Bell Tower Birding

Pity the Gull

2011-02-14T12:19:00.010+01:00

I have a new post up at 10,000 Birds (well, it's been up since the 10th, which means I am slow on my own blog) about the ways gulls confuse me.

Having had all weekend to reflect on what I wrote, I realized how utterly unjust my post is. After all, my confusion points* were not so much about the gulls themselves but about the ways in which we abuse them, namely their taxonomy and the confusion arising out of a comparison between their English and ill-translated German names.

I felt bad. But then I glanced at a few pictures I took on our Christmas Holiday at the in-laws in Stralsund at the end of 2010 and realized that gull must be so thick-skinned they likely didn't even notice my picking on them.

After all, they share their living space with Coots.
And Coots loathe gulls.
They loathe everything.
They thrive on loathing.
For the sake of loathing.

And I may be bad, but I am no Coot.

The cast in alphabetical order:

Common Gull, Larus canus - Sturmmöwe - Storm Gull

Eurasian Coot, Fulica atra - Bläßhuhn - Blaze Chicken

* "Confusion Points" - watch out for my up-coming book on how I got misunderestimated by everyone, right on the heels of George Walker's account on how he got misunderestimated by everyone.

Beach Birding

2011-01-27T10:11:00.002+01:00

"The world is grown so bad, that teens make prey where birders dare not perch."

A short comment on the comments to my last post:

Stroll along a Florida beach during spring break toting a DSLR with a telephoto lens and binoculars.
Walk up to a group of teenage cheerleaders hanging out with a few college football players and tell them:
"Looking at Tits and Boobies is fun and all - no doubt - but nothing beats a wild Shag on the beach!"

If they agree, they are from Cornell.

Why birders will always lose

2011-01-21T16:36:00.003+01:00

.

Ash-breasted Tit-tyrant

Is it any wonder birding gets absolutely no mainstream recognition as a respectable hobby?

Jeepers Creepers

2011-01-20T16:29:00.003+01:00

Well, I haven't been compleeetely lazy lately, and posted the story of my life Wallcreeper over at 10,000 Birds, in three parts:

part 1

part 2

part 3

This blog isn't dead, no worries, just sleeping soundly. Like the gov'ner said: I'll be back.

YES!

2010-11-10T10:33:00.001+01:00

That's me, right here.

Kidnapped! part 1

2010-11-09T16:19:00.007+01:00

The black haze slowly gave way to a white and blinding mist. Upon trying to raise my head the immense pain became apparent, and the veins in my temple felt as if they were about to burst. Slowly regaining more of my consciousness, I noticed that I was lying on a wooden floor. Everything around me was swaying in a constant motion, turning my head from left to right, to left, to right. It was only after a few minutes had passed that the white mist cleared and I could recognize distinct shapes. I was in a darkened room, with beams across the boarded ceiling and several linen hammocks suspended between posts along two opposing walls. Then I noticed the smell, the stench of urine and algae mixed with the salty air of the open sea. Where was I - and what had happened? After a few moments of intense concentration, the control over my limbs was such that I managed to raise my head, and then my torso to a sitting position, using the arms to stabilize my body against the rocking motion of the floor.
“Ah, you’re finally awake. A few more hours and your corpse would have been thrown to the fishes. You’ll surely be thirsty.”
I turned my head towards the direction of the voice and discovered Clare in the corner across the room, forcing a smile on her bruised face and pointing towards a jug of murky water that had been placed on the floor next to me.
“Where am I?”
“You are onboard the 10,000 Birds.” The grave tone and a voice strained by what must have been days without food and drinking water almost concealed the identity of the speaker, but I was still able to recognize him as Duncan, and old companion from my whaling days in New Zealand. Duncan looked terrible. The chain around his ankles had cut into the flesh, his eyes were reddened and sunk deeply into his skull, and a severe cut ran across his left cheek. I looked around the room and found that I was in good company, and was also not alone in my physical miseries. There was Dan sitting a few feet to the right of me, a chain around his chest firmly fixing him to the wall. His left wrist looked like it was broken. He used his right arm attending to the wounds of someone I barely recognized as Redgannet, who was too weak to move or support himself. They had gotten James as well. He had sustained no apparent injuries, but the hollow expression in his empty stare, his slow and rhythmic rocking back and forth, arms wrapped tightly around his shoulders, had everyone sense the horrors he had seen. Renato was the last I spotted, crouched on the floor behind one of the hammock poles. He did not move and was apparently still unconscious. There was a small pool of dried blood next to him which boded ill for his overall condition.
All these formidable birders and writers caught and captured onboard the 10,000 Birds, the terror of the seven blogospheres, commanded by Captain Black Bird Bergin himself and his hit-thirsty crew of Internet Pirates.
It appeared that Clare had best recovered from her capture, so I turned to her once more. “What has happened, and why are we here? The last thing I remember is sitting at the bar of the Laughing Seagull in Portland. I was celebrating a successful Shorelark twitch when a scar-faced mariner walks up to me with a bottle of Rum. From then on, everything seems blank and blackened.”
Clare gave a short disdainful laugh that was quickly choked by her coughing. “The Scar-face was Charlie Sharky Moores, and judging by the sorry state you’re in, there sure was no Rum in that bottle. I got captured at the beaches of Broome checking an Oystercatcher nest. When I noticed a shadow approaching from behind, I turned around and the last thing I remember is seeing Corey Cutlass Finger with a club raised above his head.”
She ran her fingers through her hair towards the back of her head, where she paused with clear agony. Then she resumed her tale.
“I have been here for roughly a week now, and they tossed your unconscious body in about a day ago. As to why we are here and not amongst the dead, we can only guess. You surely know that Black Bird and his crew recently expanded their blogging territory even further, and their frequent sweeping raids on the Internet, the fact that no one in the NBN seemed able or daring enough to halt their reign, have kept the entire online community terrified. Now it seems someone is finally determined to challenge their dominance. A ship called the BirdingBlogs recently left port, captained by Cardinal Gunnar the Gunner Richelengblom and manned with the fiercest sea-faring mercenaries of our time, amongst them Tom Mack the Knife McKinney, Dale Dagger Forbes and Kenn Coffin Kaufman. They are out to hunt down the 10,000 Birds and send her and the crew to the bottom of the deep for a dance with Davy Jones.”
It was at this point that an eerie hissing brought the conversation to an end. All heads turned towards James, who had silently walked to the locked door of our confinement and gazed out onto the deck through a small crack between two of the door’s boards. “I can see them! They’re walking around the deck, back and forth, back and forth like rats in a cage. The BirdingBlogs must be near.”
As he turned towards the rest of our group, the immense change in his expression chilled us to the marrow of our bones: the hollowness was gone, and his face seemed calm and quiet. His blank stare had given way to a sparkle of determined aggression, and as he looked down upon me, a short smile flickered across his face.
“We are their only hope of survival. They know that Richelengblom will give no quarter to anyone onboard the 10,000 Birds. It is do or die for us and we must serve the ship or go down with her. We are the reinforcements that will carry them to victory. Now it is the BirdingBlogs that’s being hunted by Black Bird, a remarkable change of events. You know, … “ - he paused to looked at me with an expression of pity and superiority – “we are not the first bloggers they shanghaied. About a week or two ago they got six others, amongst them Nitro Nate and Carrie the Great Auk. The BirdingBlogs was last seen near Iceland, and Black Bird suspects the ship’s lair to be on Geirfuglasker. If anyone knows how to navigate these waters it is Carrie, which is what sealed her fate. It seems pretty clear what kind of service they are expecting from Nitro Nate.”
“But if we are twelve against three, why don’t we just take over the ship and surrender to Richelengblom?” I burst out.
James gave a deep and hollow laugh that slowly rose in pitch until it gave way to the same drawn-out hissing noise that had silenced us all before.
“Do you really think Black Bird hasn’t taken care of this? Do you really expect you can out-wit the old pirate? Why do you think he captured us in two waves?”
He bent down until his face was a mere inches away from mine, and his words, spoken swiftly through grinding teeth, bore through me like a bolt of white heat. “We do not know for certain if it is twelve against three. We do not know if anyone from the first wave or anyone in this room got onboard voluntarily and has joined the crew by their own will and choosing. We can’t trust anyone. If you started a mutiny, whose dagger you reckon would pierce your back? Carrie’s? Renato’s? Or would I be the one to put an end to your pity hope of survival?”
At this he rose up again, straightened his body and looked around at each of us in triumphant determination. “No, we have no choice but to fight with them or be doomed. And by their preparations and the scurrying all across the deck, it would seem judgement day can’t be too far away.”

To be continued.

Birding & Politics

2010-11-03T18:23:00.004+01:00

Who'd have thought that the US election today would have an impact on birding in Germany?

Well, apparently a female-type Red-flanked Bluetail (Tarsiger cyanurus) thought so as it decided to show itself to me for the typical 2-or-so seconds just before darkness fell on the land south of Heidelberg.

The Red-flanked Bluetail - which is actually now called "Orange-flanked Bush Robin", but the name hasn't found much acceptance amongst birders, and gee I wonder why - is an extreme rarity in Germany which doesn't even occur annually, yet this year has seen an unprecedented influx of this largely Siberian species to Europe with probably a handful of reports from Germany and a staggering 30-something observations in the UK.
Ironically, it is my second observation of the species in Germany, although the first one was twitched and not self-found, which is always much nicer.

I'll try to relocate it tomorrow morning and take some pictures, which would help as it might be the first-ever for the Southwest of Germany and maybe only the second bird ever away from the coast.
If I manage anything, I'll make sure to let you know.

By the way, I saw more blue than red, so maybe the US election wasn't the driving factor behind the bird's appearance. Who knows - the way migrants surprise us, ey?

In the meantime, here is a very beautiful gallery of the species.

From Hiatus to Hibernation

2010-10-28T10:55:00.006+02:00

Okay, so I realize that "a couple' months" have been over for well over a "couple' months" now.

Time to act.

Well, when I announced that I would be taking a hiatus because of private stuff and work, I didn't know that the private stuff would not only entail the things I knew back then but also that I'd have to move to a new apartment in early October.

Clearly one of the hard-hitting unknown unknowns.

So that's what I did in early October: move approximately three miles to the North of Leimen, right into a more or less lovely neighbourhood of Rohrbach - still south of Heidelberg and still as ugly as it gets for a birder.

I also realized that this hiatus would likely last longer than I had expected it to last, and as the stats show that - understandably - hardly anyone still visits this blog on occasion, I decided to follow the luring calls of the good folks of 10,000 Birds to become one of their beat writers.

This means you'll at least get to avoid one new post from me each months, which will appear on the 10,000 Birds blog that you are all reading anyway and which therefore makes much more sense than to post it here where only Asian spammers occasionally make themselves heard.

The details on how exactly I ended up joining the 10,000 Birds beat blogger cast will be published here on Belltower Birding on the day my first post goes up on 10,000 Birds, which will be November the 10th.

And in case you were wondering what I was taking a picture of on the picture of me in the profile:

Haaa...haaa...HIATUS !! [Bless you]

2010-05-07T20:23:00.003+02:00

Well, it's time for me to temporarily go again.

With a few technical problems to overcome, heaps of private stuff on my mind and equally impressive heaps of work on my desk, I am unlikely to find the time to post anything ... er ... to keep on trying to post anything that makes sense.
I don't think it will be a true hiatus and even if it turns out to be, it won't be too long. Maybe a couple' months. I might occasionally blog something, we'll see.

However, one thing is different this time from the times before: I am unlikely to appear in the comments section of other blogs as well.
This time, I'll be truly and largely off-line.

Geez, just writing it feels frightening!

I'll be seeing you.

Have a happy spring migration - and if you happen to travel to Montana by any chance, have a safe trip with some awesome longspurs and don't forget to say hello to the Prairies from me.

Off Topic: A remarkable coinincidence?

2010-05-04T09:19:00.004+02:00

Last Sunday, I went to visit my mom who lives around 200 km's south of Heidelberg by train.

To make the boring train trip seem less boring, I sat down at the train's Bistro and got myself a ... *cough*cough*cough* ... chilled barley tea.

Upon checking my change, I noticed one coin was a Greek 10 cent coin.

A Greek Euro Coin.

I am not entirely sure this is what I wanted to see on Sunday.

Northern Sweetear

2010-05-03T09:36:00.005+02:00

This is what I recently found on one of my lunch breaks doing a breeding bird survey 150 kms south of Heidelberg: A pair of Northern Wheatears.

The scene: sweet

The female: sweet.

The male: sweet.

And then a Black Kite flew over: sweet.

The cast in alphabetical order:

Black Kite - Milvus migrans - Schwarzmilan [Black "Milan", a specific word comparable to the English Hawk, Buzzard etc.]

Northern Wheatear - Oenanthe oenanthe - Steinschmätzer [Stone chatterer]

My Scope: Boon and Bane

2010-04-28T12:15:00.009+02:00

I have a scope for looking at birds.
My scope and I share some wonderful birding memories and have gone united through the rotten and the glory.
For this I love it dearly, yet it sometimes appears to be one of my most bizarre birding obstacles.
Why?

Because it keeps me from digiscoping.

You see, back in the late 1990s, my good old original scope - my first scope ever - broke down and died. I was a birder without a scope and thus as helpless as a fish on dry land without a bicycle.
Luckily, these were my days in Africa, and a friend from Germany came to visit me in Namibia for a little birding trip of 5 weeks, which was to take us from central Namibia (the Brandberg being our northern-most destination) all the way down to the Cape of Good Hope and back.
As we were going in my private, personal, wonderful Toyota Hilux, there was no need and cost for car rental, and to show his gratitude materialistically, he decided to help me out of my scopeless misery by bringing with him and giving me as a gift an old scope he got from a friend who didn't need it anymore, which will bring this awfully long sentence to an end and we can all take a moment to rest.

Okay. So he brought this scope along, which was an old Asiola that had been manufactured in the German Democratic Republic, likely sometime during the 1960s, making it older than even myself.
However, a free scope is a scope and is better than no scope.
I was very happy to receive it.

Here you can see the scope during a recent heavy duty mission, scanning the fields south of Leimen for anything that might (still) live.

Here is the proof of it being from the GDR (in German: DDR), and that means it's old. However, you can also see who made it:

Carl Zeiss Jena.
Yes, folks, I own a Zeiss scope.

And frankly, those lenses made by Carl Zeiss Jena (the East German branch during the times of there being two Germanies) were back then and still are today amazing!

Seriously, they still rival the best modern lenses. I have frequently compared the sharpness of my scope to other, more modern scopes and have found that only the high-end brands like Swarovski, modern Zeiss, and Leica can match the old Carl Zeiss Jena lenses. Other brands found in the middle section of the price and quality range - like Optolyth - don't stand a fraction of a chance.

Sounds good?
Well, it is!
However, my trusty old Asiola has one major disadvantage: its teensy tiny diametre of the eye piece. Look at it, it is pathetic.

Not only does this mean I had to get used to (and train my eyes for) handling and looking through this scope.
[Whenever other birders with modern scopes look through it, they are downright appalled - until I will describe subtle features on a distant bird that they can't even see. I mean the bird, not to mention said features.]
It also means that it is nearly impossible to line up that eye piece with a digital camera for digiscoping. The field of view is just way too small.
This here is a rather fine example of the best I can do at middle range (the starling was around 50 m away). At long range, there is no reason for even bothering to consider digiscoping.

And you see, this is my dilemma, my scope bane:
As a birder, I long for a scope that will allow for digiscoping. I sometimes feel like being stuck and lost in the 20th century and would consider this - apart from a notorious lack of time - to be my biggest birding obstacle.
However, having such a nice and brilliant scope, I would not be able to settle for a medium-priced, medium-quality scope. I would only accept to swap my scope for a modern Swaro.
And as a family man, that's just way beyond my wildest financial dreams.

So I am stuck.
I really need to find next week's winning lottery ticket.
Maybe I'll scope it out?

The cast in alphabetical order

Starling - Sturnus vulgaris - Star [Starling - the German word "star" does not mean what it means in English, with a star as in "star dust" being called "Stern" in German, yet I suspect that possibly the German "Star" could have its origin in the bird's tiny white "stars" on a black, nightly sky (rest of the bird's plumage). However, I don't know.]

Suicidal Kitteh

2010-04-28T12:11:00.004+02:00

... thinks life is pain

Happy Birthday

2010-04-26T11:36:00.004+02:00

Happy Birthday, John James Audubon!

And ... "La Forest"?
Who knew?!

Mystery Turtles on Birder Hyde

2010-04-21T10:35:00.002+02:00

I have found two released (former) pet turtles here in Germany yesterday, and have no idea what species they both belong to (two different species). My guess is that they are from North America, so any herper reading this might be interested in following this link and leaving a comment or two.

A short Appreciation of the Eurasian Magpie

2010-04-19T13:19:00.011+02:00

I recently saw a stunning image of a Eurasian Magpie on the Internet (but sadly forgot to memorize or save the link), and the title of the image was something like

Eurasian Magpie - the Northern Hemisphere's Bird of Paradise

I couldn't agree more.

The Magpie is a common breeder throughout Germany, but is mostly confined to settlements. It is rather unusual to find a breeding pair out in the fields or forest edges, and I actually cannot recall even finding a single nest in the countryside - or rather couldn't recall until recently.

Within the cities, Magpies prefer nesting in high trees and the main factor influencing their breeding sites seems to be the height of the tree (the higher the merrier), not the species, degree of disturbance (by city noise, traffic, etc.), and also not the location (in gardens, alleys, etc.).

In Leimen, all things birds & birding are different, of course.

There are barely any high trees within the city limits (well, legally it's a city, but really it is not), and as a consequence, Magpies are a comparatively scarce sight.

However, and quite surprisingly so, there are quite a few Magpie pairs breeding within the roughly 1 km² of open fields and hedgerows to the south of Leimen (commonly known as the Boredom Flats and faaaamous for being the birding haunts of yours truly), and there it is one of the most conspicuous bird species.

Well, the latter sentence might better be re-phrased: There it is one of the only - few - bird species to occur.

The lack of competition is likely what had me find a whole new appreciation of the Magpie, but this is not undeserving. It is indeed one of the most striking species in Europe (or wherever it roams), and a species often neglected by birders for lack of scarcity. This is a sorry fate it shares with the Eurasian Starling, the Mallard and the House Sparrow, amongst others. But this post is dedicated to the Magpie, and thus without further ado, here are a few images taken during my recent stroller expeditions.

I hope you do enjoy them as much as I enjoy seeing Magpies. I know - I need a better camera.

Mission Accomplished

2010-04-19T12:00:00.006+02:00

Two years and four months after the start of the project I can officially and loudly exclaim in pride that the task is achieved, the mission is accomplished and my son is now officially a
BIRDER!

Well, I had suspected it for quite a while before the last weekend, and there were hints and hopes in his behaviour - like the intent listening to a Blackbird in song or the pointing out of crows - but the last days finally yielded the definite proof after I conducted a little field experiment.

We had just started out on our usual stroller tour with the aim to squeeze at least some common migrants out of the area known as the Boredom Flats south of Leimen (possibly more my intention than my son's) and to run around as much as possible, throw as many stones in as many puddles as possible with the largest possible splash, and find the steepest slope to negotiate with a training bike - repeatedly (possibly more my son's than my ideals of a good Sunday walk) .
Anyway, whatever our respective intentions might have been, we suddenly spotted these two birds in someone's front yard, both not more than 5 metres away from us:
To the left a fine male Eurasian Blackbird (called "Amsel" = Ouzle in German), and to the right a Wood Pigeon (called Ringeltaube = Ringed Pigeon in German).

This, I decided as I immediately recognized the scientific potential of the situation, was going to be the test set-up to see if he had actually learned by heart any of the bird species's names I had told him over the last few months.

So, here is the course of the experiment:

Father: "Where is the pigeon?"
Son: [points to the right] "There!"

Father: "Where is the Blackbird?"
Son: [points to the left] "There!"

Father: "Where is the pigeon?"
Son: [points to the right] "There!"

Father: "Where is the pigeon?"
Son: [points to the right] "There!"

Father: "Where is the Blackbird?"
Son: [points to the left] "There!"

etc.

Notice my cunning approach as I didn't ask alternating but irregularly, and he still got it right each time.

Now, the pigeon is not a specific name, it denominates a whole group of birds. This is something he knew and did for a long time, e. g. duckies, birdies, chickens, etc.
But the Eurasian Blackbird is a specific name for a species and one species only. And by pointing it out correctly time and time again, he identified the bird on a species level, and I would say the first identification of a bird is what clearly marks him as a definite BIRDER.

I should not forget to note that he has been pointing out "Amseln" (Eurasian Blackbirds) for many months now but all these situations included only this one species, so it wasn't clear if he had actually understood that I meant the black hop-arounds or if he just pointed out the next best bird he saw after my asking him. This time, however, the results were clear and definitive.

Can you spell P-R-I-D-E !??

Well ... Nate, and Corey, and Laurent, and Patrick.
Let's see what you've got.

The cast in alphabetical order
Eurasian Blackbird - Turdus merula - Amsel [Ouzle]
Wood Pigeon - Columba palumbus - Ringeltaube [Ringed Dove]

Springtime - Flingtime

2010-04-12T09:26:00.006+02:00

Yes, I have done it, I can't deny: I have betrayed you.
I have blogged away from my blog, strayed away from familiar ground built on trust and loyalty, and gone to the meadows on the other side of the fence (where the grass is invariably greener).

Go here to see what I have done and had to say.

Wheatear methadone

2010-04-09T13:24:00.011+02:00

Someone recently wrote that seeing a wheatear in spring was better than something entirely different. Of course I completely disagree - at least that's not the case as far as my private personal experiences go - but then I read on and found the following passages:

"...local patch-watchers have been out all weekend straining to find themselves the only passage migrant they're likely to see all spring on their dismal inland beats."

and

"Tom Logan, a patch-watcher from Croydon said 'I found a male Wheatear yesterday morning on the area of miserable industrial wasteland I like to think of as semi-arid upland habitat'."

This is when the shocking truth unveiled its crimson deathly cloak and looked me right in the eye:

That post's author is right - entirely and fully completely so!

At the Baltic coast, wheatears were the sorry passerine bunch on the barren fields that I only glanced over or nonchalantly looked at with pity after a full force day filled with 25+ species of waders (the shorebirds of North America), a multitude of huge raptors, and waterfowl in their bazillions. I guess I sometimes forgot to even write them down in my note book.

Then came the move to Leimen, a dismal inland location.

I have been here for two years now.
This translates to 2 spring and 2 fall migration periods.
I am not entirely sure, but I can only recall one or maybe two wheatears.
Not for each migration period, no.
In total.

This strikes me as sad.

However, I do get to see a species of passerine that will regularly roost and hop around on ploughed fields and ... you know ... semi-arid upland habitat, thus stepping in to fill the gap left by the lack of wheatears.

This is the Black Redstart, a species I have come to love dearly for its graciousness, and have therefore dubbed "Wheatear methadone".

Here are a few pictures from last weekend.

Vast expanses of semi-arid upland habitat (red arrow in case you missed it)

Female demonstrating cunning habitat use

Female surveying vastness of habitat on the wing

Male searching nearby prime rocky outcrop habitat for arthropods

The cast in alphabetical order

Black Redstart - Phoenicurus ochruros - Hausrotschwanz [House Redtail]
Northern Wheatear - Oenanthe oenanthe - Steinschmätzer [Stone chatterer ... sort of]

Spring - sprang - sproing, and what the f...lower?

2010-04-06T11:14:00.003+02:00

Spring is upon us here in Heidelberg and that can only mean one thing: more activity of yours truly on his alter ego blog, "Birder Hyde".

More specifically, I have another mystery bird for your valued entertainment, a danged Phyllo.

So if you feel the masochistic need for a bit of Phylloscopus ID, jump over to Birder Hyde and leave a comment.

Scream Treason !

2010-04-01T08:52:00.008+02:00

We have a traitor amongst our ranks, a person who has put his personal benefit above the Greater Good of bird and birder's welfare. He clearly must think that his act of severe treason will elevate him to the rank of an internationally well-known birder, as his field knowledge will obviously never suffice to achieve this aim of his.

I am talking about Corey F., of 10,000Birds.

You see, I had trusted him, and have done so once too often, which I regret severely now. He misused my trust and went public with one of the best-kept secrets of ornithological history, the European Treecreeper mystery.

When I learned about his intentions, I tried to convince him to abandon his endeavor in an email I wrote to him. It was of no use. He didn't even have the guts to cite me correctly, stating my "comment" was too long.

This, Corey F., is pure and sheer cowardice.

And as the secret is out now and the web is abuzz, I - as one of the Treecreeper Secret Keepers - may as well come forward with the entire story behind what is commonly referred to now as a "prank".
Here is the email I wrote to Corey F., in full length, uncensored and unaltered.
May your birding career rest in peace, Corey.

"Corey, I am not entirely sure you are fully aware of what you have done! My only hope is that 10,000Birds is too small a platform to make this go public any further than it already has, and I sincerely urge you to back out of this before more damage is done.

This "prank" has a very long and honorable history, and I think this needs to be respected. To emphasize my points, I'll give you a quick summary of the events.
You see, the "prank" (let's call it prank for now, even though it deserves a more respectable naming) started in Germany in 1820, which is 190 years ago, Corey. Please, this is a historic dimension I urge you - again - to respect! It was initially directed at the British ornithologists and only later evolved into the trans-Atlantic dimension we see today.

Back then, Christian Ludwig Brehm discovered that the Treecreeper of continental Europe shows not only sexual dimorphism in its plumage but that male and female Treecreepers also have distinct songs and vocalizations. Their reproduction strategy is comparable to e. g. the phalaropes in that the females also take a more active role in courtship. This difference in plumage and vocalizations is far less pronounced on the British Isles, likely as a result of genetic drift or other island-related factors.
Christian Ludwig Brehm immediately recognized the opportunity to use this against the British.

Well, I guess you'll need some historic background about the ornithological "community" of the Old World in the early 1800's to appreciate why he did this.

Back then, Germany was at the forefront of ornithological research worldwide. Those nations in the lead today, e. g. the British, were still largely in the hunter and gatherer state while the scientific standard in Germany was particularly high. Christian Ludwig Brehm for example was an "ordinary" man, not a professional scientist, yet he had the largest collection of bird skins in the world, numbering 15,000 specimens. More important still, those specimens were labelled and allowed for biogeographical and seasonal studies of birds and their variation. Most other collections of that time were simply very "showy", and no particular importance was given to the labelling. He also was the father of Alfred Edmund Brehm, who is to German ornithology what Audubon is to you and your hobby, and who must rate as one of the most popular and influential zoologists of his time worldwide.

I have now hopefully demonstrated to you how prestigious German ornithology was back then. In the first half of the 19th century however, the British ornithologists increased their knowledge and scientific expertise gradually and Brehm felt that the pioneering role of Germany was jeopardized by this development. Germany as a nation didn't exist back then, it was made up of numerous independent states, but a feeling of patriotism and unity was starting to emerge, and this patriotic trend (so to speak) made the newly arisen challenge of the British so unbearable to Brehm.

You have to understand all this, Corey, even if it might bore you at the moment.

So, thanks to the labelling of his specimens he discovered the sexual dimorphism in the Treecreeper and that this was less pronounced in Britain. To give German ornithology a permanent and unbreakable lead (to give them a "blocker" in modern twitching slang), he decided to "split" the Treecreeper and assign species rank to the two genders. More specifically, he scientifically described the female as the Short-toed Treecreeper and split it from the male, further stating that the "Short-toed Treecreeper" only occurs in western mainland Europe and not the British isles.

By doing this, he completely fooled the British. As the sexual dimorphism was far less pronounced on their territory, they had no means whatsoever to double-check his findings and thus had to accept the split as scientific fact without giving it too much consideration. Those British ornithologists who had the rare privilege of travelling through mainland Europe tried to investigate the situation but invariably failed to see through the "prank" as the differences are so subtle. Whenever a British ornithologist would notice that e.g. "Short-toed" and ordinary Treecreeper were attending to the same nest (as all bird parents are wont to do), a German ornithologist who was privy to the conspiracy would step in and state that individual variation was significant as well, that correct identification required substantial field experience which the British lacked due to there being only one form on their islands and that the Brit had therefore simply misidentified the birds.

As a consequence, the British got the clear impression that they weren't "advanced" enough yet to tackle such complex identification challenges and the superiority of German ornithology was saved and preserved for the time being.

During the course of the following decades, the "prank" gradually became more and more known in Germany and also amongst the British. This is not something you can cover up indefinitely, of course.

Then, however, things evolved miraculously. By the time the truth started to leak through, Britain had evolved into the Great British Empire and British pride and prejudice made it completely impossible for its ornithologists to acknowledge being fooled for so long. Therefore, the British became part of the conspiracy and promoted the "prank" further to the point we are at today: the "prank" is even maintained in the world's most modern and advanced field guide, written by a team of Irish, British and Swedish bird identification experts - who definitely knew what they were doing.

Of course, even today most birders in Europe and Britain aren't aware of the "prank" and readily identify and tick the two Treecreepers. Whenever I get a birding visitor from the USA or elsewhere, I always nonchalantly bring up the Treecreeper in a conversation. If the other birder is evidently not aware of the true situation, I'll always ask if they are missing one species. If that's the case, I'll either call the first Treecreeper we see their "lifer" or the one they already have - depending on whether they had bought me some decent beers the night before or not.

It is great, it is big fun, and even you, my dear Corey, fell for it easily when we met at the Baltic!

You might therefore reconsider your decision to uncover the "prank".This issue is bound to get very messy once discussed openly, a lot of high-profile birder careers are at stake and if the truth emerges, those - like you - who had been fooled so easily will look increasingly stupid.
And, Corey, this is not a threat but a warning: if you proceed further with this mad endeavour, you'll regret it. I know for a fact that influential US birders are involved, too. This means your birding career will definitely come to an end. Surely, you can still watch the House Sparrows and European Starlings at your Queens feeder and keep it all to yourself, but you will have no option whatsoever to proceed with a more open, public birder career - and you won't even have to bother ever reporting anything to a records committee.

You'll be deleted as a birder.

Therefore, I urge you even in your very own interest: do not post your article on the blog. You have been warned by a friend. "

He just wouldn't listen.

Important Question!

2010-03-31T10:17:00.004+02:00

I have a question that I kindly ask readers from Europe or with field experience on European raptors to answer in the comments:

Have you ever seen a Common Kestrel fly very, very high during migration? And if so: have you ever seen small parties or groups - 4, 7, 10,... - migrating together ?

I am talking about 500+ metres above the ground, so high that you could either only barely spot it with your unaided eyes - or - that you only accidentally discovered the bird waaay up high in the background of another soaring raptor/bird you were looking at with binoculars - or - in the middle of a kettle of soaring/migrating buzzards you check with your binoculars, so high the kestrel itself is not discernible by naked eye only?

I can't recall a single situation where this happened to me, but that could be old age or prolongued fatigue. Which is why the field experiences of others are important for me to find out.

The cast in alphabetical order:

Common Kestrel, Falco tinnunculus, Turmfalke [tower falcon]

You are doing it WRONG, WRONG, WRONG!

2010-03-30T11:52:00.001+02:00

* natural sausage casings; direct translation from German: natural guts. I don’t know about you, but I prefer not to be reminded by one metre high letters that the sausage casing I eat once held the stuff that makes a pigpen smell the way it does…

Another bird's name finally makes sense

2010-03-29T09:09:00.005+02:00

Bruce Bowman, of Bowman's Bird Stuff fame, has finally captured on film (as the old folks still call the process of taking a picture, digital or not) what was long suspected yet never proven, that the name "Sandhill Crane" can occasionally make sense:

Sandhill Cranes !

Introducing "The Cast in alphabetical order"

2010-03-22T12:27:00.005+01:00

Hilke of "One Jackdaw Birding" recently commented that she had trouble finding the bird species I mentioned in one of my posts in her German field guides as I only provided the English names.

This had me thinking, and even successfully so as I realized that she's got a significant point there:
Even though I blog in English, this is still a German bird blog (sometimes), so I really ought to also mention the German names in those posts that are about the birds of Germany, or more generally about European bird species.

Therefore, from this day on my blog posts (those with European content) will conclude with a list of the birds mentioned. Therein I will provide the English name, the scientific name, the German name and the English translation of the German name (as in this post of mine).

Alpine Eye Candy: Snowfinches in Austria

2010-03-17T15:48:00.016+01:00

Some may remember that I spent two weeks in Tirol (that's part of the Austrian Alps) last January.

On one of the finer days of this trip, I teamed up with Dale (or rather he took the risk of meeting me) to do some very fine birding after Dale was able to shake off his job duties Friday afternoon.

We drove up, up, up into the mountains to the small village of Kühtai, at a height of approximately 2,000 m above sea level (around 6,000 feet), for two reasons:

1) We were to attend the first international Austrian-German bird blogger convention.

It turned out to be the most successful bird blogger convention ever, anywhere, as definitely 100% of all the bird bloggers of Germany and Austria attended. A picture of the entire delegation (the complete German and Austrian bird blogger scene) and a few more details can be found here (yes, I had a good reason for looking that tired - check the comments there).

2) Dale wanted me to see Snowfinches. And I wanted me to see Snowfinches just as bad.

Snowfinches are a species of birds related to Sparrows of the Old World kind (yes, North America, rub it in some: here, we have some issues with common names not meeting taxonomic standards, too), and they occur up, up, up, in the highest mountains of Europe and central Asia. To give you a rough idea how much up I am talking about: they move down quite some ways in winter, and we were there in winter, and we were up at 2,000 m above sea level.

That's up.

I had seen Snowfinches twice before in the Alps, once in July or August of 1987 when a handful of birds quickly flew away from me somewhere around Switzerland's Matterhorn, and in February (or January?) of 1997 in the German Allgäu, where a small flock of around 5 birds would regularly fly away from me whenever I turned up at the peak of the Fellhorn during a week's trip there.

Yes, I wanted some better looks.

The first Snowfinch we saw at Kühtai ... er ... kind of flew away from me, so it seems it's some sort of a tradition thing. But then a few birds landed at a feeder nearby, and then more and more birds showed up, and then I got some amazing looks at the birds sitting, and then hopping, and then flying. Yes, away from me again, but also towards me, around me, and above me. Not below me, but one always ought to leave out one thing in order to have a reason for coming back, so I was fine with that.

And then I took some pictures:

A small group sitting amidst empty sunflower seeds on the roof of a ski-lift station

"We need to talk."

The marching bird.
I've never seen birds with such determined walking gaits. Not as goofy as the Ovenbird, but surely with a comparable mindset.

Best ... Feeder Bird ... Ever!

The Underdogs' feeding frenzy below the feeder.

And now the Eye Candy: the flock in flight.

We were there on a cloudy day, and the sky was as pale and uniformly white as the snow on the surrounding mountain slopes.

In theory this is bad. And it might be bad if you are trying to enjoy 9,999 of the world's 10,000 bird species.

But for viewing Snowfinches, this is perfect weather.

Against a white sky (or snow) the white in the birds' wings and tails merges in perfectly with the background and the Snowfinch has thus one of the most peculiar flight silhouettes I have ever seen (well, have ever partially not seen).

The following two heavily cropped images may convey part of it, but it is so astounding it needs to be seen in life to be appreciated.

Such marvelous avian wonders.

So many names in the names

2010-03-10T00:10:00.001+01:00

The following post was written quite some time ago but then got lost in the archives, half finished and half forgotten, until I stumbled upon this particular and peculiar post on Nate's incomparable Drinking Bird blog.

Bird names.
Oh, some might remember while others had hoped to forget, but this is a topic I am very fond of. I'll need to add tags to my posts one of these days - and this is not the one of the lot - but I can recall three posts on the subject (here, here, and here), with a few more surely buried in the archives.

Nate, inspired by a flaming and brilliant email from Ted Floyd (I'll have a lot of good to say about him soon) to a bird forum, writes about honorific names.
Well, I was about to look it up, but then quickly deduced that this had to mean bird species that were named in honour of a certain person by naming it after that certain person.

And as a matter of fact, this is something I had not failed to notice shortly after setting foot on North American soil for the first time in 1987.
I had bought myself a sweet little field guide - actually I had three, Peterson, the Golden Field guide and a third one whose name I can't recall, with photos instead of drawings.
Anyway, so I was trying to memorize the birds, their names and identification and struggled, because so many names were characterized by names. I'll let my comment to Nate's post do the fine tuning:
"... It is already difficult enough for a European birder to learn the identification of a few “difficult” bird species by heart before he visits North America, but to memorize in advance which warbler is from Connecticut, Kentucky, Tennessee, Nashville, Cape May, or is the sole property of Swainson, Townsend, Virginia (Virginia who?), Kirtland, MacGillivray, or Wilson, is a near impossibility, especially as the visiting birder has likely never been to any of these places, might have no idea where they are as he’s visiting Point Pelee in Ontario on his first trip to the continent, and has certainly never been introduced to the owners of the birds, let alone had a conversation with them. ..."

So quite a while ago, I started flipping through the pages of my trusty ol' Sibley and actually counted the birds named after names.

The result was impressive, as can be seen by the list at the end of this post. I am fairly sure the list is incomplete, but nevertheless:
The list contains 69 different persons, and 89 bird species are named after a person, which is roughly 11% of the bird species regularly found in North America. However, I should not fail to mention that the number of persons is likely larger than 69 as I have (for reasons of simplicity and because I just didn't want to freakin' google all the 89 honorific bird names) attributed all the Wilsons and Clarks etc. to the same person. I am fairly certain however that the two Clark birds (grebe and nutcracker) are named after two different Clarks and that this will likely be the case for a few more names.

And these are only the honorific bird names that contain a person's name. How about geographic names that honour or mention (or whatever it is that pleases) landscape structures or geographic entities, which in my honest opinion also fall into the same category?

Oh dear!

If we take geographic references and names of landscape elements into account as well, the number of birds named after a name increases by roughly 105 species to at total of at least 204 species or 25% of all the bird species of North America.

You doubt that figure?
If in doubt, think it out...

1. All the "Eastern"s and "Western"s and "Northern"s like Eastern Kingbird, Western Grebe, Northern Shrike, ...
Seriously, they may seem to make sense, but in reality they mostly don't. A few examples:
The "Northern" in "Beardless-Tyrannulet might make sense if you live somewhere in Mesoamerica but for citizens of the USA or Canada, it's a joke. And look at Texas recently, where birders were able to see a Northern Wheatear (a vagrant from the far North) and a Northern Jacana (a vagrant from the far South) at the very same time.
And last but not least, just picture Clare up at Arctic Bay. Northern Cardinal? Well, he must be chuckling all the way through his Sibley...

2. All the states and cities, e.g. California Gnatcatcher, Kentucky Warbler, Connecticut Warbler, California Gull, Florida Jay, Carolina Parakeet (oh dear), Baltimore Oriole, Virginia Rail, Savannah Sparrow, ...
All you have to do is ask birders in Connecticut if they have the namesake's warbler on their state list and you'll have to agree that it's all a bit less then perfect.

3. All the geographic areas: South-Hills Crossbill, Mississippi Kite, Gunnison Sage-Grouse, Laysan Albatross, ...

Ha! Look, while in St. Louis I never saw Mississippi Kites anywhere near the Mississippi, they were all in residential areas. The hawk might as well be called "University City Kite" if it was up to me.

And last but certainly not least, yes, you know it applies, no matter how much you may think it is unfair:

4. All the Americans: American Robin, American Crow, American Goldfinch, American Black Duck, ...
I am sorry but I just don't think that bird names were meant to sound patriotic, especially as American bird names just mimic European species that aren't even closely related to them, and I frankly feel the American Tree Sparrow and the likes deserves better.

Yet, worst of all:
5. All the Europeans or rather Eurasians: European Starling, European Tree Sparrow, etc.
Apparently, being invasive ecologically just wasn't enough.

Now, if you still disbelieve that 1 out of 4 species in North America is named after a name, go ahead: flip through your Sibley, page by page, and see for yourself.
I've been there, I've done that, and while the results were fun, the process wasn't particularly so.
I'll now leave you with the list of North American honorific bird names, the birds that were named after persons. It's a long, long list...

But rejoice: African birders must surely be worse off, but I am just not prepared to flip through my entire SASOL just yet...

Honorific Bird Names of North America

Abert (1): Towhee
Allen (1): Hummingbird
Anna (1): Hummingbird
Audubon (3): Shearwater, Oriole, Warbler
Bachman (2): Sparrow, Warbler
Baird (2): Sandpiper, sparrow
Barrow (1): Goldeneye
Bell (1): Vireo
Bendire (1): Thrasher
Bewick (1): Wren
Bicknell (1): Thrush
Bonaparte (1): Gull
Botteri (1): Sparrow
Brandt (1): Cormorant
Brewer (2): Blackbird, Sparrow
Brewster (1): Warbler (hybrid)
Buller (1): Petrel
Bullock (1): Oriole
Cassin (5): Auklet, Kingbird, Vireo, Sparrow, Finch
Clark (2): Grebe, Nutcracker
Cook (1): Petrel
Cooper (1): Hawk
Cory (1). Petrel
Costa (1): Hummingbird
Couch (1): Kingbird
Cravieri (1): Murrelet
Fea (1): Petrel
Forster (1): Tern
Franklin (1): Gull
Gambel (1): Quail
Grace (1): Warbler
Harlan (1): Hawk
Harris (2): Hawk, Sparrow
Heermann (1): Gull
Henslow (1): Sparrow
Herald (1): Petrel
Hutton (1): Vireo
Kirtland (1): Warbler
Kittlitz (1): Murrelet
Krider (1): Hawk
La Sagra (1): Flycatcher
Lawrence (2): Warbler (hybrid), Goldfinch
Leach (1): Stormpetrel
LeConte (1): Sparrow
Lewis (1): Woodpecker
Lincoln (1): Sparrow
Lucy (1): Warbler
Manx (1): Petrel
McCown (1): Longspur
McGillivray (1): Warbler
McKay (1): Bunting
Murphy (1): Petrel
Nelson (2): Gull (hybrid), Sparrow
Nuttall (1): Woodpecker
Ross (2): Gull, Goose
Sabine (1): Gull
Say (1): Phoebe
Scott (1): Oriole
Smith (1): Longspur
Sprague (1): Pipit
Steller (2): Eider, Jay
Swainson (3): Hawk, Thrush, Warbler
Thayer (1): Gull
Townsend (2): Solitaire, Warbler
Traill (1): Flycatcher (pre-split)
Vaux (1): Swift
Virginia (1): Warbler
Wilson (3): Stormpetrel, Plover, Warbler
Xantus (1): Murrelet

Thrush Saturation Saturday

2010-03-08T12:49:00.023+01:00

As every week has begun since the beginning of time, I went to visit the Best Bird of the Weekend post on 10,000Birds this Monday morning.
The problem is - as it is with every Monday morning visit since the beginning of time - that I seem to be the most trigger-happy commenting birder from the Olde Europe to do so, and as I am 6 to 10 hours ahead of North America the comments section is usually empty and I get to not read anything but write the first comment instead.
If I have something, or rather anything, to tell - a basic requirement only rarely met by myself not since the beginning of time but since moving away from the Baltic to shabby industrialized, built-up and crowded yet Central Park & Jamaica Bayless Heidelberg.
Not so this time, and after telling the world who wasn't willing to know what I wanted it to know on 10,000Birds, I found myself wondering why I didn't turn this comment into a post on my own blog.
So here we are now, not sure if being here was a smart decision in the first place but as we can always blame Monday morning, we might as well stay and see how things will develop.

I do realize that this blog of yours truly has been very rich in words recently and poor in pictures. Therefore, I'll just quickly copy and paste my aforementioned comment here and then follow up with the story in pictures.

What was your best bird of the weekend?
"I’ve had quite an interesting weekend around Leimen/Heidelberg, on my usual stroller stomping ground. We had a sudden re-emergence of winter Friday night with approximately 10 cm (4 inches) of snow, extremely unusual for March.
A lot of migrant songbirds in the surrounding mountains of the Odenwald got caught in this mess and decided to quickly dash down into the warmer valley of the Rhine. On early Saturday, during cloudy conditions and occasional flurries of snow, I watched a constant stream of small songbird groups making their way west, mostly thrushes (5 Turdus species, sadly no Ring Ouzle though) but also a few skylarks and - rarest of all - a Wood Lark. During the afternoon, conditions were better with blue skies and sun, but the entire landscape except for the roads and paths was still covered in snow.
Along my stroller route, I encountered more than 50 song thrushes searching for snacks right beside the road. This is great as I’d normally be happy to see more than 2!
On Sunday, the entire show was over with just 8 song thrushes during the morning walk and only 1 in the afternoon.

So, I guess Song Thrush, despite being a very common bird, deserves to take the cake as best bird of the weekend.
However, I’ve also had a fabulous observation of a Common Buzzard and found the nest of a Long-tailed Tit. The latter is good to know in case a certain birder from New York shows up with vendetta on his mind…"

This is not what one expects to be greeted by upon leaving their apartment in southern Germany around the middle of March, but it certainly wasn't enough to deter me from my plans of going for a stroller walk with my son - weekend quality time is weekend quality time and always will be weekend quality time until the end of time. According to this post, New Yorkers would have died left, right, and centre in such a "blizzard" just by looking out of their apartment windows, but Leimen is not New York. Definitely and clearly not.

I will freely admit there were times during the walk when I questioned my decision to just ignore the snow and literally push on.

Especially as the landscape did not specifically hold out the promise of many birds.

... of any birds.

This Great Spotted Woodpecker only gave its presence away by its pertinent scolding. No, I did not mean to write "impertinent".

Looking at the state of its habitat, I can't deny I had sympathy for the old grump, despite being of a more sunny inclination myself even on winter days in March. There was clearly spring in the air, okay? Even if there weren't any gulls around to set (purely potential) doubters right. Yeah, right!

And yes, the tiny spot up there, that's it. No, not spring. I mean the woodpecker.

Unlike the weather and conditions on ground and tree, the sky was on fire. Apparently the weather was even worse in the surrounding mountains of the Odenwald and was actively pushing migrant songbirds down into the Rhine valley. Well, it might not have been pushing them actively, but if ever there were songbirds on a mission to get from somewhere to somewhere else and get there fast, it was last Saturday and it was around Leimen. The majority of the fugitives were thrushes, mostly Fieldfares as in the picture above, but with plenty of Song Thrushes mixed in, a few Blackbirds, an odd Mistle Thrush or two and even at least one Redwing.

Stupid Fieldfares, mistaking Leimen for Lisbon and coming down to roost.

This all happened before the high noon nap of my son. However, dad's weekend quality time doesn't end there, it goes on until bedtime and specifically includes an extensive afternoon stroller tour as well. And sure enough, times had changed from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., as seen in the two pictures below. The small and lovely flurry of snow .... ahem, I mean the ferocious and totally deadly blizzard of the millennium, for potential New Yorkers reading this, had ceased to shed its white shroud over the landscape and a ricocheting spring had managed to at least reclaim the roadsides.

This is Thrush Heaven, South Central.

Suddenly, there was grass! And boy, were the thrushes happy to see it. The grassy sides of the roads were literally covered in thrushes, mostly Song Thrushes with over 50 recorded where I'd normally be happy to encounter two during migrational days of excellence, but there were also a few Eurasian Blackbirds and a single Fieldfare who had lingered long enough to notice that those Fieldfares pushing on towards Lisbon were indeed the stupid ones...

In the above pictures, you can see a Blackbird with three Song Thrushes and three Song Thrushes with no Blackbird. The second picture may help you in figuring out which is which in the picture on top. Kidding. Look, the thrush isn't called "BLACKbird" for nothing, right?

Same game again: two Song Thrushes (identical bird) and a Eurasian Blackbird. I love Catharus thrushes. That's why I love the Song Thrush. The Song Thrush is not a Catharus thrush. But it reminds me of one, and beggars can't be chosers. Particularly those beggars residing in the moldy hell of Leimen. This is why even Blackbirds are more than fine, too.

Aaaand, the grand finale of our little crash course to Thrush Identification! Yupp, Song Thrush and Blackbird. Note the differences in size and how utterly unimportant this is as a field mark.

But of course there were other species as well:

Eurasian Tree Sparrows searching the road for food. Notice the right bird hopping to attract earthworms. This is very unwise as a) Tree Sparrows don't feed on earthworms b) only thrushes are supposed to be doing this and c) it's completely pointless on a tarred road anyway.

I highly recommend looking at Tree Sparrows head-on. Few birds look that sharp when seen head-on. With the possible exception of the Wrybill.

Prime first-wave male Chaffinch, humiliated by having to feed in the mud. Thankfully, the females and male whippersnappers are still somewhere out of sight in southern France and Italy, busy avoiding lime-twigs.

And all this glory was brought to you courtesy of the towering heights of the frightening Odenwald. Migrant Songbirds, heed the warning: don't go there! Fly over Leimen instead.

My weekend stroller schedule is Saturday and Sunday, 09:00 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. and 3 p.m. to 05:30 p.m. or by appointment in case of true vagrancy.

See you there!

Looking back at birding in the 0's, part 2

2010-02-16T16:10:00.005+01:00

2005

This was a sweet year, due to two good news.
The first of the two good news came early in winter - it must have still been January or February - and actually started with what was a bit of bad news really: someone approached the company I was working for (a private consulting company specializing in environmental laws and impact assessments) because he planned to construct a fricking golf course right inside the potential home range of a known pair of Lesser-spotted Eagles.
European readers may know what this means, North American readers may not, so I’ll try to come up with an analogue. It’s not quite as severe as planning a parking lot on the last remnants of Louisiana’s Singer Tract in the 1940ies, but it also isn't that far away from it severity-wise. We have less than 100 pairs of the eagles left in Germany and they are not fairing too well.
Okay? So it’s bad, and it was our job to see if it was possible at all under German nature conservation law – I am not going to say it was our job to make it possible although that’s really what it was all about.
Well, the obvious thing to do was map the exact territory use of the eagles within the usual 3-km diameter around their nest and hope that by lucky chance and coincidence they would not be using the one field the golf course was planned on.
And the mapping of the eagles became a project of mine, which meant I was to patrol the entire potential home range for 10 days between April and September, scanning for the eagles or any other conservation-relevant bird species, mapping their movements, monitoring their behaviour and just have a really, really good time doing so.

The second of two good news had to do with my then-girlfriend-now-wife nearing the completion of her PhD and getting an invitation to spend three months at a lab in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Of course she asked me to accompany her for as long as possible and I was able to take a whole month off work. By circumstances beyond my control, the first month of her internship - where I was to come along and bird, err, help her organizing stuff and get settled - just so happened to be May.

May.
Around the Great Lakes.
Yes, May.
I didn’t really mind that a lot.

I’ll continue with my Michigan spring birding extravaganza and get back to the eagles afterwards because the best birding there was in August anyway.
Okay, so it was May around the Great Lakes and boy, did I have a good time.
First, my wife and I travelled to New York City for a week of sightseeing and a very tiny bit of birding, then she was to start working and I went to visit Point Pelee, Rondeau Provincial Park, the surroundings of Ann Arbor, the Sleeping Bear Dunes area and the eastern Upper Peninsular of Michigan.
Here is a short excerpt from the travel report’s introduction I wrote after getting back to Germany:

“This must have been one of the most enjoyable and successful birding trips of my life, not only in terms of species seen but also because most species were seen at very close range. And there are so many really beautiful species around it is hard to believe you are outside the tropics. Seeing a Northern Cardinal, a Yellow Warbler and a Blue Jay at close range within five minutes will probably bore the locals, but it is a breathtaking experience for anyone else. I recorded a total of 230 species, most of which were actually seen (which only means I did very badly on identifying them by sound alone). Amongst them were 36 species of wood-warblers (two of which – Prairie and Worm-eating - were only heard, but that still leaves 34 which I saw, and this apparently is a pretty good number compared to other trip reports I read) and 14 species of sparrows (not counting the Towhee and House Sparrows), including highlights such as brilliant views of Henslow’s, Le Conte’s and a beautiful Lark Sparrow.”

Other very noteworthy species (in my world) and good candidates for bird of the year were both American and Least Bittern actually seen, Sharp-tailed Grouse, Spruce Grouse, Sandhill Crane, Piping Plover (inland!), Upland Sandpiper, American Woodcock, Wilson’s Phalarope, Red-headed Woodpecker, Olive-sided Flycatcher, Plumbeous Vireo (yes, I know, but I never reported it), Cerulean Warbler, Prothonotary Warbler, Kirtland’s Warbler, Connecticut Warbler, Summer Tanager, Clay-coloured Sparrow, and Evening Grosbeak, just to name quite a few.

Now we quickly jump back to Germany, the meadows and fields surrounding a prime forest and the quest for the Lesser-spotted Eagles.
As if surveying for the eagles wasn’t already grand enough, the entire area turned out to be extraordinarily good for large birds, particularly raptors, and after informing local birders to this who repeatedly went there in the following years, we found that this might just be one of the most species-rich area for raptors in all of Germany (I kid you not). On my tours in August I would regularly see the following species of large, large birds:
Grey Heron, White Stork, Black Stork, White-tailed Eagle, Osprey, of course Lesser-spotted Eagles, Red and Black Kite, Marsh Harrier, both Hen and Montague’s Harrier were occasionally around although not breeding (in later years I even found a vagrant Pallid Harrier), tons of Common Buzzards (later in the year many Rough-legs as well and a few years later a vagrant Long-legged Buzzard was found by others), Honey Buzzard, Sparrowhawk, Goshawk, Common Kestrel, Hobby, (in later years and/or other seasons also Red-footed Falcon, Peregrine, and Merlin), and Common Cranes, both breeding and migrants.

Impressed?
Well, you’d better be!
This isn’t all, however.

The area is right next to the Baltic coast and the salt meadows of Karrendorf, where I spent two lunch breaks of an hour or so each on my two survey trips in August (you know, just getting a short raptor break to prevent overload). On these two short birding lunch breaks, I found:
Broad-billed Sandpiper, Red-necked Phalarope, Marsh Sandpiper, Great Snipe, and Pectoral Sandpiper.

Again, North American readers my not fully appreciate that list. Okay, here’s the translation:
It is like visiting Point Pelee (or Central Park for that matter) for no more than an hour twice in May and finding yourself (not twitching others’ sightings) Kirtland’s Warbler, Connecticut Warbler, Nelson’s Sparrow, Summer Tanager, and Western Tanager.
You do get the picture.
All these birds, from the raptors and storks to the shorebirds, are more than deserving to be named bird of the year.

And now, the drawing of the winner:
It was hard.
You see I had a fabulous time in North America, packed with amazing birds, and the birding in Germany was also extremely rewarding, with an almost equal amount of absolutely equally amazing birds.
Which of these to chose as bird of the year?

Well, I gave it an entire lot full of thought and am now convinced that the bird of the year just has to be the Henslow’s Sparrow.
Why?
Well, I don’t know, but I give you another excerpt from my travel report:

“YES, HENSLOW’S !!! This was one of the species I wanted to see the most. The precise reasons for this aren’t even clear to me today and I can’t put forward any rational arguments for enjoying Henslow’s so much. Surely it is a North American endemic that is difficult to find in general and it is declining over most of its range, but this is also the case with other species I encountered that didn’t even get me half as excited. Well, it all comes down to personal liking and that’s just what it was: I somehow desperately wanted to get good views of this chap!
And these I surely got.
Many thanks to Chartier and Ziarno for their excellent description of the species’ habitat in the Michigan guide. Without their guide and habitat description I would have certainly missed out on one of my most wanted species of the trip. On the way to one of the sites mentioned for Henslow’s in their guide (where by the way I also would have found it according to the Michigan email forum. What a book!), I stopped at a grassland beside the road that looked promising, switched off the engine and the first thing I heard was … a Field Sparrow to be honest, but the Henslow’s started singing just seconds afterwards and had me running to the patch of prairie like I was on drugs. I then stood on the edge of the small stretch of prairie for at least half an hour and only got brief views of flying birds that dropped into dense cover after what were at best a very few seconds. Without them singing constantly I would have not gone looking for them in that particular patch in the first place and I also would not have been able to put an ID on any of the small brown jobs that zoomed across the meadow.
Eventually, a bird started singing about 50 metres away from me on a high perch right on the edge of the grassy area and I knew instantly that this was my chance! Silently crawling on my belly I managed to approach the bird and finally enjoyed extremely brilliant views of it singing right in my face at what must have been less than 10 metres. Amazing when you can see the feathers on its throat vibrate in full song. What a beautiful species!!
I am also very proud to say that I didn’t set a single foot into its habitat (crawling along the edge of the prairie), hence not damaging anything (which is completely out of the question anyway, but I just thought I’d mention it) and that the bird singing in front of me also left because it wanted to have a word or two with its opponent on the other side of the field, not because of me watching it.
CHEERS, Michigan!”

Yupp, that sums it up nicely: Cheers Michigan!!

Not dipping on a Dipper

2010-02-03T09:57:00.021+01:00

As some of you (particularly those who regularly read Dale's excellent Discovering Alpine Birds) might know, I spent two weeks in January in and around Tirol.

The main reason of course was a ground breaking international event Dale's blogged about here (and that I will blog about at a later point in time if time herself, who is a river, will permit) but of course, while I was there and the family was with me, I thought that I might also try to get some birding done.

And yes, I did.

Well, I had visited the Alps before on a few occasions in the 1980ies and late 1990ies and was thus familiar with the very vast majority of its special birds, so there was no real rush to get lifers. However, I very much looked forward to re-connecting with a few enigmatic species I hadn't seen in a long, long time.

Amongst these species was the Eurasian Dipper.

The Dipper is a bird frequently found along mountainous streams and creeks (and therefore not a tricky bird to see or get), yet I had spent 12 years in the flatlands of northern Germany where it is but a rare visitor from Scandinavia, and one that had basically avoided my detection for the entire period there .

It was thus with great pleasure that I found a mountain creek with a lovely weir and heaps of boulders along its banks was running through our little holiday destination of Kiefersfelden, right on the German-Austrian border. And by a stroke of luck (aka a good and long nap of my son), I found myself searching said location on my first full day there, for the Dipper.
I will let the pictures do the telling in a few instances, and it will suffice to write that I found not one but five Dippers along the 1.5 kms of river I searched, although the first 5 minutes were spent in a state of anxiety when the weir, my expected hot spot, held only Mallards.

Shortly after the weir though is where this blog post really begins:

The weir where the Dipper wasn't at first - but was on later day's visits I won't blog about...

The river above the weir where the Dipper wasn't where the Dipper was at first - but wasn't on later day's visits I won't blog about (the weir is in the background)...

And here it is, the star of this post:

Dipppp...

...errrr!

The passerine diving machine - going...

... going ...

... gone - what an unexpected end to this series!

And it's back up again.

The claws of this species, by the way, must be amongst the world's sharpest. Because those rocks can be dippery when wet.

I had watched the Dipper for well over half an hour when I realized it got dark and that it was time to return home to the family.

Walking along the river bank back towards the weir, a strange and barely audible whispering caught my ear.

I stopped in my tracks.

There it was again, and this time I was able to locate it as coming from amongst the boulders underwater.

In tune with the waves' rushing and purling but clearly discernible against its acoustic background, there was a tiny, soft, and repeated "Who", and like Horton I bent down to investigate further.

To my amazement, I found a choir of caddisfly larvae had gathered on a small area of sand amongst the rocks where the current was subdued by their larval cases and the boulders sheltering them, and they sang a sad and mellow song that I will reproduce here to the best of my abilities and as I noted it out in the field, lying down in the snow by the river, and I will call their tune The Ballad of Jack The Dipper.

The Ballad of Jack the Dipper

Oh, the shark has pretty teeth, dear
And he shows them pearly white
Just a jackbill has The Dipper, dear
And he keeps it out of sight

When the shark bites with his teeth, dear
Scarlet billows start to spread
A white bib, though, wears The Dipper, dear
So there's not a trace of red

On the embankment...around sunset,
Lies a dead aquatic critter
Someone's diving 'round the river bed
Is the someone Jack the Dipper?

From a boulder in the river
A small pebble’s drooping down

Yes, it’s from a larva’s case, dear
Bet you Dipper's back in town

Makes you wonder if we owe one of literature's finest stories to Brecht & Weill spending one too many holidays at a creek in the Alps ...

Wayward Blogger

2010-01-14T16:26:00.004+01:00

I'll be off the blog again until the beginning of February, family holidays near the German Alps.
Let's hope for a Wallcreeper or two at the castle Neuschwanstein.

Here is something to keep you entertained:
The following picture was taken in North America. Which species is shown?

Cheers, I'll be missing you.

Admitting Defeat

2010-01-13T10:02:00.005+01:00

I have added Fraser's Birding Blog to my link list.

It was hard, really hard as I have mentioned here (and someone else who should really blog more frequently again has mentioned here).

The following series of pictures was the best I was able to do while being at the in-laws in Stralsund over the Christmas and New Year holidays (I have fully recovered, thank you).
These are Black-headed Gulls at dusk, and I solemnly declare defeat.

Southern Germany Today

2010-01-12T15:41:00.003+01:00

You know, I wonder if Copenhagen was such a failure simply because of lousy seasonal timing.

Somewhere down there is my foot, and it doesn't like it that way

Looking Back at Birding in the 0's - part 1

2010-01-04T13:02:00.006+01:00

I really don't want to go down in blogging history as the one boring maverick that didn't participate, so here they are: my Top 10 birds of the last decade.

I have however decided to twist the rules somewhat. This was deemed a necessity as the first decade of the new millennium took me to the North American Great Lakes in spring, and just naming the top 10 birds would likely have resulted in a list of 10 North American warblers.

Therefore, I have decided to do a little write-up of each year's birding highlights (mostly pertaining to birding trips I went on) and then choosing a Bird of the Year for each of the last decade's respective years.
Furthermore, I have decided to divide this post into several parts, and here is part 1 which covers the first half of the decade.

2000
The year 2000 was one of my power-birding years - the last one actually in a remarkable series that started in the late 1980ies.
The first few months of the year were spent in Greifswald where I finished my Masters thesis ("On the Ecology of the Mountain Zebra in southern Namibia") to become a biologist. It was a very stressful period and thus there was little time to go birding, but as it was a true milestone (possibly more so for me than the rest of the world) I was fine with that.
In July I flew back to Namibia for one last time, having spent 6 months there each in 1997/98 and 1999, to sell my stuff (which means sell my beloved Toyota Hilux) and say my farewells to the newly found friends, the best scenery in the world and the wildlife, too - but not without getting some serious birding done. Together with a friend from Germany, I went on a trip through the southern half of Namibia and the Cape province of South Africa in July/August and later went on some shorter trips to Etosha NP, Spitzkoppe, Swakopmund and the Waterberg Plateau. In October, finally, it was time to head back to Germany for good - back to Greifswald to start fighting for grants for a PhD project (which never materialized for me, the grants came half a year too late and a good friend of mine did the project instead).
I finished the year visiting my mother in Spain (she was spending the winter there), from the middle of December to the middle of January, and we did a "southern circuit" trip, from Valencia to Andalusia, Extremadura and back.

What was my bird of the year then?
Well, I thought long and hard about it but eventually decided that it was the Antarctic Fulmar I saw on a pelagic trip out of Cape Town on August 12th. We saw an incredible number of tube noses that day, almost 20 species and including 7 species of albatross, and the cloud of a few thousand albatrosses following a (not long-line) trawler was possibly the most awe-inspiring sight of my birding career. All these birds were amazing and I struggled hard to identify the one species that would symbolize the best birding day of my life. The Antarctic Fulmar was possibly the rarest of the birds we saw, certainly the most unexpected, but also the one I had told our guides I was particularly keen on seeing before the trip. And that's why it took the cake.

2001
The year 2001 was still filled with fine birding and a few trips, although the trips didn't quite match up with the time spent in southern Africa.
Birding around Greifswald was as great and exciting as it always was and always will be and I yet again scored more than 250 species around the city in the course of the year.
In late May/early June, I went on a short trip to Greece, although we did not visit any birding hot spots. Good birding, but not as good as it can get in Greece.
July and August saw me back in central Asia (Kazakhstan) for the third time on a faunistic trip organized by the University of Greifswald. Again, this was not a pure birding trip but it nevertheless turned out to be fabulous. We travelled from Almaty north to lake Saizan and back.
The bird of the year was seen at the end of this trip, on a small lake in the Tian-Shan mountains just south of Almaty (Corey, Dale and Sharon: if you are reading this, I am most definitely not trying to rub it in), where we found and watched a beautiful Ibisbill.
I started to work - in a real job, for the first time ever in a 9 to 5 fashion, only more like 7 to 7 - around September 15th.

2002
This was a very quiet year for birding as the job got very stressful. A notable and brilliant exception was a marvellous trip to New Zealand where I spent 3 weeks in April.
Stewart Island is the only place I've been to that could admittedly rival Namibia.
Obviously, the bird of the year 2002 had to be one of the New Zealand lifers, but which one?
Seeing two Black Stilts, one of the most critically endangered birds in the world, and actually having found them myself without any outside help or hint, was truly impressive, but as it was such a bitter-sweet experience (I'd really prefer each species of bird to be so common that I'd be able to call it a trash bird) it didn't quite make it to position No. 1.
Surely, spending half an hour walking right next to a foraging Kiwi in bright daylight without the bird giving me as much as a casual glance would qualify as the observation of the year, if not the decade, but the one bird species that really hit me hard in the heart was a common New Zealand endemic, the New Zealand Fantail. That is my bird of the year 2002.
Why would I choose such a common bird that's easily seen over the Kiwi, a bird most Kiwis haven't even seen, or an albatross, or a penguin, or the Kea?
This is hard to put in words, but the Fantail's subtle yet beautiful colouration, its inquisitiveness and its movements - including its fanning of the tail - had an effect on me that's comparable to the Sandman's star dust, only it didn't make me tired. Instead, it magically conveyed an amazing joy of life, a feeling that life is beautiful and meant to be lived to the fullest. And that was very remarkable.

2003
This is the year the birding really slowed down. Again, the job was so stressful that there was little time for birding. In addition to that, I moved from the German birding-Mecca Greifswald (most Germans aren't aware of this though) to Stralsund (where I worked).
Stralsund is also nice, but it doesn't have a fraction of the birding potential Greifswald has and thus there was literally NO birding after work.
I went on two short (a week each) trips, one in April to the Mediterranean island Majorca and another one in September to Tenerife and Gomera, two of the Canary Islands.
The Majorca trip was nice but not overly so, especially as most of the island's birds can (and were) also seen on mainland Spain, although seeing the endemic Sylvia-warbler (can't think of its name now) was nice.
Therefore, the bird of the year was seen on Tenerife/Gomera, where I saw all of the occurring Canarian Island endemics (the chat only occurs on Fuerteventura where we didn't go).
Which one to choose?
Well, I did see some very nice sea birds from the ferry between Tenerife and Gomera, and seeing my first (and so far only) Great Shearwater was very impressive. I temporarily thought I would choose the Flying Fish that got spooked by the ferry's bow (you know, sort of birds in the broadest sense) and indeed this was possibly one of my most memorable natural history moments of the decade (I never realized they'd glide that far), but the price goes to a Laurel Pigeon that perched beautifully on a dead branch below a breath-taking viewpoint in the mountains of Gomera.

2004
Definitely the low-point year of my birding life. Nothing happened except some job-related nice Baltic birding, but nothing too far out of the ordinary.
This is one of the very few years of my life in which I did not see a single lifer (with the other ones being 2008 and 2009 - I really, really could do with a cool birding trip).
In September, I went on a second trip to Majorca where the birding was very nice again, just not mind-blowing. As I went with my soon-to-be-wife, a non-birder, and wasn't expecting any lifers or really rare birds, I took the birding slow and easy and enjoyed sitting on the patio of coastal pubs drinking espresso and fresh orange juice.
You know, birding is nice, but fresh espresso in a comfy chair overlooking the Mediterranean can be quite nice, too.
The nicest birds were possibly the Eleonora's Falcons falcons that offered superb views, but as the bird species of the year, I eventually chose the Eurasian Black Vultures.
They are just truly and astonishingly, impressively large birds.

This was the first half of the last decade. Come back soon to see just how well things picked up in 2005, a year that once again was filled with birder's joy and - yes, drool drool - lifers!

Cheers and a happy and birdy year 2010!

No words, just awe

2009-12-08T13:50:00.001+01:00

Sometimes I wonder why I even bother picking up a camera.

This is one of these times, with a hat-tip to Dale.

Fighting the loss of Biodiversity - the UK way

2009-12-04T09:26:00.006+01:00

We all know that apart from climate change and the continued production and consumption of butterfinger chocolate bars, the loss of biodiversity is one of the most severe crises the world is facing at the moment.
Luckily, this is not the age of leaning back passively in a wing chair, eating butterfinger and watching things go to waste - this is the age of fighting back, right?

Right?

Anyway...

Of course the main mode of countering species loss is to save species from extinction, but at the current rate bird populations are dropping all around us, that sure ain't enough. More needs to be done to supplement our conservation efforts:
If we lose species after species yet want to maintain our current species diversity, heck , we just need to make new species.
And - as so often when it comes to bird conservation or new music genres - the UK has taken a lead in creating new species, with a simple means:

BIRD FEEDERS

Here are the links, with a tip of the hat to Laurent:

LiveScience Article

Not Rocket Science Blog post

The LiveScience article features an interview with Martin Schaefer who participated in the research that is due to be published soon (see publications list on his site).

Now, on a personal note it might be nice for you to know - it sure feels nice for me to tell you, so there you have it - that Martin Schaefer is a very good old friend of mine and an amazing birder as well. He is one of those friends I haven't really seen in many, many years as we both traveled around the globe far too frequently to stay in constant contact and news exchange, but of all the people I have met in my life, he is amongst the ones I felt closest to.
Okay, sentimental off for now, normal blogging continues.

So apparently the providing of winter food has split the Blackcap in half.
Martin - being the thorough scientist he is - maintains doubts whether the two populations will evolve into different species:
He says human habits of feeding birds will likely change over the time that would be necessary, and we are still talking about quite some 1,000+ years, so the migration routes and segregating behaviour of the UK winter birds might come to an end sometime.

I say that he is generally right, but this is a problem that can be fixed easily. Nature conservation bodies simply have to promote the development of feeders that - once filled - will supply Blackcaps for the next few millennia to come, independent of changes in human attitudes.
I am hopeful that very soon, feeding wintering Blackcaps in the UK won't look like this anymore but more like this, and it will be a visible token of today's society's commitment to fight biodiversity loss and take a pro-active approach towards evolution.

And that sure is good to know.

Happy Thanksgiving

2009-11-26T09:30:00.006+01:00

If Benjamin Frankling had had things his way, you'd now be eating Bald Eagles instead of Turkeys.

And refrain from saying you're eating Turkey on Thanksgiving, the Turks might take offence!

I am where you least expect it...

2009-11-25T14:08:00.001+01:00

... over at Birder Hyde with a new post on some mysterious Gavia.

Is it GISS, or what?!

2009-11-23T15:12:00.013+01:00

There's an interesting post (with tons of golden comments) over at the Drinking Bird, to which this post is some sort of follow-up, or rather the results of a few follies ("thoughts" - remember?) of mine that were sparked by the post and its comments.

Am I a GISS birder or am I not?

First, I think it is necessary to define GISS. It means General Impression of Size and Shape, and if someone identifies a bird by GISS, they only go for the bird's appearance, not really its field marks.

Now, of course I can see that one would be able to identify birds of obvious size and shape by these traits alone, say a Limpkin or a Great Horned Owl or an American Robin where other Turdus - thrushes don't occur, but I have a nagging feeling that most observations we do "from the hip" and thus attribute to GISS-identification actually are not GISS after all but something completely different.

An example should do nicely to get my point across:

We spot movement on the ground below a barren winter bush, raise our binoculars and immediately identify the bird as a White-throated Sparrow.
Asked a few moments later by what field marks we identify it, we just respond with a shrug of our shoulders, stating that it was just obvious the moment we looked at it.

Was that identification by GISS?

I think not.

I think this was just an extremely fast conversation between our eyes and our brain along the following lines:

Eyes: there's movement of a small brown bird on the ground.
Brain: check the back, is it patterned?

Eyes: yes, it is patterned in stripes and spots.
Brain: Sparrow! Check the head pattern.

Eyes: black and white stripes.
Brain: White-crowned or White-throated. Check throat.

Eyes: throat is white.
Brain: It's a White-throated. Mouth: YAWN

Mouth: YAWN

Of course, the last bit that involves the mouth would be completely different if our little scene would take place inside a visiting birder from overseas. Face it, North America: the White-throated Sparrow is amongst your finest birds, however common it may be.

This conversation can take as little as a fraction of a second, somewhat depending on our activities the night before, and we may therefore be unaware of it.

My conclusion is that most identifications that are done real quick and are often attributed to GISS are indeed very fast conclusions drawn from checking the precise field marks that are necessary by actively scanning the bird's features. And this means they are made solely because of our knowledge and experience, which is why beginning birders usually suck at this until they've done a few years worth of birding.

Knowing immediately into what broad group a bird belongs and then knowing which parts of the bird to check for which field marks has got nothing to do with GISS identification, it is just plain old bird ID gone ultrasound.

Another difference between a more experienced birder and a novice that is somewhat related to GISS-ascribed identification is the ability to focus our concentration on an object we see, the ability to take a mental snap-shot.

Okay, example:
Show two test persons of varying birding experience a bird for just a second, a bird neither one has ever seen.
The more experienced will probably manage a reasonable description.
The novice will just be overwhelmed by the bird's many features and later have no idea whatsoever when asked to sketch it.

This ability is also vital when identifying birds very quickly: The expert's assessment of "Catharus, weak reddish spots on breast" (this will again not take longer than a fraction of a second or so) is more likely to lead to Veery than the novice's "oh my gosh! a brown bird, wait (minors may potentially read this), where did it go?" even if we give the latter birder an extra second.
Now, if that novice birder would stand besides the expert, having just seen the same bird hopping by so quickly, hearing him say "Veery" immediately, and then ask him how and why s/he knew so quickly, the expert's answer would probably be "You know, just the whole thing, it was obvious" and we would call that GISS ID. As in the first example, the point is that an identification made real fast (in the first example it took us only a split-second, in the second example the bird gave us only a split-second) is often attributed to GISS- Identification.

And as in the first example, I think it isn't.

So, here's my assessment: the fact that expert birders are able to identify birds amazingly quickly whereas beginners struggle is due to these two abilities:

a) they know immediately which areas of the bird to check for which field marks
b) they can make a mental snap-shot of a bird

Neither of these has anything to do with the assessment of the bird's general impression of size and shape, it is based on having learned the area's species potential by heart and having practised your eyes/brain coordination.

Having said that, I will now get back to the initial question of this post: am I a GISS birder or not?

Well, for the most part I am not.
I am someone who has spent prolonged periods of time in various places of the globe and within these regions, I simply have learned the species over time, know what they look like, know what to expect and what features to focus on. Within these regions, I will identify the very vast majority of the birds I see within less than a second. However, this to me in not bird ID by GISS or intuition, it is just bird ID routine.

GISS does play a certain role though:

There are a few groups of birds where the general impression of size and shape is important, and that is birds seen mostly over long distances.
I can usually identify flying raptors by their flight style and very general proportions.
I can usually identify jaegers and jaegermeisters at very long range by their impression of size and flight style - which I find easier than identifying them at short range - but this is usually where the identification bit of the GISS technique ends.

The most important aspect of GISS however is this:
In my approach to bird identification, GISS is used mostly not to tell me what a bird is but to tell me what it is not!
A mismatch between the general impression of size and shape and the features I see is what gets my adrenaline flowing as it means I am seeing something I should not be seeing, so it's got to be something special.
Whenever this happens, I start making notes or hopefully taking pictures to allow for a thorough analysis of the observation. Usually, a bird whose GISS is okay but whose plumage does not correspond will be an aberrant familiar bird, like a leucistic or worn or whatever shabby individual. Sometimes however, it can end up being quite a special bird (although this one was caged).

To conclude, I would say that I am mostly a birder with a significant amount of routine on his familiar stompin' grounds who uses GISS mostly to seek the unusual amongst the usual, and not to really identify a bird.

This should make the rarity committees rather happy.

The Splitting of Birds

2009-11-19T13:20:00.009+01:00

Taxonomy is an intricate, complex and often weird business that usually fills birders, or at least the keen listers amongst them, with no insignificant amount of joy nowadays, as taxonomy has more and more evolved into the Fine Art of Splitting Birds.

In other words, what was regarded as a single species with distinct subspecies or subpopulations in the past is now often re-evaluated as comprising two factual species.

If you've never seen any of the forms involved, you'll neutrally acknowledge the split.
If you've seen one of the two forms, it won't change anything which means no benefit but also no harm done.
If you've seen both forms, let the corks pop, you have an "arm-chair tick"!

However, we mustn't forget that all armchair-ticks come at a price, and that this price may seriously jeopardize our joy of watching birds. As a constant reminder, let us look at the recent taxonomic history of the Herring Gull, Larus argentatus:

Once upon a time, not so very long ago, all silvery-backed large white-headed and -tailed Gulls of the northern hemisphere were called Herring Gulls. The bird below, photographed on the Baltic Sea shores of Germany recently, is a fine example of this magnificent species.

Herring Gull during the Golden Age of the species

However, European researchers soon realized that the Mediterranean and central Asian populations were indeed not of the same species and the Herring Gull was split. We'll neglect the taxonomic fate of the Mediterranean and central Asian forms for now and focus on the remainder, the Herring Gull that was now confined to the shores of Northern Europe and large parts of North America. This bird, depicted below, was surely still majestic but had somehow lost a significant part of its former glamour.

The gull of former world dominion after losing the Mediterranean and central Asia

As if losing the lush dumps of the south hadn't already been a severe blow to the poor Herring Gull, more bad news came in form of a genetic comparison of the remaining populations in North America and the Old Europe: turns out both forms of what was presumed the same species aren't even each other's closest relative, so another splitting event was due and the Herring Gull lost a significant part of its kingdom again, confining it to the cold and often miserable northern part of Europe. The sorry remains of what was once a shining regent of an Empire can be seen below.

Crippled by taxonomy, a European Herring Gull would love to look at a brighter future ahead but fails due to losing its head

Now, firm supporters of progressive taxonomy might point out that the remaining European Herring Gulls can be separated into two forms, the south-western subspecies argenteus and the Baltic and Scandinavian form argentatus and that both forms differ significantly in many, many ways (that might one day be analysed here or on Birder Hyde, we'll see).

I would like to urge these birders to be cautious and considerate.

If we keep on splitting the Herring Gull, we might one day realize that there is nothing left for us to watch and enjoy!

Clearly Gone, for another "X" on a birder's list

A Quick Question

2009-11-11T13:55:00.003+01:00

Terns.

I've seen them.
You've seen them.
Everyone's seen them.

Yet recently, I started to wonder:

I have seen them in flight over sea, coast and river, over marshes, fields and mountains, from arctic tundra to desert coast.
I have seen them perched on tree, stone and sand bar, seen them sitting on ship, pole and birder's head.
I saw them dive into waves, deep seas and shallow estuaries, man made waters and white-raging rivers.

But I have never seen them swim.
Anywhere, really.

Neither on sea, lake or river, and certainly never on a birder's head.

Have you?
In life or on a photograph?

Finally: the Pill for the Birds?

2009-11-10T15:38:00.003+01:00

Well, I am back home and thus - as I have mentioned before - back on my blog as home is wherever you can access your blog.

And boy, do I have stories to tell.

Of course, whether I will ever tell them here is a matter of time and thus improbability, but at least the stories are in my head and might one day make it through the keyboard onto your computer screen - we'll see.

Now just a thought I recently had (I call thought what you'd call folly, just in case you forgot) which is entirely unrelated to anything that happened in the past few weeks but might be as worthy of your attention as the rest of the blog is or not.

Is the Pileated Woodpecker pronounced Pile-e-ated or Pill-e-ated?

I have always been a firm supporter of the Pile-way, yet recently during one of those stages in between being awake and asleep, when the mind wanders to contemplate wondrous wonders, the following line of arguments suddenly appeared and I was actually able to hold on to it and remember my reasoning on the subject the next morning.

The problem with the Pile is the "e". If the Pile-part of Pileated was pronounced "pile", the "e" would not be free to be separately pronounced as a follow-up syllable and the bird would be called a Pile-ated Woodpecker.

Yet as much as birders tend to disagree over the pronunciation of the bird's name, all the fighting and fuzzing is about the first syllable. There is mutual agreement that there is a drawn-out "e" at the bird name's centre. Or, put more plainly:

[Pile/Pill]-e-ated Woodpecker

You see that central "e"? Completely undisputed.

However, if we reserve the "e" to form the second syllable, we are left with a "Pil", which would then be pronounced as in "Pilgrim" or more pleasingly "Pils".

So, following this line of argument, it seems I'll have to pitch my tent in the Pill-e-ated camp for the time being, which will take some time to adapt to. Time, of course, is certainly not of the essence to me right now as a Pileated Woodpecker is as far away from my home spot here in Germany as can be. Nevertheless, I take this moment of revelation and its linguistic challenge as an invitation by the Big Power Of Birding Fate to re-visit the bird's realm in North America.
The "when" and "how" is something that has as yet not been resolved, but the pure need itself has been recognized as a matter of inevitable fact.

I'll be back ... [strong Austrian accent]

2009-10-09T12:21:00.000+02:00

... around the middle of November.

Spot the Difference

2009-09-28T11:34:00.008+02:00

Always striving to entertain my loyal readership, I have decided to add some variety to Belltower Birding and post a riddle:

Below are two images of the same scene that differ only in one teeny tiny aspect.

Can you spot the difference (and I don't mean the light)?

View from my kitchen window on Sunday, Sept. 27th at 13:16 (1:16 pm) :

View from my kitchen window on Sunday, Sept. 27th at 17:24 (5:24 pm) :

Yeah, dudes with chainsaws.

I have a significant problem with chainsaws. Indeed I dislike them so much that if I was asked to name the five most horrifying inventions of mankind I'd rate chainsaws to be second only to atomic bombs, and closely followed by the guillotine, cell/mobile phones, and "butterfinger" chocolate bars.

An Ambivalent Anniversary

2009-09-15T14:02:00.015+02:00

It's that day of the year again.

Exactly, it is September the 15th, the day of days and date of dates.

Two years ago today, I moved from A to B.

Now, any anniversary is a good occasion to look back and see or evaluate how things worked out and if promises were kept. Therefore, let us look at the last few sentences of the fateful post of September 14th, 2007:

"But what about my blog? Well, darn, I am sorry to disappoint, but even back in Germany, I'll just keep on blogging!"

That was quite a promise to make, yet it is also one that can easily be verified - or not - by looking at my post stats:

Sure enough, although I maintain a monthly post frequency that is regularly achieved by other blogs on a daily basis, I'd say a small hiatus is acceptable and that's a promise kept.

"Things will very much remain the same here at Bell Tower Birding, it's just going to be another bell tower and different birds I'll be writing about."

This sentence contains three different declarations that need to be looked at separately, namely that a) things will remain the same b) it's just going to be another bell tower and c) and different birds I'll be blogging about.

"Things will remain the same"
As the opening sentences of this truly glorious post will attest, I seem to have built a certain reputation over the years that remains largely unaltered and intact, recent masterpieces by other blogs challenging my position on the blog market notwithstanding. Another frightening promise kept.

"It's just going to be another bell tower"
As you may remember (and this might assist your memory), my blog was named after the Burton Memorial (or Bell) Tower in central Ann Arbor, seen on this picture taken from my back-then-apartment.
I'd like to say that the reasons for choosing it as the name of my blog were manifold as it would sound so intelligent and as if I'd put a huge amount of thought into it, but basically the only reason was simply the pair of Peregrines that tried to breed there and were usually around.
As these were deemed the only birds I'd get to see regularly (what with living in a downtown hell of concrete and tar), I had predicted they'd be a regular and prominent feature of my blog, a prediction that never materialized safe for this one post (which coincidentally contains the same recycled picture of the tower - well, bummer).

However, was I being right and righteous in keeping the name after I moved back to Germany? Were there any bell towers and falcons in Stralsund as well?
As you can see from the pictures of this post, Stralsund actually has a number of excellent bell towers. However, there are no Peregrines nesting in Stralsund, so my blog integrity was challenged. To save the day and the blog, I decided that any falcon on a tower would be a good falcon and thus instrumentalize the numerous Common Kestrels breeding on said towers to save the day.
But of course, you may ask - after having carefully studied the stats graph above - how about the new domicile in or rather near Heidelberg.
Again, things needed to be stretched somehow to make fit what initially didn't quite fit: here in Leimen we have a pair of lovely and aristocratic Peregrines again that scare and hunt the heck out of our Common Kestrels, but the bell towers of Leimen are so ridiculous (as all of Leimen is) that the Peregrines settled for a tall and weather exposed chimney. So yet again, to save the day any tower was declared sufficient regardless of musical ornaments and here we are, on the Belltowerbirding blog and not the Factorychimney blog. A dignity stained is still a dignity saved, and the name remains.

"and different birds I'll be blogging about"
This is where the term slacking really hits the homes of Belltowerbirders: this is a promise not fully kept.
Surely I still managed to write a few post about the birds of the Baltic, but even then the majority of posts was related to North American birds and birding. With me being in Heidelberg now, this is even more of a broken promise as I don't get to go birding a lot and if I do, I need to either get back to the treadmill so quickly I forget to blog about it or I am technically not allowed to mention the outcome of my time outside on my blog as it is all job-related (but not really anything secret).
This is something I am still working on, and while I do I hope my slacker status regarding German birding posts will be viewed with mercy and understanding.

"And don't worry, as soon as I am back, I'll make my reappearance known to you by flooding your own blog with comments."
Oh geez, don't throw anything at your monitor, please!
As the following victims of comments abuse and online stalking by yours truly will attest, commenting on other blogs is something I excel at.
Look, I am sorry Patrick, Carrie, Nate, Clare, 10,000Birds-guys, Wren, Katie, Larry, Dale, Amila, Joan, Will, John, and all the other blogs I did not mention specifically but am known to regularly roam and haunt.

It's just that ... you know ... you're really good company - no matter where life takes me. And that's why blogging is such a special thing to do.

Another quick post

2009-09-03T14:16:00.004+02:00

With the shift from August to September, birders in North America will also perform a shift in birding activity: from shore to park and shorebirds to wood-warblers.

One thing however will remain largely unchanged and unaffected by that shift: the birding rhetoric of fall.

Yes, North American birders and particularly bird bloggers tend to infrequently refrain from enriching their posts with colour adjectives of the dull kind during the fall/autumn season. In other words, they whine and whinge a lot about the birds in brown, grey and shades thereof.

If you, my inclined reader, are amongst their ranks, pull yourself together, dry your tears and take comfort:

European birders are far worse off than you.

See?
Now go and enjoy your hatch-year Blackpolls.

Today 95 years ago...

2009-09-01T10:33:00.001+02:00

... Martha died.

Names Games, part 2: North America

2009-08-14T11:17:00.003+02:00

In part 1 of my translation series I have provided examples from Europe, but how about German names for North American birds?
Yes, in case you are wondering: all the world’s bird species were given a German name. You may wonder further, asking what sense that makes when all the field guides will only contain English and scientific names and thus all conversation – even amongst Germans – about those foreign bird species will probably rely on the English names? But even though you might make a good point and it might not make very much sense, a few people apparently considered it interesting enough to be worth their while and here we are with German names for all the birds in the world except some recent splits and discoveries.

In contrast to European bird names, those names from strange and foreign lands (strictly from a German view point) did not evolve through common usage amongst the ordinary people over a prolonged period of time or underwent multiple changes as the names evolved (e.g. Lesser Blue-eared Glossy Starlings from Africa simply weren’t at the centre of people's every-day conversations in 18th century Germany). Sadly, these German names were actually made up by birders and / or scientists rather recently and therefore are often characterized by a clear lack of aesthetics and fantasy. Most are actually – in my opinion – rather boring, like “Messingglanzstar” (Brass Glossy Starling) which is the lovely Lesser Blue-eared Glossy Starling.
This lack of creativity sadly also applies to many of the German names of North American bird species. However, using the fabulous BabelBirdy site, I have found a few examples that might fill your heart with joy or your head with ache. These German names were translated into English as in part 1 and I am more than curious to learn from my (North American) readers what they think and like or dislike:

The German names of selected North American Bird Species, translated into English

There is not much excitement in the big, large non-passerines as most groups also occur in the old world, so there was no need to make up a lot or create some serious nonsense. People simply took the German name for the group and added the specific part. Here’s what I found to be quite charming:

Anhinga = American Snake-necked Bird
Yellow-crowned Night-heron = Crab Heron
Roseate Spoonbill = Pink Spooner
Wood Duck = Bride Duck (no idea!)
Bufflehead = Bufflehead Duck (oh, the cowards! Why did they have to add “Duck” to one of the coolest bird names of all time? Why Büffelkopfente and not just Büffelkopf?)
Harris’s Hawk = Desert Buzzard
Laughing Gull = Aztec Gull
Black Skimmer = American Scissorbill
Dowitchers = mudwalkers
Greater Roadrunner = Road Cuckoo

Now we get to the smaller birds, and these include quite a few groups that don’t have any representatives in the old world. Here, people had to get at least a bit more creative and I have found a few interesting translations.

The Tyrant Flycatchers are called tyrants in German and there sadly is not a lot of variation or alterations within the group – all tyrants:
Olive-sided Flycatcher = Spruce Tyrant
Northern Bearless-Tyrannulet = Chaparral Fly-piercer (my goodness, the only exception to tyrant but what an awful one. Germans are no better than the rest. We owe the bird, we all do, all the languages in the world, every nation. We owe a lot.)
Empidonax flycatchers = mostly Tree Species + Tyrant (e.g. Yellow-bellied = Birch Tyrant), interesting: Pacific Slope Flycatcher = Bank Tyrant

Vermilion Flycatcher = Purple Tyrant (crap)
Eastern Kingbird = King Tyrant (wow, if the Eastern Kingbird gets split some day, maybe we can have a King Dictator Tyrant and then a King Dictator Sith Tyrant Overlord – what an evil creature in the Land of the Free)
Scissor-tailed Flycatcher = Scissor Tyrant (the definite anti-climax of my research, how lame, what a sorry excuse for a bird name)
Great Kiskadee = Bentevi (what? I have no idea whatsoever! Looks like a random combination of letters to me)
Phainopepla = Mourning Silk Snapper (the snapper as a reference to flysnapper = the German expression for a flycatcher)
vireos = basically the German translation of the English name + Vireo e.g. Hutton’s Vireo = Huttonvireo (can you spell b-o-r-i-n-g?)

Gray Jay = Tit Jay (wait, the Paridae, not the structures that define mammals)
Tree Swallow = Swamp Swallow
Tufted Titmouse = Native American Tit (in German, we use the politically incorrect term for the ethnic group which is however not politically incorrect in German as the “Indianer” are very highly respected, almost adored here thanks to the Karl May books and movies)
bluebirds = cottage singers (interesting!)
Townsend’s Solitaire = Townsendklarino (please, don’t ask where the Klarino comes from unless you want a useless response of a clueless guesser. It sounds Italian, well, definitely nothing even remotely resembling a German origin - your job, Rick)
Varied Thrush = Necklace Thrush
thrashers = mocking thrushes

wood warblers = forest singers
Prothonotary Warbler = Lemon Forest Singer
Blackburnian Warbler = Spruce Forest Singer (another chance wasted! The poor creature)
Nashville Warbler = Ruby-spot Forest Singer (Not bad, ey? Not bad)
Northern Parula = Tit Forest singer (yet again, the Paridae, not the …)
Yellow Warbler = Gold Forest Singer
Cape May Warbler = Tiger Forest Singer (YES !!! Strrrrrrrike!!)
Yellow-rumped Warbler = Crowned Forest Singer
American Redstart = Flysnatcher Forest Singer (well, as I said: Flycatchers are Flysnatchers)
Common Yellowthroat = Little Willow Yellowthroat
Ovenbird = Pipit Forest Singer

The birds formerly known as North American Tanagers (likely to become Tanager-Cardinals) = Tangaren (oh no, I’ve been betrayed by my own language!)
Dickcissel = Dickzissel
Blue Grosbeak = Azure Bishop
Painted Bunting = Pope Finch (yes, I swear it is true!)
Pyrrhuloxia = Slender-billed Cardinal

All the Emberizine sparrows and their allies are correctly called Buntings in German (har har har):
all towhees = Ground Buntings
Chipping Sparrow = Buzzing Bunting
Field Sparrow = Clapper Bunting
Vesper Sparrow = Evening Bunting
White-crowned Sparrow = Badger Bunting
Dark-eyed Junco = Winter Bunting (I love that one)
The other “sparrows” are mostly a direct translation of their name’s specific part + bunting, e.g. Baird’s Bunting, Henslow’s Bunting, Grasshopper Bunting, White-throated Bunting, Harris’s Bunting etc.

Icterid orioles = Trupiale (yet again, why oh why?)
Icterid meadowlarks, grackles, cowbirds and blackbirds = in German, an alteration of the word starling is used ("Stärling", although the German word for Starling is “Star” without the –ing, but the root is the same), so it is comparable to calling these species not starlings but maybe steerlings, stoorlings, steurlings, stierlings, stairlings, etc. in English. Even though I find it sad to name all the Icterids (except for orioles which are Trupiale and some grackles being Grackels) “Stärling” without any variation or diversity, I do recognize the creativity behind simply making a new word up for such a large group. The only interesting example for a species I found:
Great-tailed Grackle = Jackdaw “StXXrling” (so you know where to look for vagrant Jackdaws in North America now)

American Goldfinch = Gold Siskin
Pine Siskin = Spruce Siskin (yeah, we love to cause some confusion)
redpolls = Birch Siskins

What's that you say? Oh, I can't hear you, just write it down in the comments section, will you?

Names Games, part 1

2009-08-10T19:06:00.021+02:00

I have recently found that I often reflect on language, particularly the English one (in which I blog despite the fact that German is my first language), and more specifically about the ways in which English relates to German and how it all shows in the birds and the birding we do - an obvious connection.

In this post, I will pick up that thread once again and combine it with another one of my favourite topics, bird names.

One of the most interesting aspects of knowing two (or more) languages is the possibility to compare the different terms used for the same thing or issue. I don't mean the plain translation of ordinary terms, like "house" being "Haus" and "teacher" being "Lehrer" and "bird" being "Vogel". That is boring. What I am interested in is the different (or identical) ways in which languages use descriptive terms.

For example, the blossoms of a willow are not just called "willow blossoms" in English but are "willow catkins". Now, if we translate the German term "Weidenkätzchen", we get to "willow kittens" which is quite remarkable.

Another example, this time without the happy ending:

A screw driver in German - when the exact term is translated to English - is a screw puller and thus exactly the opposite of the English term (Germans are fond of disassembling while the English prefer to construct? Who knew...).

Now, as I have promised, I will combine that aspect of languages with my passion for discussing bird names, specifically the descriptive ones. What I will therefore do in this first of two posts is present the German name of European birds as it translates directly into English (some also occur in North America, e.g. the Loons/Divers) and see where the most striking differences are. In a second part due to be posted soon, I will do the same for some North American birds.

So here we go, part 1:

The German names of selected European Bird Species, translated into English

Common Loon/ Diver = Ice Diver
Black-throated Loon/ Diver = Gorgeous Diver
Red-throated Loon/ Diver = Star Diver (not the fame but the celestial bodies - wonder why? Winter plumage!)
storm petrels = storm swallows
shearwaters = storm divers
petrels = storm birds

Great White Egret = Silver Heron (all the Ardeidae except for the bitterns are "herons", no differentiation in e.g. herons and egrets)

Little Egret = Silky Heron
Bittern = Reed "Dommel" (I am not entirely sure what the root of the word "Dommel" is but would guess it comes from drumming = trommeln, making the bogbumper a Reed Drummer. An older, inofficial name is Reed Ox)

Glossy Ibis = Sickler

Mallard = Stick Duck (probably from some strange hunting technique / background)

Tufted Duck = Heron Duck

Common Pochard = Table Duck (apparently it tastes really good and was therefore often presented at festive dinner table events)

Goosander / Common Merganser = Goose Sawer (the size plus the fiercely toothed bill)
Lesser Spotted Eagle = Screaming Eagle

Golden Eagle = Stone Eagle

Common Kestrel = Tower Falcon (all Falconidae are falcons, no differentiation in kestrels, falcons)

Hobby = Tree Falcon

Corncrake = Quail King
Avocet = Saberbill
plovers = rain whistlers
Calidris sandpipers = beach walkers
Tringa sandpipers = water walkers

Common Sandpiper = Riverbank Walker

A Riverbank Walker doin' its thing on a riverbank

Red Phalarope = Thor’s Little Chicken
Red-necked Phalarope = Odin’s Little Chicken
skuas/jaegers of the genus Stercorarius = robbery gulls
terns = sea swallows
Puffin = Parrot Diver

Barn Owl = Veiled Owl
Eurasian Kingfisher = Ice bird

House Martin = Flour Swallow (no differentiation in martins and swallows, all are swallows)

This Flour Swallow either got itself a bit dirty (they are supposed to be white) or is of the wholemeal variety

Barn Swallow = Smoke Swallow

Well, if it was "smoked" instead of "smoke" I'd postulate a certain resemblance to bacon but frankly I have no idea whatsoever where the smoke comes from

Winter Wren = Fence King
Bohemian Waxwing = Silktail

Dipper = Water Ouzel
Cetti’s Warbler = Silksinger
Phylloscopus warblers = leaf singers
Acrocephalus warblers = reed singers

Marsh Reed Singer (palustris) - yes, I am sure. I mean, look. it is so distinctly coloured, there's no mistaking it.

Locustella warblers = buzzers (Field, Reed and Beat buzzer, can you figure out which is which?)

Hippolais warblers = mockers

Sylvia warblers = grey slippers (Not the shoes, the movement – derived from an old German expression. In modern German this reads as "grass gnats" by a funny yet pure coincidence:

gra smügge = old/ancient German for grey slipper while gras-mücke is modern German for grass gnat - all you have to do is move the "s" a bit and the Sylvia Warblers, which are called Grasmücke, have a very obscure name)

nuthatches = gluers (as they often narrow tree holes that are too large for them by gluing clay around the rim)
Red-backed Shrike = Ninekiller (derived from the myth that it would kill 8 animals and store them on thorns before eating its ninth victim)
Great Grey Shrike = Robbery Strangler
Hawfinch = Stone Biter (as in cherry stone biter, its former and now unofficial name)
Bullfinch = Dome Cleric or alternatively (now official) Dolt
Pine Grosbeak = Hooked Dolt
Yellowhammer = Gold Bunting

And then the many "Little X-throats":
Whinchat = Little Brownthroat
Stonechat = Little Blackthroat
Bluethroat = Little Bluethroat
Robin = Little Redthroat
Siberian Rubythroat = Little Rubythroat

Little Brownthroat should actually be called Little Buffythroat and then we could call another species Brownthroat, like e.g. some North American or tropical species. Wait, what's that you say, brown as a bird colour is largely restricted to Europe? Well, crap!

So let's hear it in the comments: which ones do you like, dislike, think are nice or funny or boring or should be opposed? Have an unlimited and uncensored go at it!

Beating a Dead Horse - or was that a Harrier?

2009-08-10T14:28:00.007+02:00

Quite recently, the one and only blogdad Charlie Moores posted a very emotional article about his views on hunting that sparked a very interesting discussion in the comments section here.
In the course of the discussion I made the following comment highlighing what in my opinion was the most important of Charlie's points:

"Birders/conservationists are often asked/expected to tolerate, respect or even support (duck stamps) hunters and cooperate with them for the “greater good” of nature conservation which supposedly is a common goal.
But how much does the “other side” (the hunters) tolerate, respect and support us, the non-hunting or non-fishing nature enthusiasts?
If birders buy duck stamps, do hunters donate to nature conservation organizations?
If birders respect hunting seasons by staying away from certain areas at certain times, do hunters step back from certain hunting opportunities to allow for better birding in those areas during certain times?
The more I think about it (and I know at least the German hunting scene quite well as I grew up in a forester/hunter family), I’d say tolerance, respect and cooperation amongst birders and hunters is very much a one-way street."

Here's a bit of news that would seem supportive of my scepticism (make sure to read the comments).

Possibly someone from the UK's hunting lobby with whom we supposedly share the common goal of conservation could provide the figures to the following questions:

How many Red Grouse are there in England?
On how many square kilometres is the hunting of the Red Grouse allowed?

How many Hen Harriers are there in England?
How large are their combined breeding ranges where the hunting of Red Grouse might not be quite as easy as elsewhere?

If hunters completely refrained from hunting within the territories of Hen Harriers, the loss of hunting area to them would amount to how many % of the total Red Grouse hunting area in England?
Why would this be inacceptable to hunters, as is shown by the apparently continued illegal shooting of Harriers in England and elsewhere in the UK?

But of course, it needs to be stressed here that there is a common ground for hunters and birders.

New I and the Bird is up - this time including the Me-I, not just the Others-I

2009-08-06T13:24:00.007+02:00

Between the booty of a mariner and the Cheyenne bottoms, the English language with its many twists and tweaks and double meanings is a constant well of refreshing insights. The full extend of its linguistic excellence however is only unveiled to a chosen and privileged few who not only happen to be birders and are thus appreciative of beauty and quality in ultimate perfection but who also have the constant courage and graze to blog about their birding adventures and thoughts.
As a natural result of the bird bloggers' supremacy and in celebration of their literary excellence, the blog carnival I and the Bird was initiated by Mike Bergin exactly four years (and a month) ago, a very fine anniversary that needed to be solemnized accordingly.

Corey (here is the link to his profile, but the picture near the end of this post conveys a far more realistic image of the man who claims to be Corey Finger) has lived up to the challenge of the occasion and crafted a fine new edition of I and the Bird. This newest edition just so happens to also include a link to my submission (and I had no idea it was an anniversary edition) , the first in a horribly long time (or not long enough time, depending on who you ask, right Corey?!).

Cheers, enjoy, and I had no idea about the dog poop. The things you learn from reading 10,000Birds.

Giving Google Earth a good Kick

2009-07-31T16:28:00.003+02:00

All good things come to an end or "funny is over" as the Germans would say.

For the first time since I started the (not-so-) new (-anymore) job about a year ago, I was given a particularly boring project that requires me to spend copious amounts (aka all) of my work time in front of a computer - a hellish thing for any biologist in summer.
This won't really change until the first week of September. If it hadn't been for this last-minute emergency project moving up the priority list to positions 1, 2, 3 and 4, I would have had business trips to e.g. Romania and the north-west of Germany.

And that really sucks.

Now, don't tell me you'd have guessed that I was really bored and stuck at the computer, judging by the enormous amount of comments I left on your and others' blogs. Be nice instead and have pity on me.

Anyway, as I am often bored and as there are just so-and-so-many comments you can leave on other blogs before you'll be flagged as an Internet nuisance, I started this little game with Google Earth: virtual travelling. This is how it works:

1. Open Google Earth (obviously) and zoom in to a height of around 15 km (or roughly 10 miles). Then, give the globe a good kick [hold mouseclick, drag, release] so it starts to rotate and then "minimize" the program (so it isn't visible on your screen anymore but a mere icon at the bottom of your screen - geez, sometimes it is hard to blog in English when your computer is set to German).

2. Work on for a long time, leave comments on blogs, go to the staff canteen, look out of the window, scratch your head, pick your nose, ... all those things people do at work but don't look at Google Earth for, you know, like,... half an hour or so.

3. When you think the right time has come, click on the icon again so the map appears on your screen and if it is not blue (which means you're somewhere over open ocean) instantly click on the map to stop the globe from rotating.

4. zoom in and out to see where you have landed and rejoice.

5. if you are really bored and no-one is watching, search for birding travel reports from that area, look it up at Wikipedia and generally just pretend you'd be - virtually - travelling through the land you've accidentally hit. This however will take a lot of time and your employer won't like that. The Google kicking however is something that will entertain you without really requiring a significant amount of time, so it really is quick and easy entertainment.

I've had two really neat results so far:

I once landed precisely on a small atoll of the Maldives.
The second incident was remarkable: I started out in Newfoundland and gave the globe a kick. When I looked some time later, the screen was blue (ocean) so I minimized it again, waited, looked again: blue. Minimized again, looked again: blue, etc etc etc. for a long, long time until I finally made landfall. I had travelled from Newfoundland all the way down the Atlantic and halfway around Antarctica to the south coast of Australia in a straight line. As far as I can tell, this is - incidentally - the longest straight line you can draw through the ocean without touching land. It was more than 20,000 kilometres or roughly 13,000 miles.

The things you do...
But I shan't despair, birds will come my way - and the blog's way as well, I promise.

Beyond the Notebook

2009-07-28T13:40:00.031+02:00

A notebook (non-digital, and my apologies to potential google searchers gone astray) surely must be the pride of a birder.
I always kept one and I would use it to chronicle my days out and the birds seen, to make sketches and descriptions of my rarities that I was to report to regional or national records committees and also to casually show it to fellow birders e.g. to have them check out one of my field sketches that just so happened to be on the page right next to a super rarity I knew this birder had never seen in his life.

I don't keep one anymore.

Why?

Because I once lost it. Here's the story:

When I had returned from Namibia back in the late 1990ies and a friend asked me to come birding with him, I didn't find my German bird notebook as it was still somewhere in the cardboard boxes amongst my other stuff I had stored away while being out of the country for 6 months. Of course I did not dare leaving the house without a notebook, and so I took the African Thesis Data notebook along.

Then - after viewing a beautiful Red-breasted Goose at the coast - it started to rain and I got nervous as I hadn't copied my thesis data yet to ... well .. anywhere and I feared I might lose all my data by getting my notebook wet. So I stuffed it under my belt and kept it dry under the rain coat as we slowly walked back to the car.

We got into my friend's car and drove home where I noticed something was different, something was missing: there was nothing pressing against my belly anymore.

I had lost my notebook somewhere.

First, I searched the car.
It wasn't there.
However, the rain still was there, harder than before.
Then my friend drove back to the coastal marsh with me - in the rain - and we began to search the path we had taken before back to the car - while it kept on raining.

Finally there was my notebook.
It was on the road out in the open, but it was not in the rain.
How can that be?

Well, it was completely submerged in a huge puddle of rainwater!

The shock.
The horror.
The hours and hours spent with a pair of tweezers, soft paper tissue and a hair-dryer.

In the end, I saved most of my data and reckon I might have lost 5 % of it, so I was lucky.
But I also was a wiser man.

From that day onwards I did not keep a notebook anymore but decided to shift to a device that would still allow me to record my observations and chronicle everything but that was less vulnerable.
It is thus with great pride and pleasure that I present the safety-device for recording your field observations right where you make them: out in the field, with no risk of destroying a wealth of data when things go awry by losing your entire notebook.

This is it, the ultimate replacement of the notebook:

A sheet of paper, sized A4 or something comparable, squared in a 5 mm grid (or alternatively a 3467/7836 Inch grit - yes, I do believe that this is silly and the metric system is superior, how come you ask?).

Notice wrinkles around the eye of a young man who hasn't slept in 19 months, Corey and Patrick - this look is where you're headed, enjoy the ride!

An important feature - aside from the paper being squared - is that it is hole-punched.

To prepare our field note device, we'll first have to place it flat on a table and then fold it ...

... once ...

... twice ...

... three times.

Yes, it does look awkward but folding a sheet of paper three times is much easier with both hands when not simultaneously holding a DSLR in one hand.

This is how your field note device should look like when you're done, fitting nicely and comfortably into your hand.

Now all we have to do is attach a ball pen and we're ready to go get some birds - and write them down. Thanks for asking but my ring finger is perfectly normal, this is just a very strange perspective along its central axis.

As our field note device was folded three times, it is rather thick and stable (like writing on a pad 8 sheets thick) and easily allows us to write clearly while holding it in our palm. Notice that at first we record the date and weather (and also notice that I made it all up as can be seen by the unrealistic description of the weather, but the species recorded are a realistic estimate of an average day around the Great Lakes - and even though I write left-handed, it also works the other way around which I think proves how neat the concept is)

When the first "page" is full, we simply turn the field note device around and continue. Now, isn't that sweet?

Because the grid is so small and our "page" not much bigger either, it enables or rather ... well ... forces us to write real small and thus space efficient, which is good especially in productive birding areas where we can expect to see lots. Again, notice the nice assemblage of species to be expected around the Great Lakes.

Now comes the ingenuity of the device: when both "pages" are full, we don't need a new field notes device - no, all we have to do is fold it the other way and we have two brand new "pages" for even more field notes. Honestly, birding doesn't get much better than this!

Of course our field note device will experience some heavy duty in good birding terrain, being constantly written upon with greasy, sweaty fingers and stuffed in and out of a tight pocket, so our notes are at a constant risk of being abraded and destroyed- you'd think.

This is indeed not the case! By folding it the other way around as we have done in the previous step, the notes we have taken thus far will be protected "inside" our field notes device in perfect security and sheltered from the rough tides that characterize an average birding day.

So the day wears on and the birds get better and our notes get longer and suddenly even those new two blank pages aren't blank anymore but full, as can be seen above. What then?

All we have to do is fold it open twice, turn it around and re-fold it the other way ...

... once ...

... twice, and we're back to square 1, with four empty and blank "pages" for even more field notes and all our notes taken so far sheltered and concealed inside.

Being stable and handy, the field notes device also allows us to occasionally sketch birds we've seen but cannot identify out in the field, e.g. this strange warbler I ran into on one of my rambles through the Arb.

When counting incredibly large numbers of birds, I have found it quite practical to write the species down at the far left edge of the field note device and then note the number of birds in each group I encounter or - with birds that mostly occur as singles or in very small groups stretched out over a prolongued observation time - mark them with ... geez, how do you call that in English ... "bars" I add up in blocks of 5. Well, you'll know what I mean by looking at my example, in this case the Golden Eagle.

Eventually and on a good day out, even those new "pages" will be full and our sheet of paper, when unfolded, will look like this (notice that in this staged example, I eventually got a bit lazy in the upper left corner). What's next? Yepp, you guessed it, all we have to do is ...

... turn it around and fold it ...

... once (notice yet again the ingenuity of protecting your data inside) ...

... twice ...

... three times ...

And don't forget the ball pen!

This concept - in my humble and not quite un-biased opinion - surely deserves two thumbs up, but this is where I had clearly reached my limit without a tripod for my camera and one thumb up will have to do in this post. Feel free to admire.

And before I forget: of course you can also archive all your field notes devices conveniently by filing them away in a stable folder. This is why they have to be hole-punched.

All things considered.

This was post number 200 on Bell Tower Birding. Considering that I have been around since November 2006, I wouldn't really call it a milestone. Maybe a yard- or inchstone of some sort or maybe even something I should have shut my mouth about in shame but you know: it is what it is and it is number 200, so there you go.

Happy birding trails.
On quiet nights, I can hear the rustling of wings from the far North. Fall migration is coming!

Good Golly!

2009-07-24T10:04:00.002+02:00

This article is not only amazing in itself but - if correct - would also explain one of the more bizzare of the birds' migration routes from India across the open ocean to Africa.

Sorry, Monarchs, it seems your reign is over - bring on the dragonflies then.

Worried out of my Wits

2009-07-23T11:36:00.029+02:00

In addition to being tired for 19 months in a row now (future fathers beware) a recent incident has got me worried. Yes indeed, my current times are tough and as shared problems are problems halved (as the saying goes in German), I decided to do some blogging about it.

The Kakapo (and you sensed this would be about the Kakapo, right?) is not only one of the truly magical and most special bird species to grace our planet, it has had its ups and downs in a remarkable way as well.
Its biggest up-phase was surely in the days of old when there was no-one inhabiting New Zealand but the birds, and the Kakapos in their millions busily trotted the forest floor in search of fruit amongst the burrows of assorted seabirds, minding their own business and worrying about nothing really but how to make more Kakapos than there currently were.
It soon got a bit tricky though when the later-to-be-called Maori arrived 700 years ago and brought in a few mammalian predators, but the Kakapos still managed to stay on top of things and remain common throughout the islands' forests that were lovely, dark and deep.
Bad luck started to hit the birds in earnest with the large-scale arrival of the European traders and whalers around 1790 (now, here's a big surprise). It got particularly nasty when those Europeans eventually noticed that the land was nice and the Maori no real match to their rifles (although they sure gave them some hell occasionally) and thus decided to settle there in large numbers, bringing in more variety and viciousness to the already established yet alien mammalian fauna.
This was clearly too much even for a timid creature like the Kakapo and they rightfully felt offended in such a way that their numbers declined sharply. It is as yet and unresolved matter if the Kakapos were driven out of their natural range by encroaching humans and the terrible smell of English afternoon tea or by rats, cats and other hairy threats (well, maybe the matter was resolved recently). Possibly it was a combination of both and whatever it was, the Kakapos were so not amused that they got scarce enough to be feared extinct by 1970.

Being feared an extinct species was clearly the dramatic low as far as we can tell, although each surviving member of the Kakapo kind surely was barely aware of it, still busily trotting the forest floor in search of fruit amongst the vacated burrows of extinct seabird populations, minding their own business and worrying about nothing really but how to make more Kakapos than there currently were.

Luckily however, as a result of a human change of heart (or was it the discovery of humans that they had a heart after all?), the species was searched for, rediscovered and effectively protected and has since started a slow yet rather steady climb to recovery, numbering 125 birds in 2009.

This figure is far from the millions that once were, but better than the zero that once was feared.
If current trends continue, we can safely assume that a world population of 1,000 birds will be reached in roughly 200 to 300 years. In geological terms this is very soon, in biological terms... ah well, I've always liked the geological time scale in certain contexts.

Now however, the species' future is in dire jeopardy again through circumstances as yet beyond the powers of manipulation by human kind:

Have you read the news that New Zealand moved 30 cm (!) closer to Australia due to a single earthquake off its coast?

Australia, as you may know, is full of big furry and hungry predators and if this rate of approach continues, New Zealand's predator-free Kakapo Islands will be within leaping range of Dingos and Devils within a mere 7,500 earthquakes.

And you know what the problem is? Clearly this: who can tell at what maximum rate those earthquakes can occur? Once every thousand years or a thousand each year?

No-one can tell, that's who.

Surely some scientists might argue that probabilities for such an earthquake to occur repeatedly within a biological time scale are low, yet with a bird as special as the Kakapo, probabilities are just not enough to rely upon.
So, as I have shown by clear reasoning, the recovery of the Kakapo is merely a small breath of hope into the storm that is looming doom (gosh, how much I had hoped to write a similar text about loons, entitled "doom looms over loons", but I couldn't find anything on flightless, nocturnal loons in New Zealand and all that rhymes with parrot is carrot).

And that has me worried.

I really think DOC should lift the ban on visiting Kakapo islands so that at least the bird will be on everyone's life list before it ceases to exist in a mere 7,500 earthquakes' time.

Go for it, DOC - just go. As long as I am allowed in first.

Sigh!

2009-07-03T10:30:00.001+02:00

165 years ago, on July 3rd 1844, humanity had one of its crappier moments.

Fish on Birder Hyde

2009-06-25T13:03:00.001+02:00

If you just so happen to be an expert on small European freshwater fish, you might want to take a look at my latest "post" on Birder Hyde here and help me out!

Cheers.

Back to the Future: A Post from the Past

2009-06-22T09:39:00.007+02:00

I am back home and thus back on my blog (home is where the blog is, so they say).

This however is not a recent post.
See that title? It is a post I wrote while waiting to be picked up at the airport two weeks ago.
So many exciting things - all blogworthy - happened inbetween (now and then) but as I was there on a job-mission, all the data belongs to my employer and I am technically not allowed to blog about it.

Such is life.

But nevertheless, here's what I wrote back then at Saint Petersburg's airport:

While I write this, I am sitting in a small cafe at Saint Petersburg’s international airport. Well, I can’t get Internet access here, possibly more due to my work machine’s security conscious configurations than due to a lack of wireless networks on Saint Petersburg airport, which means I can write but not post – a very clever way of blogging, and so innovative.
So by the time you will get to read what I am writing now, I won’t still be sitting there.

I hope.

I am due to be picked up in two hours, so I was told. Looking around though, on an international airport where no-one seems to speak anything but Russian, I might end up stranded here after all until my return flight in 12 days. But the coffee is surprisingly good, so I can think of worse places to be stuck in.

Restrooms in Kazakhstan spring to mind.

Right, I am kidding, of course I’ll be picked up as I have already spoken to the guy and he’s on his way.

Anyway, a few short birding notes while I am still outside my working area (secrecy, right?):

Last German bird seen from the plane as we rolled towards the runway on Frankfurt international airport was a female Common Kestrel (well, the plane rolled while we all sat). Of course I can’t entirely rule out Lesser Kestrel, but let’s stick with probabilities.
Maybe it was the very same bird that was Sharon Birdchick’s first Eurasian bird/lifer? Funny times we live in. And a small world, too.

The flight was rather boring as we had low cloud cover below us all the way and I was sat at a window facing south, into the sun. It was nice though seeing the landscape around Saint Petersburg airport while we approached for landing. So much birding potential, I was amazed.
Lots of good habitat for Blyth’s Reed Warbler. I only wish Corey was with me. Although, come to think of it, even if he was here physically he might not really be with me emotionally when I’d get all excited about Blyth’s Reed Warblers.
I really don’t understand it though. Bird species that can be distinguished from each other by the prominence of a slight eye-ring over the brightness of the supercilium in front of the eye or vice versa are just really cool birds to hang out with, good company.

Aaanyway, the first bird in Russia was not, let me repeat this: not, and to my uttermost dismay, a Blyth’s Reed Warbler. You’d think Acrocephalus warblers would be easy to spot from a plane at an altitude of several hundred metres going at a speed of several hundred kilometres an hour approaching a landing strip but let me tell you, they are not.
Gulls, on the other hand, are. So the first bird of the trip that I was able to identify to species level was a gull, a Common Gull Larus canus to be more precise. This is a species as range-restricted and rare as its name may suggest, so you can guess just how thrilled I was about that observation.
I really like Common Gulls though, they are sassy little birds, and additionally an observation of a Common Gull means things can only improve from then on, so there you have it: thank you, Common Gull Guys & Galls!

And a little bit of gossip about Russia, anyone?

Right, so I was standing around wondering how to kill two hours of spare time when I saw the little cafe and an ATM right next to it.

The Russian Ruble.

I must confess that I had and still have no idea how much it’s worth compared to the Euro (shame, I know, bitter shame), so when the choices of amounts to be withdrawn showed up, I was puzzled.
You see, I am no poor man (not rich either, just average), but I didn't really feel like getting a random amount of Rubles from that machine just to find out after the trip that my wife had to sell our little son into slavery to some dubious regional tribe’s chief in Sudan to pay for the bills. As all I wanted was a coffee, I chose the smallest amount, which was 100 Rubles.
The coffee, average size, American style as they call it, was 125 Rubles.

So either that ATM is ridiculous (who’d ever go through the process of using an ATM at an airport for an amount that won’t even buy them a darned simple coffee?!) or I’ve just had the most expensive coffee ever, for which my wife will have to sell my little son … ah, you know the story. I used my credit card. For a single coffee. Seriously.

We’ll see. So far, I am having a good time. Surely it’ll even get better once birds start entering the scene.

It always does when they do.

P.S.: I am back from exchanging 50.00 Euros cash and I got 2,100 Rubles for them. Apparently, the coffee was affordable and the ATM was indeed ridiculous. You do the math, I am too lazy now (that’s my story and I am sticking to it), but it seems I’ll get to keep my offspring after all.
So I am back at the cafe with another 30 minutes until pick-up time.
With a larger cup of coffee and a piece of cake: biscuit with a topping of caramel, chocolate and butter cream.

Life could be worse.

P.P.S.: I think I am not risking my job or telling you job-related secrets when I mention that I did end up seeing and hearing sing several Blyth's Reed Warblers? Actually I encountered a total of 5 different Acrocephalus warblers which even in the Western Palearctis is a pretty good number.
I guess Corey or any North American birder who knows the sharp looks of the Acros is absolutely envious now.

Yeah, I bet.

Out of Office

2009-06-07T19:12:00.004+02:00

This is an automated response to all my visitors to let you know that I won't be online anywhere - neither on my blog nor in your blog's comments - until around June 22nd.

Not that this would be new news on this blog.

I'll have to survey a few square kilometres in western Russia for anything that lives and may be noteworthy, so I am particularly hoping I'll get to see some Blyth's Reed Warblers. I haven't seen any since 2000, so you can tell I am excited about the prospect of re-connecting.

As I didn't have the time to get a booster on my bear & beaver bite vaccination, wish me luck.

Post on Birder Hyde

2009-05-28T16:21:00.002+02:00

I have a new post up on Birder Hyde which provides links to pages and posts dealing with the relatively recent observation that in two species of common European birds, atypically singing or calling individuals are frequently encountered.
This mostly pertains to Germany though and most of the links lead to German texts, sorry. The soundfiles will be okay for everyone though, I guess.

Here's the link to Birder Hyde.

Tit for Tat, only it's not a Tit

2009-05-27T11:16:00.021+02:00

Vagrants.

Who doesn't like them?

Yes, as shameful as it may appear in an age of disappearing biodiversity and increasing problems with invasive species, a rarity or vagrant spotted once in a while amongst the flocks of our common birds is the "salt in the soup" as the Germans would phrase it, or ... geez, wait ... I don't know, ... the whatever in the whatever it is that the English would use to describe the one component of the birding lot that makes it all worthwhile.

So frequently during the year's migration seasons, birders on the east side of the Atlantic venture out to search birds from the west side of the Atlantic while birders on the west side of the Atlantic do the same, only in reverse.
As a consequence of that passionate dedication, we know quite a bit about the patterns of vagrancy around the northern Atlantic and there is a striking difference:

North American vagrants can be as easy to find in the UK's autumn season as sand in your shoes after a day on the beach (but are far more pleasant than that). Finding a European bird along the Atlantic coast of North America however is no easy task but a big event of national dimensions.
This difference is not all too surprising as it can be explained easily with migration patterns and autumn storms.

However, and to the best of my knowledge, no North American species has established a pattern of regular occurrence in Europe, let alone a breeding population, even though dozens of individuals of dozens of species are storm driven to the UK and France each year. When Ring-billed Gulls started to hit European west coasts in masses each winter in the 1980ies (roughly around that time anyway), everyone thought they'd soon start to breed.
Again to the best of my knowledge, that still hasn't happened.
The Scottish Spotted Sandpipers? Well, that was one pair, one year a long time ago (in 1975), it was an unsuccessful attempt and the birds never came back. Nothing even remotely resembling the establishing of a breeding population.

In North America the picture is a completely different one: Little and Black-headed Gulls have quickly established themselves as breeding birds on the New Continent and the Lesser Black-backed is soon to follow, if it isn't breeding regularly already.

So the score is 3 : 0 at the least (Northern Wheat-ear? Eurasian Teal?), a bit of an uneven score if you ask me.

Now finally, the North American avifauna has given us in Europe a Tit for our multitude of Tats. And it is thanks to one man on a mission that we know of it.

Jens Hering, a German birdwatcher with a strong and respectable scientific touch from Saxonia, has spent a few summer seasons on the Azores, a small group of islands out in the central North Atlantic that are politically part of Portugal and biogeographically part of the Western Palearctic region, so have nothing to do whatsoever with North America. All ours.

The Azores have gained a lot of fame in European birding circles recently as a sure-fire destination for finding heaps and masses of Nearctic/North American vagrants in autumn, especially after a few decent October storms.
Very few people visit the Azores during the breeding season as most of the species breeding there can also be seen during the Nearctic Twitches in autumn or elsewhere year-round in the Western Palearctic.

Big mistake, as Jens Hering demonstrated very impressively.

In June 2008, he was able to observe several Black Ducks, yeah Black Ducks, on a small pond on the island of Flores, one of the westernmost islands of the archipelago. After much effort time-wise and physically, he was able to photograph a female Black Duck on that pond which was being followed by three ducklings aged between 14 and 20 days! Several drake Black Ducks were also in the vicinity.
His amazing find was published in the German birding magazine Limicola:

Hering, Jens (2008): Erster Brutnachweis der Dunkelente Anas rubripes für die Westpaläarktis auf den Azoren. Limicola 22: 181-187.

Black Ducks had been seen on Flores for quite a few years already before his breeding record, and especially the observations from 1998 and 2000 strongly suggested a successful breeding in those respective years there as well as the birds seen included not only adults but also young birds in their first year. However, as these young birds were observed in late summer and were perfectly able to fly, they did not constitute a definitive breeding record for Flores as it was quite possible they were wind-driven vagrants from North America in much the same way as the accompanying adults were.
Jens Hering now finally managed to provide the proof everyone expected but never managed for so long!

Well done!

This breeding record of the American Black Duck on the Azores seems to represent - yet again but for the last time in this post: to the best of my knowledge - the first incident ever of a North American bird species establishing what is likely a stable breeding population on the other side of the Atlantic.

By a duck.
Not a sandpiper, not a gull, not a hummingbird or motmot - nope, a mighty duck.
Quack!

A little addendum some might find interesting:
As soon as he had found the breeding Black Ducks, he was faced with a tough identification challenge.
As we all know, there are three species of Black Duck on this planet, one in North America, one on the west side of the Pacific and one in Africa. With the Azores Black Ducks clearly being vagrants, anything was possible so the intrepid discoverer had to establish if those Duckies were of African or North American origin. The Pacific option was simply too far off to be worth considering.
The identification of the BD's as being American was quickly done however when one of the birds stretched its wing to expose (I am sure on purpose) the diagnostic wing pattern.
I have summarized their identification in the image below for the two most typical/representative subspecies.

Now, the alert-minded reader will not fail to notice that there can't be a Texan race of the American Black Duck as it is not known to breed or even occur regularly in that state.

Good point, indeed.
But wrong point.
So where's the good in it? No idea, I just didn't want to appear rude.

Well, you see, I have conducted my own bit of research and established beyond scientific doubt that there is an as yet undocumented population of Black Ducks in the swamps of the "Big Thicket" in far eastern Texas. When seen in flight, the Texan Black Duck's secondaries appear white from above (with the white stripes overshadowing the red ones) and the underwing is largely white as well as in all other forms of Black Duck. The Texan population lives along wooded oxbow lakes and bayous, likes to perch behind tree trunks and is really hard to photograph unless a birder's attention is drawn to it by the nasal Red-breasted Nuthatch-like calls that are so unique to that subspecies.

Go figure.

A final thought on the breeding record though: how can we know for sure the young ducklings really hatched on the Azores? When they were observed swimming around in the small pond on Flores with their mom, they were between 14 and 20 days old, and we all know that ducklings can swim right after hatching.

Now, if the ducklings hatched at the nearest North American breeding site in Newfoundland, a mere 1,938 km away, and swam towards Flores, they would only have had to swim between 97 and 138 km per day, which translates to a speed of only 4 to 5.75 km/hour.

I am pretty confident ducklings are capable of that.

English makes me smile

2009-05-25T09:48:00.003+02:00

Well, this is largely off-topic, but today's Wikipedia main page reminded me again of how funny and peculiar (in a friendly way) the English language often is to someone who did not grow up with it but learned it at school or through "doing" on prolonged stays abroad in English-speaking countries (US, Canada, southern Africa), or in short: to me.

So what was up with Wikipedia today?

Well, I am aware that many western countries, in particular the US, are having problems with a large part of their respective populations being slightly or slightly less slightly overweight. People really need to monitor their eating habits more closely and initiatives to lose weight are always welcome. However, the Diet of Worms may be pushing it a bit too far.

Something else I recently came across:

Mouse - Mice
Louse - Lice
Spouse - Spice ?

And lastly, as this is still a birding blog, I have often wondered if the Dovekie (or Little Auk) may offer a clue as to how the word Plover is really pronounced.

If only I knew how to pronounce "Dovekie"...

A New Blog

2009-05-20T12:01:00.002+02:00

I just started a new blog.

Okay, how much longer do I have to wait until you'll stop laughing and will read on?
Still some more?

Well, fine, you're welcome, I always enjoy good humour when I am the victim of it.

You see, you make a good point saying I should first start to blog on Belltower Birding again with anything even remotely resembling some sort of frequency.

But then, I felt that this blog was about stories I want to write.

And looking at my posts, I noticed that I recently had simply one or two too many "Look, I found this odd bird, here are the pictures, any suggestions?" - themed posts, and I found that a bit disruptive and rather boring - although the many visitors were nice.

So anyway, for these ID-Issues I started a new blog.

It is called "Dr. Jekyll and Birder Hyde" (don't ask, I won't tell you anyway) and will feature my mystery birds as I find them.

The first mystery post is up, an egg shell I recently found in Germany. So if you have any kind of knowledge on egg shells, give it a shot over at Birder Hyde.
You'll be a better person for it - just come back, Tom, will you.

A Reply to Patrick's Question

2009-05-05T14:43:00.009+02:00

Patrick (you know, the ONLY Patrick) has a new post up here which I find really neat. Here's what he has to say:

"Ok, time for a poll. What's your favorite warbler song? Let's stick with North American wood warblers. "

What a great idea!

It is May after all, and as birders get ready to storm the Parks, Points and Presqu'Iles in search of warblers, he has lured them into listening to their bird song CDs and refine their acoustic birding skills.

Clever, in a very educational way.

I read some of the comments with great interest and lo and behold (or rather shock and awe):
it got me thinking.

And you see, there is a problem.

The problem with Patrick's question is that most of the answers in the comments section are by North American birders. Therefore, and very naturally so, these answers are biased as the commenters are all born and raised amongst the warblers or other birds of North America and connect certain great/memorable birding moments with a certain warbler song.
So it is not really the song they find is their greatest/favourite one but that particular connection or memory.

Problem recognized is problem solved.

If your locals are all under the influence, ask the sober stranger.

It is thus with great pleasure that I present (trumpets, please) here on Belltowerbirding and (as of currently) nowhere else the un-biased truth, the fact beyond the fiction of other people's mindset, the truly and objectively so greatest warbler song in all of North America.

Here is what the newbie - the European birder who has only spend a ridiculous two springs in North America - has to say about it:

North American warblers look absolutely amazing but their songs are - frankly - mostly crap. Come on, it is no use denying, I have made personal painful experiences with the subject:

I spent hours and hours listening to the Stokes' CDs while driving from migration hot spot to migration hot spot trying to memorize those songs but essentially and to the untrained / unbiased ear they all sound exactly the same!

"Blackburnian Warbler: chip chip cheeeep
Chestnut-sided Warbler: cheeep chip chip cheeeep
Black-throated Green Warbler: chip cheeeep chip cheeeep"

As I was driving in a rental, I gave the CD player a few decent blows as I thought the CD was stuck on "repeat".

Turns out it wasn't.

I then returned the CD to the store and demanded a refund as the cover had promised something like 50 different bird songs which obviously wasn't the case, just the same song 50 times.

They appeared to be amused, but I got neither my money back, nor my 50 different bird songs. You see, I just didn't realize that exactly this would be what I'd get at Point Pelee and elsewhere:

Chips and cheeps.

Good side: hardly any heard-only lifers.
Bad side: a handful of missed lifers.

Geez.

And if one warbler - like the Ovenbird - sound unlike the other warblers, it sounds like a completely different North American bird species, so it's no better than the rest.
Yes, you may find it ridiculous but for a first-time-spring-birder in North America, it is hard to tell an Ovenbird from a Cardinal or a Carolina Wren.

Teacher-teacher-tea-kettle-tea-kettle-teacher-tea-kettle my behind!
Come on, these birds just can't ever be serious, right?
The jester-pesters.
In a very friendly way, I kid because I still love birds, of course, and warblers in particular.

Well, you are right, rant off for now.

So what is - viewed neutrally - the best warbler song in North America?

Well, obviously it is the Blue-winged Warbler.

Why?

Well, because its song is a deep, sad and desperate sigh of disappointment, a sigh resulting from the desperation that it (and its whole group) have such great looks but just cannot sing very well and that this will get you very far in the humans' music industry but it just ain't no good when you're a bird.

Praise the Buzzard, hail to the Crows (and some credit to the sparrow, too)

2009-04-29T10:23:00.021+02:00

So this is how you do it:

1. Spot a rare and difficult to identify bird.

2. Photograph it.

3. Put the pictures on your blog.

4. Notify the local birding / twitching community through a few email lists.

5. Lean back with a drink and relax.

6. Watch the number of visitors to your blog soar (especially cool when the bird you recorded was a raptor).

A sweet 180 visitors - This was by far and a wide margin the highest number of visitors per day ever on Belltowerbirding. Only once before did I manage a three-digit number of (I think) 132 when I hosted I and the Bird.

So praise the Buzzard for showing itself, hail to the Crows for mobbing it and drawing my attention to the hawk and cheers to all those visitors who were either curious or skeptical and thought the news worthy of being checked out.

Please come back again.

I know you [the ones who came here for the Buzzard and the Buzzard only] probably won't as there will not be Buzzards here every day, but it was still nice having you around and I appreciated your presence here.

Rock on.

There are still good birds to be seen and themes to be blogged about.
It is spring, the birds' migrations are all over us and I like that.

By the way, the smaller Friday peak was my Savannah Sparrow post at which I hinted in an Email to the SE Michigan birding list. You see, it always works, it's just that raptors are apparently almost four times as popular with birders as New World sparrows are.

Who'd have guessed?

Adlerbussard/Long-legged Buzzard bei/near Leimen

2009-04-28T13:26:00.012+02:00

[Dear regular readers: last weekend was yet again outstanding. Well, I didn't log a fine male Prothonotary Warbler but this would surely be asking a whole lot too much for a weekend in central Europe. However, I spotted and photographed what I am more than confident is a 2nd cy Long-legged Buzzard near my home"town" of Leimen in Germany, a very rare straggler to Germany with only a few observations each year - if that many at all. Sadly, I currently don't have the time to blog about it the way the bird deserves to be blogged about, and this post's aim is solely to offer others the possibility to check out the pictures and comment if they want. The rest of the post will therefore be written in German - first time ever on Belltower Birding - but of course anyone in the English-speaking world with an opinion on the bird is very much invited to comment. Cheers, more blogging soon to come your way - on other blogs for sure, but likely also on mine.]

Die folgenden Bilder eines sehr wahrscheinlichen (oder vielleicht sogar sicheren, denke ich mal) Adlerbussards im 2. Kalenderjahr konnte ich am Sonntag 26.04.2009, 11:38 bis 11:42 Uhr zwischen Leimen und Nussloch (südlich Heidelberg) anfertigen.
Der Vogel wurde zunächst von zwei Rabenkrähen genervt, kreiste daher langsam nach Norden in meine Richtung und zog schließlich im Gleitflug dicht an mir vorbei (ich fand's klasse) nach Süd-Ost.
Insbesondere bei seinem dichten Vorbeigleiten fiel die sehr beeindruckende Größe des Vogels auf.
Die Proportionen weisen ebenfalls deutlich in Richtung Adlerbussard: lange eher schmal wirkende Flügel mit fast parallelem Vorder- und Hinterrand, großer und weit nach vorne gestreckter Kopf sowie langer und auffallend anders geformter Schwanz im Vergleich zum Mäusebussard.
Auch die Färbung spricht neben den Proportionen eindeutig - meiner Meinung nach - für einen Adlerbussard, am wichtigsten folgende Merkmale: hell zimtfarbene Steuern auch oberseits, diese nur ganz schwach hell rotbraun gebändert (K2), fast ungezeichnete Unterseite mit deutlichen schwarzen Karpalflecken und kleinen dunklen Flecken an den Flanken, helles Feld auf dem Oberflügel.

Insgesamt liegen 52 Fotos vor, hier nur eine kleine Auswahl (ich kann also bei konkreten Fragen gerne nachliefern):

Ich würde mich sehr über Kommentare zum Vogel freuen (zustimmend, kritisch oder ablehnend - egal) . Das Blog ist zwar generell in Englisch gehalten, aber deutsche Kommentare sind natürlich mehr als willkommen (über die "comments"-Funktion am Ende des Artikels).

Herzlichen Dank und "happy birding trails"

A Strange Savannah Sparrow

2009-04-24T10:44:00.006+02:00

Yes, context IS a rather significant factor in birding.

This post is about a bird Laurent and I had seen on 23rd of May 2007, almost two years ago. It caused me quite a few head-aches back then but as I didn't reach a satisfying conclusion I basically just forgot about it eventually and - as we say in German - let grass grow over it.

Then came Nate's post about a strange Savannah Sparrow here and today, a bird similar to Nate's was reported and photographed in SE Michigan.

So the grass was mowed and the strange 2007 Savannah Sparrow re-emerged from the soil like Phoenix from the ashes to make an appearance here on my blog for you all to see and shake your heads about.

Okay, there was a report of a Nelson's Sparrow from near Point Pelee's tip so we went there in hopes of finding it. Walking along a narrow path through some grassy patches, we eventually flushed a small sparrow from the ground that landed in a small bush nearby. In flight we could clearly see that the outer tail-feathers were white, so it was a suspicious flying thing that merited closer inspection. In today's birding world nothing is worth anything anymore unless it is photographed, so as soon as I had spotted the little bird in the bush, I completely focused on taking pictures and managed the two shots presented below.

You can actually see the white on the outer tail and I find the bird surprisingly Ammodramus-like in general appearance for a Savannah and also rather intensively reddish brown.
But see for yourselves:

What makes this bird particularly interesting is the tail pattern: the Sibley guide states that white outer tail feathers are a feature of "western subspecies" although sadly, sadly he doesn't specify which ones and where they occur.

The third picture shows a Savannah Sparrow on territory (awfully cropped) near Point Pelee and was taken on the same day. It is included here as a reference for the typical local breeding birds and - dang - can you tell the difference?

I sure can!

As before, comments are highly appreciated!

There may be more to it than just Context

2009-04-23T12:19:00.005+02:00

Context may play a good part in concealing some bird species from the dangers abounding around them.

It allows them to sleep soundly...

... or recharge undisturbed for the migration flights ahead ...

... but if your plumage is lacking even the basic prerequisites, neither context nor desperate measures will get you beyond a nice try.

Birders from the British Isles: I need your help!

2009-04-20T10:44:00.012+02:00

Am I lucky or not?

That is a good question, and I hope a few fellow birders from the UK and Ireland (or elsewhere) can help me answer it.

For the last few couple' years, I was more than interested in the different forms of the White (or whatever) Wagtail, Motacilla alba etc., that may or may not occur here in Germany.

So whenever and wherever I chanced upon one such bird, I studied it at length and with passion and affection.

Now, last week's Thursday was one such event, and to my great surprise and astonishment, the wagtail I was looking at was quite a bit darker than the usual albas and even had a few black areas on the "shoulders".

So it seems I had found a Pied Wagtail, Motacilla (alba or not) yarrellii from the British Isles, a surprisingly rare bird for the south-west of Germany with probably not even one observation each year (can you believe it? I can't, but that's another story).

Well, being a form so rarely reported in Germany away from the immediate North Sea coast, there are always a lot of discussions, issues and raised eyebrows connected to reports of it and if you have not seen a completely black-backed and classic male (which the bird I am referring to wasn't), then people will always tell you that ordinary albas may sometimes be quite dark as well and show black areas and that the yarrellii you have observed was likely just an ordinary alba or at the most a hybrid alba x yarrellii anyway.

Frankly, amongst the definite breeding birds in Germany (birds seen after the middle of May when migration really is over) I have only once seen a bird with a few black marks that might or might not have really been a hybrid. But apart from that, anything blackish or darkish where an alba is light grey is something I would strongly associate with yarrellii.

But as I have never really been to the British Isles, I may (or may not) have no idea what I am thinking or talking about. Thankfully though, there are the blessings of the bloggosphere and the Internet and if there are birding issues I am lacking expertise in (oh no!!!), I can just ask ...

... YOU!

So, please, if you have anything to say about the bird - whatsoever - let's hear it in the comments section.

By the way and before you scroll down to the pics, there is a second "mystery" bird following the wagtail, a Yellowhammer, so if the wagtail doesn't float your boat the other bird might and you'd possibly care to take a quick look.

Cheers, thanks in advance for your comments and happy birding trails!

Okay, now on to the Yellowhammer.

The following pictures show what I would call either a female Yellowhammer or - as I have no clue how to age Yellowhammers and am simply too lazy to look it up now - an immature 2nd CY bird.

At first glance, this looks like a typical bird but I have found a few features odd:

- The lesser coverts have white tips. This can occur sometimes and I have seen it once in a while on Yellowhammers, but it is quite rare.

- The greater coverts however have a white margin as well, and this is something I don't recall having ever seen on a Yellowhammer. Interestingly, the bird has moulted one of its coverts (the innermost) and the fresh one is of the neat rufous you'd expect to see in a Yellowhammer. But can the older, whitish ones be so heavily bleached?

- The colouration of the tertials is puzzling to me, too. The margin is supposed to be rufous and rather broad on the outer web with the extension towards the feather's centre so typical of the Emberiza-buntings. The tertials of the mystery bird however show a rather narrow whitish margin that is lacking the Emberiza-extension. Of course some of the margin is abraded, this is obvious, but still it is a more than strange pattern - in my honest and humble opinion.

- the central part of the back is almost white and reminiscent of an Arctic/Hoary Redpoll. This is also something I haven't seen before on a Yellowhammer.

- the neck is quite grey which is a pattern found frequently on Yellowhammers, but I have never noticed it as being so obvious as on this bird.

So, the big question is:

Can this be an ordinary Yellowhammer and I have as yet simply an over-simplified image of the species' variation? (Ha! Remember that stereotype post?)

Can this be an abnormal Yellowhammer, a mutation of some sort?

Can this be a hybrid with another species of bunting and if so, with which?

As with the wagtail, any comments whatsoever are highly appreciated.

Of course, if there is someone out there who knows for sure this is not a Yellowhammer after all but a classic individual of a highly range-restricted super-rare and special East Asian bunting that's never been recorded West of Tibet before: step forward valiantly and speak out. Your case will surely be met with more than just massive interest.

Thanks, cheers and here - finally! - are the pictures:

Will we live to see ...

2009-04-08T10:18:00.000+02:00

... the Return of the King ?

Way To Go, Bell Tower Birder (quite literally)!!

2009-03-30T12:17:00.003+02:00

The ultimate bird blog (getting better every day) 10,000 birds has reached the magic milestone of 1,000,000 visitors.

This is quite a milestone to reach for a bird blog.

So I quickly did my math and established that I'll be where they are now in no more than

114 years

Bell Tower Birding: It's all about keeping things in perspective!

On Stereotypes, but not on Tilley Hats or Birding Vests

2009-03-27T11:20:00.004+01:00

Last week, I was happy.
I am happy most of the time, but last week I was particularly happy as I was particularly lucky.
My job required me to spend two days of solitude in nature, a most valuable experience, roaming a natural area that’s out of bounds for pretty much everyone but me and having nothing else to do but check what neat animals might be around.
As this was my job, I am sworn to secrecy and cannot tell you of the wonderful things I saw, like the Crested Newts that were so numerous it made me dizzy counting them, the Eagle Owl perched on a fence whose calls accompanied me throughout the night while counting the Newts, the Eurasian Woodcock I flushed or the flock of Common Cranes that flew over at sunset.
Nope, you’ll never know about these things – ever.

But what I may tell you about is what I experienced at the hotel I was staying at, during breakfast.

As I was working mostly at night, I slept in each morning and had a long and extensive breakfast at the hotel before heading out again (after a short after-breakfast nap).
During the first day of my staying at the hotel, there was some sort of business meeting and the hotel was packed full with … well … stereotype business men and women in their shirts, suits, ties and costumes.
On the first morning (I sat alone at a small table facing the room) I watched two businessmen at the table next to me having breakfast.

Now, before I continue I need to stress that even though I thoroughly enjoy talking about or making fun of stereotypes I have enjoyed a humanistic education, consider myself quite tolerant and would never, ever judge any person by the stereotype I think they might belong to but solely by their actions towards others. That said, I had a great morning of stereotyping with even a good lesson learned on why stereotypes are crap and what they tell you about birding.

So, there were these two men having breakfast right next to me. For the sake of better understanding, let’s call one BM (big macho) and the other LW (little wimp).

These two couldn't have been more different:

BM was not fat but a strong and big man, a typical “beef-eater” type. He had strong arms and muscles showed through his shirt at his chest, a thick neck and a powerful built in general. Despite being German, he was probably of Mediterranean origin as he had thick black hair and his skin was rather dark.
LW was very tall but exceedingly thin, his arms appeared to be made of straw and his legs that barely filled his trousers would have made a Black-necked Stilt feel overweight. He was blond and pale.

BM was sitting with both elbows on the table (this is not considered particularly rude in Germany as opposed to the US), had his legs slightly spread and when he was not leaning over the table, he was leaning back in a relaxed yet manly posture.
LW was sitting straight, his knees pressed together under the table and bent at a 90° angle, his elbows were off the table but tightly against his ribs (the posture deemed well-behaved in Germany) and he never leaned forward or backward but his torso was always straight.

BM was wearing a light blue shirt with a dark blue tie, no jewellery of any kind.
LW was wearing a pink shirt and a tie with a delicate pattern of pink and light grey, he was wearing a small diamond (or crystal) earring in one ear.

BM had apparently used a razor (wet, with foam and a blade, not sure how to describe it in English as opposed to an electric shaver).
LW had apparently used an electric shaver.

Even though it had already been a stereotype feast so far, it even got better when they both grabbed their breakfast eggs at the same time [In Germany, we usually eat boiled eggs, not fried / scrambled for breakfast, and we “open” the boiled egg at the top and use a small spoon to eat the insides, with the yolk preferably still being slightly liquid at the core]:

LW (we’ll start with him this time) placed the egg in one hand upright, took his breakfast knife by the blade using the knife’s grip as a club and hammered it on the top side of the egg about 30 or more times in very quick succession but with very little force. He then put the knife back on the table besides his plate, keeping the egg as it was in the other hand, and then started to peel off the very small fragments of egg shell very thoroughly one by one and with high concentration, placing the loose pieces neatly on the rim of his plate.
BM took the egg, placed it laterally onto the table and beheaded the poor thing with one violent yet precise blow of his knife.

I barely managed to control and suppress a spontaneous outburst of laughter and thought to myself that despite being something to condemn, there was possibly even a grain of truth in stereotypes.

But then it happened:

LW was apparently full while BM was still hungry (so far, so good), so BM got up again and walked over to the breakfast buffet.

There, he took a small bowl and filled it neither with cornflakes nor with yogurt (both marginally so but still acceptable for the real men out there) but with MUESLI, yes, muesli!

My stereotype world already began to crumble and I thus continued to watch in horrified surprise, but the whole picture I had constructed of him finally and completely imploded when he also grabbed a piece of fresh fruit, a banana, pealed it, cut it into very thin slices, all of the same thickness to which he paid a good amount of attention, and mixed it under his muesli which he than began to eat slowly with a coffee spoon.

Stereotypes, I tells you, stereotypes. They just aren't what they used to be.

So, what does that tell you about birds and birding?

Two things.

First of all, birding is much more of a mindset than a hobby, it is about the way we see instead of look, are alert and under constant vigilance and always apply our keen and observing senses to the world around us. It is an addictive way of life, a path through the world that once taken will not allow you to stray even for one step and you can't help but observe always, everywhere and all the time.

This at least is the only way I have of explaining without loss of face why I spent so much time and energy watching two guys have breakfast.

But then, it also tells you something about birds.

When we identify birds, we have a firm and fixed image in mind, which is matching the image we see in a field guide.
This picture of a species however is not how each individual bird of a given species looks like, it is the grand average of all the birds of that species, the ... drum roll, trumpets ... stereotype image!

When we watch a single bird of a particular species, we can quickly check the important field marks and place it in a category, which is the species, sex or age the bird belongs to:
"This is a male adult ABC Warbler molting from non-breeding to breeding plumage"

The longer we watch this bird however, the more time we invest, the more details we will find in which this particular individual differs from the stereotype image, e.g. in subtle ways of its patterning or the progress of its moult.

In most cases, this will only lead to a more thorough understanding of variation within a species, but in some cases, the parting from a stereotype image is vital for the bird's identification.

A Common Redpoll not exactly matching the stereotype might end up being a sought-after Hoary/Arctic and the strange "ringtail" Montague's Harrier might actually turn out to be the vagrant Pallid we had hoped for so passionately. But if we just place each bird in a category according to the stereotype image that is dominating our mind after a quick glance and without ever giving it any more thought, these species will seemingly avoid our detection and be cursed as our Nemesis.

So there you have it: Stereotypes are crap and need to be eradicated in human interactions as well as birding.
It makes life better that way.

Nice idea

2009-03-25T16:17:00.004+01:00

Gunnar Engblom of Birding Peru came up with what I think is a neat idea, to write a book on the "1,000 birds to see before you die".
As the choice of species is a rather subjective matter, he's asking other birders to help him out by submitting their top 100 here.
What I find very interesting is Gunnar's intention of producing the book as a free e-book or to eventually use it to raise money for species in peril in cooperation with Birdlife International.

Sounds like it is not only a fun thing to do after all but something that might eventually make a difference.

Here is my top 100 list for those interested (no need to scroll down otherwise).
Frankly, choosing the top 100 from roughly 10,000 species was a bit hard since I sadly don't have field experiences with all the bird species in the world (working on it though). I also didn't have the time or literature to go through pictures of all the world's birds, so my choice is based on
a) what I have either seen already or at least know about from my travels or
b) on birds that are so prominent in one way or another that I have heard of them without specific search, sort of by simply being interested in birds, reading blogs, magazines, owning general birding books and other comparable coincidences.

Furthermore, I always tried to keep in mind the "see before you die" aspect, so I think the species must be very peculiar and unique. Therefore, I have not chosen a hummingbird, a trogon, a kiwi, a sunbird or any member of other flashy and colourful bird groups from the tropics (yes, I know the kiwis are neither colourful nor tropical, but it makes the sentence easier to read that way):
I think everyone ought to see at least one hummer and one species of kiwi before they leave for good, but which one they see seems less important from the perspective of mortality. So none of the species in the groups mentioned made the top 100, although each group as a whole surely would have achieved a very high ranking on my list.

Well, another little snag I hit:
I have two favourite birds, the Bearded Vulture as a firm and eternal No. 1 (yeah, pittas, even if I ever lay eyes on one of you ... not a chance, hear me, not - a - chance!) and the New Zealand Fantail a firm and eternal yet very close No. 2 (possibly along with other species of fantail if I ever get to see them).
For the rest of the top 100, the rating was done without giving it too much thought. A little thought was put in it, of course, or else the whole thing would be pointless. Still, any questions on why I rated species X three times higher than species Z is likely to remain unanswered if you expect more than a "just because" from me.

For the spoonbilled sandpiper and quite a few others on the list, the question should sadly be "rate the top 100 species you'd like to see before they die", but if this whole book idea does work out and money is raised for Birdlife International, we might still turn the tides.

Anyway, that's the way the cooky crumbles and here's the list. Species in red are the ones I have already seen (adding that little showing-off element to the whole business of rating your top 100), species in black would be very nice lifers.

100 Bearded Vulture Gypaetus barbatus
99 New Zealand Fantail Rhipidura fuliginosa
98 Great Grey Owl Strix nebulosa
97 Wandering Albatross Diomedea exulans
96 Red-breasted Goose Branta ruficollis
95 Ivory Gull Pagophila eburnea
94 Spoon-billed Sandpiper Eurynorhynchus pygmeus
93 Northern Raven Corvus corax
92 Ross’s Gull Rhodostethia rosea
91 White-throated Sparrow Zonotrichia albicollis
90 Resplendent Quetzal Pharomachrus mocinno
89 Ostrich Struthio camelus
88 King Eider Somateria spectabilis
87 Andean Condor Vultur gryphus
86 Snowy Owl Bubo scandiacus
85 Philippine Eagle Pithecophaga jefferyi
84 Harpy Eagle Harpia harpyja
83 Ibisbill Ibidorhyncha struthersii
82 Dalmatian Pelican Pelecanus crispus
81 Spinifex Pigeon Geophaps plumifera
80 Gurney's Pitta Pitta gurneyi
79 Mandarin Duck Aix galericulata
78 Shoebill Balaeniceps rex
77 Ruff Philomachus pugnax
76 Scarlet Ibis Eudocimus ruber
75 Smew Mergellus albellus
74 Atlantic Puffin Fratercula arctica
73 Wallcreeper Tichodroma muraria
72 Harlequin Duck Histrionicus histrionicus
71 Kea Nestor notabilis
70 Blue Jay Cyanocitta cristata
69 Superb Fairywren Malurus cyaneus
68 Dupont's Lark Chersophilus duponti
67 Azure Tit Cyanistes cyanus
66 Firecrest Regulus ignicapilla
65 Eurasian Bullfinch Pyrrhula pyrrhula
64 Green Jay Cyanocorax yncas
63 Crimson-breasted Shrike Laniarius atrococcineus
62 Ocellated Turkey Meleagris ocellata
61 Yellowhammer Emberiza citrinella
60 Broad-tailed Paradise Whydah Vidua obtusa
59 Evening Grosbeak Coccothraustes vespertinus
58 Black Bee-eater Merops gularis
57 Blackburnian Warbler Dendroica fusca
56 Egyptian Plover Pluvianus aegyptius
55 Black Lark Melanocorypha yeltoniensis
54 Mute Swan Cygnus olor
53 Kagu Rhynochetos jubatus
52 Hoatzin Opisthocomus hoazin
51 Eurasian Hoopoe Upupa epops
50 Wrybill Anarhynchus frontalis
49 Northern Lapwing Vanellus vanellus
48 White Tern Gygis alba
47 Pin-tailed Sandgrouse Pterocles alchata
46 European Goldfinch Carduelis carduelis
45 Yellow-billed Loon Gavia adamsii
44 Mountain Bluebird Sialia currucoides
43 Greater Painted Snipe Rostratula benghalensis
42 Varied Thrush Ixoreus naevius
41 Gyrfalcon Falco rusticolus
40 Connecticut Warbler Oporornis agilis
39 Kentucky Warbler Oporornis formosus
38 African Skimmer Rynchops flavirostris
37 Steller's Sea Eagle Haliaeetus pelagicus
36 Lyre-tailed Nightjar Uropsalis lyra
35 Sunbittern Eurypyga helias
34 Marabou Stork Leptoptilos crumeniferus
33 Superb Lyrebird Menura novaehollandiae
32 Black Grouse Tetrao tetrix
31 Secretarybird Sagittarius serpentarius
30 Ovenbird Seiurus aurocapilla
29 Pied Thrush Zoothera wardii
28 Painted Bunting Passerina ciris
27 Blue Crane Athropoides paradiseus
26 Black Heron Egretta ardesiaca
25 Golden-winged Warbler Vermivora chrysoptera
24 Northern Parula Parula americana
23 Black-throated Blue Warbler Dendroica caerulescens
22 Black-and-white Warbler Mniotilta varia
21 African Finfoot Podica senegalensis
20 Flightless Cormorant Phalacrocorax harrisi
19 Violet-backed Starling Cinnyricinclus leucogaster
18 House Sparrow Passer domesticus
17 Locust Finch Paludipasser locustella
16 Scarlet Tanager Piranga olivacea
15 Bohemian Waxwing Bombycilla garrulus
14 Royal Spoonbill Platelea regia
13 Great Bustard Otis tarda
12 Pied Avocet Recurvirostra avosetta
11 Grey-necked Rockfowl Picathartes oreas
10 Bluethroat Luscinia svecica
9 Sage Grouse Centrocercus urophasianus
8 Beautiful Nuthatch Sitta formosa
7 Blue Swallow Hirundo atrocaerulea
6 Gray's Lark Ammomanopsis grayi
5 Olive-sided Flycatcher Contopus cooperi
4 Budgerigar Melopsittacus undulatus
3 White-winged Flufftail Sarothrura ayresi
2 Black Harrier Circus maurus
1 Christmas Frigatebird Fregata andrewsi

In the News: Well-known Blogger botches up and misses his chance to rake in US $ 50,000

2009-03-23T14:51:00.010+01:00

Okay, these things can easily happen. It's happened to me a few times, and if you are a birder, it has more than likely happened to you as well:
We miss out on a grand once-in-a-lifetime birding chance, or rather: we mess up bird-wise despite being at the right place at the right time.
Most of the time, we won't notice, e.g. we simply don't see our ultimate nemesis bird sitting right behind us out in the open while we are fully concentrated on scanning the landscape in front of us for said nemesis bird. So the frustration is limited to having just had another fruitless attempt at getting a nemesis as we will never know just how incredibly close we actually were.
Sometimes however, and more and more frequently in an age of endless photographic possibilities, we learn afterwards what we had missed out in the field and the disappointment is heart-breaking.
Yes, I see you need an example to understand what I mean.
Surely many of us will recognize this situation:
You show some slides (wait, make that a power point presentation) from your last birding holiday to a few birding pals of yours and all they do is constantly point out birds in the background of your pictures, birds you hadn't noticed out in the field when photographing the bird in front. This in itself is nice, but it will downright kill you if these background birds are the lifers you wanted to get so desperately on that holiday but had missed - so you thought.
The knowledge of having missed those birds through sheer ... well ... not-being-focussedness, through a birding mistake instead of just never having actually been close to one, is one of the most frustrating emotions I have ever experienced in birding.
Luckily though, I was the guy who pointed out the birds, so I have experienced it passively, so to speak.
[This has really happened to me: I showed my friend two "missed lifers" on his holiday slides, Citrine Wagtail while he took pics of a Reef Heron and Spanish Sparrow in his picture of a White Stork's nest. I can't say I enjoyed it, but it was a noteworthy evening].
Aaaanyway. So this can be extremely frustrating. But what would you say and feel if you not only messed up a chance to get a lifer but if this lifer was worth US $ 50,000?

I don't know.
You surely also won't know.

But hey, I know someone we can ask:

Hello Nate, my friend!
Are you with us tonight?

Good.

So, there you were in the Carolinas (crowd holds breath),
in March (part of the crowd starts murmuring),
in a swamp forest (murmuring gets considerably louder)
and you took this photograph [reproduced here with your kind permission] ...

... without noticing that you had just flushed a large black-and-white woodpecker off the far site of a trunk?
(crowd explodes!)

Look closely, my friend:

See that black body?

The largely white underwing pattern?

The black wing tip?

Haven't you seen something like this before, somewhere on the internet?

And isn't there a US $ 50,000 reward for a conclusive picture?

So tell our valued readers, Nate, how does it feel?

The Post that didn't make it

2009-03-03T07:14:00.007+01:00

This collection of random thoughts was meant to not appear here but on Sharon Stiteler's birdchick page, as the winning entry of her Swarovski contest that would earn me the pair of binoculars needed so urgently to turn my non-birding wife into what everyone ought to be:
a bird enthusiast.

Apparently, the post got lost on the internet somehow when I sent it to her and therefore didn't even make the top 10. Yes, these things happen all the time.
The post is all about the role names play in birding, a subject I touched before and might even look at again:

Democracy is the little brother of Evolution. Really, it is. A lot of democracy’s greatness comes from the fact that it is surprisingly darwinistic, and their affectionate relationship is being much appreciated this year, the year we celebrated Darwin’s 200th birthday and witnessed the peaceful shift of power from one hand on to the next. Democracy – like evolution - is all about the survival of the fittest and in this case strength or fitness lies in numbers, or majority of votes. The majority principle also applies to the social aspects of life and the values and criteria we apply to judge our fellow citizens. This is where democracy really hits the homes of birders: the majority of the people around us see us – the birders - as geeks, and as they are many, they must be right. There can be no denying it: the firm association of birding with geekness is rooted so deeply in society it almost got manifested in the United States Declaration of Independence, the product of one of democracy’s finer hours. An early draft version, which read as follows

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all birders are created geeky”

was only changed to what it is today after the influential naturalist and early birder William Bartram convinced Thomas Jefferson over a tea or two that he was only in it for fame and fortunes. Good man, that Bartram, so never mind that King Vulture incident. This close shave with eternal embarrassment clearly demonstrates that we, as birders, may disagree all we want yet the fact remains: in the eyes of the world, birders are not placed right in the centre of the curve that depicts the Gaussian distribution of normality in a given population.
We may indeed hold a position closer to the curve’s periphery.
Heck, we might not even make the curve at all.

It’s not all bad and lost though as some birders have optimistically set out to set the record straight and give birds and birding the place they deserve, at the heart of today’s society. The first step of foremost importance for those intrepid birders thriving to change the geek image is surely to identify the cause for this awkward misconception. And in deep sympathy and support of their quest I offer my fair share of thoughts in the following paragraphs.
This is how I see it:

Some of the reasons why birders cause fellow citizens to raise an eyebrow or two in suspicion may pertain to their maintaining an interest in small brown birds despite being consistently informed by the concerned passer-by that there are Bald Eagles around.
Other factors may vaguely be connected to the preference for Tilley hats, the wearing of multifunctional poly-pocket birder’s vests, and wrapping one’s shoes in neon duct tape during excursions.
However, while all this may be part of the problem the real culprit has nothing to do with the things a birder looks at or uses to dress up with. It’s the birder’s vocabulary or rather their vocalisations that frequently causes distress to those non-birders caught unexpectedly in a conversation on birds.
Seriously, nothing will increase your geek score like throwing in a few decent bird names during a casual conversation on past time activities. Admittedly some bird names aren’t all that bad and reach a certain level of social acceptance. Casually mentioning Ivory Gull, Lucifer Hummingbird or Gyrfalcon during a conversation may even leave a lasting impression on those around you.
Sadly we don’t get to use those names all that often.
Most bird names however are just pathetic. Northern Beardless Tyrannulet springs to mind immediately – the poor creature. Others – like Phainopepla - will likely get you an appointment with your personal rehabber if you try to say them three times in a row real fast, so you had better not come across a small flock of these. Other bird names are even downright dangerous and may get you in serious trouble. Yes, they do! Have you ever tried to have a conversation on the Bridled Titmouse amongst a group of minors when some of their parents were around? This is something I really do not recommend.
Apparently, the frustration amongst birders about frequently having to use lingual lapses of reason as names to describe what they feel passionate about has led to another communication breakdown that may be seen by those outside the birdwatching community as … shall we say peculiar? Birders just try to avoid names to such extend that they never use their own or other birder’s names in direct conversation. They just don’t. It doesn’t happen.
“Hi! Seen anything?” is the phrase commonly used at birding hotspots as an introducing ceremony amongst birders while “Is the [insert name of rare bird] still being seen?” or less politely “Where is the [insert name of rare bird]!?” is all you get at sites where a rarity has been sighted previously and is being “chased”.
Obviously, birders are so much focussed on their target that a simple addendum in the form of “Hi, my name is…” is simply too much distraction and a plain waste of birding time.
Of course there are instances when we as birders have to get conversationally more specific about certain persons birding with us or around us. In this case, the clever approach is to combine the person in question with the birds they have seen. This worked quite fine for me during one memorable day at Ontario’s Point Pelee. I had reported a Clay-coloured Sparrow, not a shabby bird at all for the park and a bird others were trying to relocate. So for the rest of the day and wherever I went, I was “The guy who found the Clay-coloured”.
In order to fully appreciate this effect however, one needs to choose their rarity carefully. “Oh look, there’s the guy who found the Bachman’s Warbler” may be something we’d enjoy hearing for a day or two.
On the other hand, it may not raise our spirits quite as much to overhear others saying “Oh look, there’s the guy who discovered the Phaino… Philo… Philha…, you know that black Arizona bird? White in the wings, with reddish eye? That Philanthro, Piano, Picassothingy, you know? Oh forget it, never mind. It probably wasn’t him anyway. - Hey, what’s that bird over there?“

Actually, birders were shown quite clearly how things are done properly in the world of personal introductions not that long ago by a decent man and friend of the birds who also happened to be an acquainted author. Who knows, maybe it was not only the name that he borrowed from a birder for his most famous fictional character. Maybe it was this particular birder’s manners as well.
This is who I am talking about and how I feel things should be handled amongst birders in the future. So next time we meet out in the field:

The name is Clay-coloured. The-guy-who-found-the Clay-coloured.

A new way Gulls mess up my mind

2009-02-24T08:44:00.010+01:00

The grandeur of Northern Gulls is mostly secluded from even the alert and willing observer by geographical constrains, in particular a lack of distributional overlap. Quite apart from their grace by plumage and motion which in themselves render these creatures an aura of magnificense, the intense scarcity of observation possibilities in a birder's life alone places Ross's and Ivory Gull firmly within the top ten of any birder's most desired species.

Those birds are indeed more than hard to come by.
The intrepit North American birder can either visit Alaska in late summer for Ross's and Newfoundland in winter for Ivory, or hope for an odd chance of seeing both birds as vagrants in the lower 48 at some stage in their life, however unlikely that may be.
European birders striving to catch a glimpse of either of these species face even tougher challenges: Ivory Gulls can be found breeding on the remote islands of Svalbard far to the North of northern Norway and may thus be seen during a visit to this (almost) remotest of Europe's corners, but there is no area where one may chance upon a Ross's with any rate of reliability. A few winters spent sea-watching on the Norwegian coast, on Iceland or the Shetland Island or along the harsh winter west coasts of the British Isles may lead to a certain probability for a vagrant record, but this is just about as good as it gets.

Then came this winter, and things changed.

First of all, this winter has seen a small influx of Ivory Gulls to northern Europe. Well, a handful (or slightly less) birds have been found scattered widely across the coasts of the continent, so an influx is a rather strong word, but due to the scarcity of records in other winters we'll just call this year's birds an influx and leave it at that.

Before you start wondering why I started this story in the first place, rest asured that I - of course - did not see any of those Ivory Gulls. In fact, I have not seen any Ivory Gulls at all, which is a shame. But this winter was so peculiar that I just have to point it out to North American readers who may not be aware of the implications it has on searching for the species.

So here we go ...

Despite the occurence of a few birds in the North of the continent, European birders were quite surprised when news came out from France of a bird found on the country's south-west coast, close to the border with Spain. Now, an Ivory Gull is an extremely unusual and rare bird even along the northern coast of France, but this far to the South, it is absolutely astounding. Here are some pictures of the bird.

But ... it even got better. A few days ago, a handful of Dutch birders sought shelter from the winter's miseries in their country and went to the arid landscapes of central Spain. And while scanning through the Mediterranean avian goodies of a lagoon complex south of Madrid, they chanced upon an adult ... now sit down, please ... Ross's Gull!

While the fact that this is only the third ever for Spain alone goes to show how unusual this record is, the additional facts that it is an adult bird and that it was found as far inland as a gull can go in Spain makes it just completely incredible.

Here is a video of the bird, which already is quite smething to see. But if you scroll down this gallery on surfbirds, you'll find a picture from February 21st 2009 of it swimming amongst a small group of Flamingoes, right below a picture of the Fench Ivory.

Have you ever seen a Ross's Gull together with Flamingos? I sure haven't. In fact, this is likely the most bizzare assembly of species I have ever seen on a single photograph.

Maybe I should sort of translate the whole incident to birding in North America, as most of my readers do the majority of their birding there and even though they are surely aware of Europe's geography, they might be less familiar with bird distributions on the East side of the Atlantic:

The magnitude of this incident is comparable to an Ivory Gull being found on the coasts of Georgia while an Alabama inland lake hosts a Ross's at the same time.

So there you have it. Kind of makes defining your target species for future birding trips a pretty difficult thing to do. But hey, we always knew gulls were full of surprises.

A little bit on Birds and Glass Windows

2009-02-23T10:42:00.006+01:00

Just a little chunk of information as the wider frame of things has already been discussed quite extensively, for example here .
For background reading, just follow the links provided on the Greatest Auk's site, especially this one, which provides even more links to follow and so it goes on and on until the power company disconnects your electricity as you have forgotten to pay your bills over following all the links and then you die of hypothermia.
I know this was awefully off-topic, but on the other hand I found it so outrageous I just had to mention it sometime somewhere.

Aaanyway, back to birds and windows.
The Swiss Ornithological Research Institute Sempach (sort of the Cape May of Switzerland, only that in technical terms Switzerland doesn't have a sea next to it) in conjunction with Birdlife Switzerland has published a guideline for builders, architects and the interested public (whoever might be interested) on how to avoid window strikes by birds.

You can find the site here and the pdf version here. If you feel adventurous, you can also read the German, Italian or French version (click on the flags in the upper right corner).

They do not mention the Sibley approach though, and Sibley also apparently hasn't done any further research into the matter.
Does anyone out there have additional information they'd like to share with me?

The whole topic really is a pressing issue and sadly for this Coop, New Jersey isn't (future) Switzerland. Let us just hope initiatives like the one in Switzerland will be received favourably by the general (building, planning etc.) public there and elsewhere so that window strikes stop to seriously mess up our joy of spotting good birds at unexpected places.

For Your Valued Information

2009-02-22T14:00:00.005+01:00

Before I indulge in excessive blogging on my recent birding adventures, it would seem helpful to bring you up to date on my current situation and location. And as I always enjoy to hand a helping post, that is something I'll gladly and quickly do.

Last June, the big change I hinted towards before had actually come:

My family - which happily includes myself - has moved away from the Baltic to Southwestern Germany.

Away from the Baltic? Oh no!!!

Yes, terrifying, I know.
From the significant perspective (which is and always will be birding) this is sheer horror. I have moved from a place where I was able to see 270 or 280 species a year within an hour's driving distance from home to where that number will likely be closer to 120, possibly 150 if I am lucky and fuel prices will drop to a level we last had in the 1980s.

So, why did I do it?
Well, the reason is a new job down here and the reason for choosing that job, apart from personal things outside the scope of this blog, actually was ...

...

... better birding!

Not around home, wich is the small town (well, more of a village really in a heavily populated area) of Leimen just to the South of Heidelberg.
But my new job includes heaps and piles of traveling, basically and on average 2-3 days a week during the summer, throughout Germany, central Europe and possibly even all the way to central Asia, including for example Georgia and even Kazakhstan. Within the next years, maybe even this year, Africa might be included while Southeast Asia and Australia might also be future possibilities.

Very neat job.

So here I am now, in the south-west of Germany again, and the following days will provide you with small insights into the sometimes lousy but mostly boring birding that can be done around here.
It won't be too bad though, I hope, so take courage and visit again.

We interrupt the Silence

2009-02-21T18:38:00.004+01:00

... for a bit of blogging!

Yes, yours truly is back, for a little while at least.

Due to a twisted chain of incidences mostly revolving around my wife and son visiting the in-laws for two weeks while I have to remain where I am and work, I have a lot of time - two weeks to be more precise - to sit on the sofa quietly and miss them.

And while I am there, on the sofa, I might as well log onto my blogger account and do what I haven't done in quite a while: release some of the pressure I put on the comments section of other blogs and actually produce a few posts myself again, which - incredibly - I will post on my own blog, and not said comments sections.

I do have to get used to writing again - more on that possibly later - yet I am rather fond of the idea and am curious what will come out of it.

So for now, I'll be doing some thinking about what to put on my blog while watching tonight's James Bond movie on TV.

So, I hope to be seeing you here again tomorrow, last of the faithful readers.

349 !

2008-11-05T09:21:00.001+01:00

Change has come to America.

Hope has been restored.

Thank you!! From the rest of the world!!!

A good day to be a birder

2008-05-23T12:14:00.007+02:00

Something is very wrong with this post, and I mean wrong in the most unjust, immoral and grievous way instead of wrong regarding layout and spelling (granted, that's also going to be the case, as usual).
And just so that you know, I am going to tell you right away what it is that has me crying out loud in despair:
This post is about the 24th of May (which is tomorrow) three years ago!

And that's just a mighty long time too long ago.

Aaanyway, here goes, and as we are now starting to see posts where birders mention that spring migration in North America is winding down (well, those migrants have to wind down from the skies sometime to land on their breeding ground, right? So I don't know what the big deal is about that), here's my testimony, my raised finger and shout-out statement that baby, it ain't over 'til it's over!

Rondeau Provincial Park, Ontario, Canada, one finest and earliest morning of May 24th, 2005

The night had been short, all too short to be precise. Luckily, there was no chance or risk of me sleeping in as the car seat of my rental had been far too uncomfortable again, so in the first light of dawn I was up, birding gear around neck and shoulder and out on the trails of the park.
I remember that it was cold before the sun came up and when I got to the head of the Marsh Trail, a breeze from the lake didn't help much either to forget the night's chills.
The reason for choosing the Marsh Trail as my first birding location of the day were three-fold:

It is a long, long dead end trail and according to the observation book at the office, it receives very little attention by visiting birders, so I was likely to not meet anyone and that - I felt - was a bonus hard to beat after a few days on the crowded trails of Point Pelee (that was before I experienced the trails at Crane Creek, but more on that later, possibly).
My trip list was lacking a few Marsh birds, especially rails and Least Bittern, and that was unlikely to be mended by another woodland walk.
My trip list also suffered from a severe lack of Empids, with only Least recorded, and I had been told at the information centre that both Alder and Willow Flys were likely to be encountered along the trail.

The fact that my choice had been excellent was proven by a singing Alder Flycatcher along the first short stretch of the path, and even though the peculiar feeling of being at the right place at the right time was starting to grow in my tummy, I was still completely ignorant of the quality birding the day would bring.

The first stretch of the Marsh Walk produced some fine birds for sure, like Philadelphia Vireo, Eastern Bluebird, Brown Thrasher and 8 species of warbler (most notably being Ovenbird, a late Yellow-rumped and Wilson's), but the marshy component was still missing. Towards the south however, the trees began to vanish and the Marsh opened up, with cattails, reeds and flooded meadows on both sides of the trail. It was here that I finally picked up species like Marsh Wren, Caspian and Forster's Terns, and from the willows, the distinct song of Willow Flycatchers was heard as well, with some of the birds giving excitingly close views at eyelevel just a few metres away. I was surprised to see a few fly-over shorebirds, most unexpectedly including a Ruddy Turnstone, but the single most unexpected observation was surely that of an American Bittern flushed right besides the path. Sadly, a Virginia Rail was heard only. A Savannah Sparrow with two distinct white stripes ("suspenders") on its back had me all confused and in high-adrenaline-hopes, but alas, it could not be turned into a Nelson's Sharptail. A few Black Terns offered their condolence about this though, which was welcome, as was the sight of 1,600 Double-crested Cormorants which were scanned thoroughly in a vain attempt at locating the Neotropical Cormorant that had been seen in the general area. Returning North again back towards the camp ground, the trees bordering the path produced different surprise birds as on the way down.
Apparently, birds were in a big mood to migrate. Flycatchers in particular were there in force, and although the Lord of the Fly's (Olive-sided) would evade me all day despite an excellent supply of snags, Yellow-bellied, Least (4th Empidonax of the day), Great Crested, Phoebe and Wood-pewee were quickly added, as was a Gray-cheeked Thrush.

It had gotten late and the fact that I hadn't eaten anything all day started to feel a bit unpleasent by 1:30 p.m., the time I returned to my car at the camp ground.
Being the birder I am, I was now faced with the fact that I had not brought any food with me (come on, who would waste minutes in shops at the end of May in southern Ontario?! Not me for sure!). I needed body fuel though in order to not pass out on the trails which would have me miss out on even more birding than if I had gone for food, so what was I to do?
I knew that they offered basic breakfast at the information centre, so I headed there to see what had been seen in the park and tuck in seriously. Upon getting there, my thirst and hunger were overwhelming, so I pushed open the door, stepped in and shouted: "Quick, three beer and a pizza!"
"Where and when?" was the reply of the birders present, and I will never fathom the debth of the Canadian sense of humour.
After a good few bagles and cream cheese I was off to the southern tip, with the plan being to drive there, park the car, walk to the tip and back north again through the interior of the peninsular to the Information Centre and from there down south again along the beach to the parking lot containing my car. This was quite a hike, as you might gather from my description, but this was May, this was Southern Ontario, this was what birding is all about and such is life anyway.
The birding was grand to say the least. Surprise birds were fly-over Great Egrets, a Green Heron perched quite a distance away from the water at the parking lot, a huge gathering of gulls off the tip, with an estimated 3,000 immature Bonaparte's Gulls, 500 Ring-billeds, 100 Herring and a Great Black-backed, all feeding on the millions of small dead fish washed ashore (a natural phenomenon I was told, and I haven't mentioned the exquisite smell yet which was overwhelming, especially after some bagles with cream cheese), and songbirds came through my field of view without end, including more Least and Yellow-bellied Flycatchers, Eastern Towhee, Great Crested Flycatcher, Red-breasted Nuthatch, all regular thrushes except Hermit (none all day), more Brown Thrashers and a total of 16 species of wood warblers, most remarkable great views of a Yellow-breasted Chat, a heard-only Cerulean Warbler, Orange-crowned, Canada, my first ever Mourning and more Wilson's Warblers.
On the last bit of tar road just before the information centre, and just after adding Acadian Flycatcher to my life list (the last of the regular eastern Empidonax flycatchers, all seen on one day!) I hit a small pocket of warblers and vireos at eye-level just a few metres into the forest.

This was when it happened:

Very soon I spotted a “Blue-headed Vireo” that

a) didn’t even have a trace of green on its back, just a bright blue-grey/plumbeous (if you catch my drift) colouration

b) showed no yellow or buff on the underside / flanks, just pure white or maybe a trace of blue- grey

c) showed a weaker white supercilium before the eye than I had noticed in Blue-headed Vireos, though the spectacles were bright and normal.

I basically had no idea what I was looking at (being only familiar with the ordinary Eastern vireos and not having learned the Western vireos by heart) but new that this was a bit too much for individual variation in a Blue-headed Vireo. I therefore observed it very closely and as I was only a few hundred metres away from the Information centre eventually rushed there to check the identification guide and get others (staff / more credible people than myself) to confirm my observation.

Getting there and looking through the "Sibley's" on their counter it became immediately and spontaneously clear that I had seen a frickingly amazing blotty heckish out of range PLUMBEOUS Vireo!

But as rain follows sunshine, it was the staff's day off, there was only one (non-birder) person behind the counter at the information centre and it was thus impossible for her to leave the office unattended, and no visiting birders were anywhere to be seen.
No pictures, no witnesses, just me and the bird and my word of birder's honour and a whole bunch of excited (and eventually disappointed) birders the next day who did not manage to relocate the bird.
I never reported it to the rarities committee. I know I should have, but that's just the way it is.

A great bird nonetheless.

After a bit of a break at the camp ground (I needed to reformat my brain's harddrive after such an observation and also had a shower - yes, I am not quite that radical about my birding time schedule), I returned to the information centre's parking lot after dark upon a tip I had gotten from the staff the day before:

I was not disappointed in the least.

The chorus of "night-singers" was reminiscent of the wildest (birdwise) nights in Africa, and to end the day with hearing 1 Whip-poor-will, 1 Common Nighthawk, 5 American Woodcocks and a Chuck-will's-Widow (a mighty good bird for Canada) was very well-received by this humble birder of yours.

I ended the day with a staggering 112 species, roughly half my trip's total, without having tried for a "Big Day". Some of the misses are ridiculous, like Prothonotary Warbler (at Rondeau, of all the places!) and 19 species of warbler is pretty shabby to be honest, so I am sure a bit of dedication and a knowledge of song (all the species except "night singers", rail(s), Alder Fly and Cerulean were seen) would surely have produced a day's total somewhere in the 130ies or 140ies.
This day turned out to be amongst the most productive and memorable birding days of my entire life indeed, and to think I had condemned my stupidity of not taking up another hobby that doesn't require sleeping in cars and getting up at 4:30 in the morning before I started my birding endeavour only has me shaking my head now in retrospective.

Here's my day's list for those interested, and for those who are not, this sentence will mark the end of the post (so there's no need to scroll to the bottom of 112 lines).

I promise to post some pics soon again!

Common Loon
Double-crested Cormorant
American Bittern
Great Blue Heron
Great Egret
Green Heron
Canada Goose
Wood Duck
Mallard
Lesser Scaup
Red-breasted Merganser
Common Merganser
Turkey Vulture
Red-tailed Hawk
Bald Eagle
Virginia Rail
Killdeer
Semipalmated Plover
Ruddy Turnstone
Sanderling
Dunlin
American Woodcock
Bonaparte's Gull
Ring-billed Gull
American Herring Gull
Greater Black-backed Gull
Black Tern
Forster's Tern
Caspian Tern
Mourning Dove
Common Nighthawk
Chuck-will's-widow
Whip-poor-will
Chimney Swift
Ruby-throated Hummingbird
Red-headed Woodpecker
Red-bellied. Woodpecker
Downy Woodpecker
Hairy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
Pileated Woodpecker
Eastern Wood-pewee
Willow Flycatcher
Alder Flycatcher
Least Flycatcher
Yellow-bellied Flycatcher
Acadian Flycatcher
Eastern Phoebe
Great Crested Flycatcher
Eastern Kingbird
Warbling Vireo
Philadelphia Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo
Yellow-throated Vireo
Plumbeous Vireo
Blue Jay
American Crow
Barn Swallow
Cliff Swallow
Bank Swallow
Tree Swallow
Black-capped Chickadee
White-breasted Nuthatch
Red-breasted Nuthatch
Marsh Wren
Carolina Wren
House Wren
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
Eastern Bluebird
Swainson's Thrush
Veery
Gray-cheeked Thrush
Wood Thrush
American Robin
Gray Catbird
Brown Thrasher
European Starling
Nashville Warbler
Northern Parula
Yellow Warbler
Chestnut-sided Warbler
Magnolia Warbler
Blackburnian Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Cerulean Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Palm Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
American Redstart
Common Yellowthroat
Mourning Warbler
Ovenbird
Canada Warbler
Wilson's Warbler
Yellow-breasted Chat
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Indigo Bunting
Northern Cardinal
Eastern Towhee
Chipping Sparrow
Field Sparrow
Savannah Sparrow
Song Sparrow
Swamp Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Baltimore Oriole
Red-winged Blackbird
Common Grackle
Brown-headed Cowbird
House Sparrow
American Goldfinch

Late Learning in The Great Outdoors - part 1

2008-05-15T15:15:00.005+02:00

This post was meant as a contribution to the blog carnival "Learning in the Great Outdoors".
I was - however - so satisfied with getting down to writing something for my blog (instead of just posting a few pics and making up a few lines) that I got carried away and continued to write and write and write.
This had two dire consequences:

1. I didn't meet the deadline of LitGO # 12 and thus was - naturally as I didn't submit - not included.

2. The post had to be broken down into several parts, with the nice consequence that I can still extend the ones not posted yet.

Okay, without further ado, here goes:

Two Lessons Learned in the Great Outdoors
Part 1 : Where I Learned

The Fish River Canyon in the far South of Namibia is a place where magic abounds and where the wonders of the Great Outdoors are breathed in with every step you take. However, and very remarkably so, it is also a place that only few get to fully appreciate, for a reason that is highly unjust as it has nothing to do with the Canyon itself. It is too far off the other touristy highlights of the country and for those who venture into South Africa, the adjacent Namaqua Land also offers no significant attractions (unless you are a birder and terribly fond of larks), so in general there is a big rush from Namibia’s Keetmanshoop past the Canyon and all the way down to Cape Town. The Fish River Canyon is usually experienced by those travellers from the view points scattered along its eastern rim during a short detour from the highway. After about an hour or two and a few pretty pictures matching exactly those you see in travel magazines or on postcards, the area is ticked off the trip’s to-do list in a nonchalant been-there-seen-that way and left in a hurry - with Cape Town or Windhoek’s airport calling loud and clear.

This is very much how I experienced the Fish River Canyon during a short stop around high noon back in 1991, and the blinding harsh sunlight reflected off the cliffs, the heat and the general lack of life amongst the rocks made for one of the least memorable moments of my travels through southern Africa.

A few years later, in 1997, I was about to finish my studies of Zoology at the University of Greifswald and was looking for a research project for my Master’s Thesis. The only local option was salt marsh beetles - admittedly an excellent group of biota to understand the ecosystems along the Baltic coast of Germany but not really the reason I started studying Zoology in the first place - and thus I soon found myself enquiring about projects abroad. Soon, my attention was focused on Namibia but in the days of affirmative action, it was very difficult for a foreigner or a white man (let alone for a white foreigner) to get into anything even remotely similar to an official project or research position. The radio-collared Leopards of Waterberg Plateau, the prime target at the onset of my enquiries, were soon found to be definitely out of reach.

Just as I started to accept having to fall in love with beetles, a surprise possibility arose: a scientist I met during my early days at the University of Freiburg was to start working as the general manager of a huge (600 square kilometres) private game farm in southern Namibia and invited me to visit him privately and conduct my studies there. No official permit needed, just a tourist visa you get at the airport in Windhoek. He also offered to be my supervisor, so the case was settled rather quickly and preparations began.

Of all the places in Namibia however, the farm was bordering on the Fish River Canyon National Park (nowadays called Ai-Ais / Richtersveld Transfrontier National Park or Peace Park), a place I thought (back then) was amongst the few ... well ... lesser attractive ones in Namibia, especially when compared to the lush and green (in parts, this is still Namibia) Caprivi Strip and Kaokovelt.

But beggars can't be choosers and as this was my only chance to avoid the salt marsh beetles, I was all game and ready to dive right into the Great Outdoors of Namibia's Fish River Canyon.

Glass Windows...

2008-05-08T18:41:00.002+02:00

... helping to entertain bored office workers since 2000 BC

One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest

2008-05-07T10:30:00.002+02:00

During the usual craze, madness and insanity of an ordinary work day, I looked up from my desk to the sky outside my office yesterday and then this came over:

A nice adult - probably female - White-tailed Eagle. They are common along the German Baltic coast and I see them a few times each year from my office window, but never before did one come this close while I had my camera at hand.

May P.O.R.N.

2008-05-02T12:27:00.006+02:00

Today is what the Germans call a "Bridge Day". Well, of course they don't call it "Bridge Day", they call it "Brückentag", but it translates to just that and it means it is one of those working days that separate a public holiday (in this case May 1st) from a weekend. Everyone in their right state of mind would take such a Bridge Day off to have a short 4-day holiday, but of course the fact that people in their right state of mind would do it generally excludes me. Which is precisely why I am here at the office, working while the sky is blue, the temps are pleasing, the birds are moving - all without me - and my wife keeps calling me every 30 minutes to tell me how lovely it is outside and how sad I wasn't there with her.

To compensate for all this misery, and in case anyone else today shares my sorry fate, here's some May P.O.R.N. (Pictures Of Returning Neotrops) from last year's trips to Ohio's Crane Creek in May, offerering quick and easy satisfaction to those desperate for a visual warbler fix but deprived of the place and time to enjoy the real thing.

Bay-breasted Warbler

Blackpoll Warbler

Black-throated Green Warbler

Black-and-White Warbler

Ovenbird

Northern Waterthrush

Magnolia magic

Happy Cameraversary to Me!

2008-04-28T11:22:00.003+02:00

Exactly one year ago, I took my first pictures with my then new camera set-up, a Canon Eos Digital Rebel XTi and a Sigma Apo 70-300 mm lens.

NICE - view from our bedroom window towards Ann Arbor's Burton Memorial (or Bell) Tower on the evening of April 28th, 2007

The first post containing the flashy output of me using 21st century technology (for the very first time regarding any type of 21st century technology, I may add) was on April 30th, about a day's playing around with my camera and the birds at Ann Arbor's "the Arb" (which happened on the 29th, in case anyone took a deeper interest in the dates I am delivering).

Here (again) the first bird picture ever taken with the lovely camera of mine, one year ago tomorrow, this time very slightly photo-shopped as the times they are a-changin'

It was a great day for me and the camera as well, as the camera soon started to enjoy our little birding days out, especially to Crane Creek in May, and we have developed a deep and ever growing friendship since.

The only regrets I have regarding the camera is that I didn't manage to obtain it 4 silly, short, fricking days earlier!

The First Love is the Lightest

2008-04-25T13:30:00.003+02:00

Patrick (you sure know who he is and what blog he's on) started this nice little inquiry into his readers' or fellow bloggers' first pair of binoculars.

Surely, an object as vital to our hobby as fins are to a fish has to have a lot of interesting stories and memories attached to it, and so this is a thread I was very happy to pick up.

However, my efforts came to an abrupt halt right at the start: This is such a nice thing to think and write about but, try as hard as I might, I just couldn't remember my first pair of binoculars!

You see, being the son of a forester, I can't remember days of my youth when I did not have a pair of binoculars. Indeed, I was frequently and completely astounded as a kid when friends of mine told me in one of those deep and meaningful sandpit conversations they did not have a pair of bins and neither had anyone in their family. This seemed as strange to me as saying they didn't own any Playmobil or that no one in their family used air for breathing.
Sure enough, my very early pairs of binoculars - and I certainly made use of them so intensively that I had to have my parents give me a new one as often as I needed new shoes growing up - were rather simple 8x30's or 7x50's that didn't cost a lot and were thus of a low quality. I can't even remember how many I had, let alone tell any stories connected to them. These early bins are therefore of no use to me in the context of this post or to satisfy Patrick's curiosity.

Therefore, I have slightly bent the rules like this:
my first pair of binoculars specifically chosen and obtained to look at birds was the 10 x 50 Optolyth alpin. Back in the very early days of birding, those ancient times of youth, Optolyth was a brand very popular and common amongst birders in Germany. They were somewhat intermediate in both price and quality between the cheap no-name-no-use brands and the top notch Svarowski, Leica and Zeiss elite and - in my very honest opinion - had the very best price-performance ratio of all the binoculars in the whole wide world (not that I knew all of them, I was just so fond of my bins). The alpin series was specifically designed to weigh as little as possible for long days out in the field or - as the name implies - for carrying them uphill over prolongued periods of time. And indeed, they were very light in comparison to other bins back in the olden days of the late 1980ies and fully served that purpose to my maximum satisfaction and my neck's most heartfelt gratitude.

Why did I choose them?

- The 10 x magnification because I needed it for bird identification, with the 7 x and 8 x I had used before not giving me the visual satisfaction and close-up views I had desired to get.

- The 50 front lens diameter to allow for use during dusk or dawn expeditions (well, rarely the latter to be honest, I do like to listen to my pillow especially before my morning coffee) when I was after mammals in Germany's forests with my dad.

- The alpin series because I did a lot of my birding on foot and by bike (naturally in the days before I was legally allowed to drive) and these were long days out, so having a light-weight pair of bins instead of a heavy-duty brick around my neck was very comfortable.

- And last but not least Optolyth because Svarowski/Leica/Zeiss was and still is far too expensive for me.

Now, what about that special, charming and funny story connected to them?
In this aspect of Patrick's inquiry, I fail miserably.
I specifically remember these two things about them:

After finishing high school, I went on a 100-days birding trip throughout Scandinavia and after a very memorable midnight tour onto a Swedish fjäll (barren, tundra-like mountain top) where I was guided by locals to a Great Snipe Lek, I drove off with my bins on the roof of my car until I could see them through my rear view mirror falling off and onto the concrete road at 60 km per hour. This was just a few days into the trip and I feared the worst, but happily the bins survived almost unscathed. The optical axes were slightly off afterwards, so I always saw the double amount of birds there really were, but that was solved by conveniently closing one eye looking through the bins, turning them from binoculars to a monocular. I kept on using them like that for a few years and when I got another pair (of the same kind, by the way) it took me quite a while to adapt to using both eyes again.
And to the geeky side of things, I had a handy black leather bag attached to the strap to protect the bins if I got into rain or heavy weather. So whenever I raised my binoculars, this big black leather bag would cover my whole face from my eyes downwards to my chin. Often - especially during summer when my clothes didn't offer many pockets - I would store my notebook in the bag and it would thus swing back and forth like a clock's pendulum banging against my nose each time I used my bins.
Sometimes, having specialized tools might give their bearer a certain gravitas, but that surely wasn't the case here. I most certainly just looked like I was trying to redefine "geek" in a very motivated way.