Jul 19, 2016

• #11

Jeff hopkins said:

Hoopoe was the bird that turned me into a birder and I do love seeing them.

But my favorite bird is a peregrine.

Click to expand...

My heart always lifts when I see a peregrine or a red kite. I always look out for them and just stop and watch them whenever possible. Now a far more frequent experience than it used to be with peregrines from the garden and red kites from the M4 and train journeys to London but I remember my first sightings really vividly - Slimbridge and Tregaron respectively.

I suppose one of my early spark birds was waxwing. My grandmother told me that some birdwatchers were looking at two birds in her front cotoneaster hedge. She described them to me and I showed her a picture of a waxwing in a book. She told me that it wasn't them! I twitched them at the first opportunity and they were two waxwings after all as I expected. My first twitch at the age of 14. Again always a bird that gets the heart racing and brings a smile to my face.

All the best

 

S

SanAngelo

Well-known member

• Jul 19, 2016

• #12

I was always in the forest preserve as a child, never enamored in any one creature just the adventure of being deep in the woods.

In 1976 while backpacking through Mexico I saw a flock of Keel-billed Toucans outside of Cancun on the road south. There wasn’t really a Cancun at the time; it was one long concrete street with a few brick and mortar tiendas. No restaurants only one or two cocinas con comida del dia. No posadas, the police let us crash in their bunk house, an old quonset hut.

Leaving Cancun towards Playa del Carmen and Tulum, within a mile we came across 3 or 4 bulldozers pushing dirt, coconut groves, and other vegetation away from the beach. Ahead of the cloud of dust and up-rooted trees flew numerous flocks of displaced Keel-billed Toucans.

I could just imagine what it was like if I got there one year earlier..!!

I never looked at birds the same after that.