December birding: Pygmy Owl & Parrot Crossbills!

Since the beginning of October there has been an unprecedented invasion of Parrot Crossbills in the Netherlands. Many groups of varying sizes were seen throughout the country. In my region the observations were spread rather thinly - there was a group present on NP de Hoge Veluwe but not anywhere else. I tried to see this group once and had birds, just taking off from a pine tree: not a really satisfying observation. Since you have to pay an entrance fee for the park I didn't visit them more often - I wanted to find them myself!

And thus, almost every weekend in November and December I did a lot of cycling through the forests, surrounding Apeldoorn. It wasn't succesfull until last week. My dad found some Parrot Crossbills early December, but we could not relocate this group.

Last Thursday, the second Christmas day, my dad and I did a search for Crossbills again. After a few hours searching we still hadn't seen any Crossbills. When we were close to Kootwijk there was one more place I wanted to check with my dad for Parrot Crossbills: to me this would be the perfect place for them!

Once we arrived there I noticed a Crossbill perched in a pine tree. One look through my binoculars and I knew enough: Parrots! Full of exitement we started taking photos. A bit later the bird flew off with a second one and started foraging in some pine trees further down the path. So there were two birds, a male and a female!

Finally after so many hours of searching I'd found my own!

 Parrot Crossbill (Loxia pytyopsittacus), male (photo taken by me)

Parrot Crossbill (Loxia pytyopsittacus), male and female (both photos taken by Tammo).

Kootwijk - Regelbergen - the pine forests to the right is where I found the Parrot's

Now time for another story:

Since a couple of weeks a Pygmy Owl has been present not far from my house. It had been really hard to find the last few weeks but since last weekend the bird has been observed continuously. Yesterday I visited the bird with my dad, and indeed: we had fantastic views of the bird! My second observation ever of Pygmy Owl and that only 20min from home!

Pygmy Owl (Glaucidium passerinum), last photo taken by Tammo

The group of birders at the Pygmy Owl

Combo Twitching - Daurian Shrike & Black Guillemot

Together with my dad, Jurgen v/d Meer and Maarten Kaales we decided to have a twitchday on yesterday. Last time we did it was very succesfull with Steppe Grey Shrike and two Olive-backed Pipits, so our expectations were high :)

On Saturday the 19th of October a group of birders discovered a Daurian Shrike near Vinkeveen, in the western part of the Netherlands. The previous years we've had good twitchable individuals (mostly on the isles) but this is still the 12th record orso for the Netherlands. I'd never seen one before so this was our target species number one.

We arrived at Waverhoek around 7.20 and it would still take half an hour to be able to scan de area for the shrike. During the sunrise we walked to the location, observing hundreds of geese and ducks departing from the lakes nearby. Also many Snipes. Arriving at the location we were the only ones present. As the light got better we started scanning. One hour later we still didn't have the shrike, and a group of ca.30 twitchers had gathered. We decided to go to IJmuiden since we could always do the bird on our way back home. As we walked back the same way we came we didn't find the shrike and got in the car. We drove away when I suddenly see a small group of people actively staring through their scopes and photographing something... a quick look from the car reveals the shrike! It had been present along a path where most of the twitchers had walked past during the morning when heading for the ''old location''!We had walked another path (so no blaming us for not finding it earlier haha).

The bird showed wonderfully, shifting between perching in a reedbed, some small bushes and undergrowth. Initially there were some doubts about the ID of the bird (either Red-tailed or Daurian). In the end the conclusion was Daurian Shrike.

Observations on the shrike: small shrike, lightbrown plumage, crown seemed a bit darker, with a more greybrown tinge, faint barring on the underparts, no barring uppertailcoverts, eye-stripe brownish, reddish orange tail. Amongst others light tips on greater coverts and pattern of tertails make it a 1st-winter. In active tail-moult. 3 old feathers with 7 new ones growing.

Daurian Shrike (digiscoped by Tammo)

Daurian Shrike (Lanius isabellinus), 1st winter

Next stop was the Zuidpier near IJmuiden. The last time I visited the place was already two years back. It was pleasant birding there. We soon located the Black Guillemot that has been present  there for a while, great bird and great views! 

Black Guillemot (Cepphus grylle), first winter

Other birds observed: 1st winter Shag, Rock Pipits, Red-throated Divers, Gannets, Pontic Gull, Yellow-legged Gull.

Red-throated Diver (Gavia stellata)

 Gannet (Morus bassanus)

 Purple Sandpiper (Calidris maritima)

It was a fantastic day, great company and wonderfull birds!

Finger biters

Finger biters, not so surprising when you take a look at their bills. Both ringed at my CES recently.

 Hawfinch (Coccothraustes coccothraustes), male

 Jay (Garrulus garrulus), 2cy female

Ringing site at dawn

Review of the year 2012: starting with Israel

As the end of the year closes in it's time to review this year! It's been a great year concerning birds, my two months stay in Israel being the definite highlight! Therefore I will start with a review of the two months Israel, followed by other top birding moments of 2012.

At the end of February I went to Israel to volunteer for 1,5 months at the IBRCE and for a week at the JBO. It was a great experience, learning lots of things about the passerines there - birdspecies I'd never handled before - and next to that, the raptor migration was impressive as well, with thousands of Steppe Buzzards passing by.

To start off with the typical migrants that stop by in Eilat:

 Cretzschmar's Bunting (Emberiza caesia). Many were present during the month March with up to 60+ at Ofira Park on one single occasion. All over the city and the IBRCE this species was seen. Ortolan Buntings arrived later, also passing by in huge numbers.

Rüppell's Warbler (Sylvia rueppelli). We observed and trapped many species of warblers. Rüppell's Warbler being one of my favourites! Over 100 individuals were trapped, an impressive number! This picture was taken in Ofira Park, where they were foraging out in the open. 

Barred Warbler (Sylvia nisoria). This is my other favourite warbler. Such 'bulky', large, sylvias are amazing birds to handle! And look at the eye...

Rufous-bush Robin (Cercotrichas galactotes). These beautiful bush robins arrived late March, early April. Too bad we missed out on the Black Bush Robins this year..

 Pied Wheatear (Oenanthe pleschanka), adult male

Cyprus Wheatear (Oenanthe cypriaca), adult male

'Vittata' Pied Wheatear (Oenanthe pleschanka), adult male

This spring was marked by an unprecedented influx of Pied and Cyprus Wheatears. They popped up everywhere and some eventually ended up in our mistnets at the IBRCE. Most wheatears were present just behind the IBRCE in the Date palm plantations. Identifying them in the field was quite a challenge, once in the hand it was much easier.. The second (well first one alive) 'vittata' for Israel was found on the 24th of March by two Dutch birders, Marc Guyt and Arjen van Egmond near K20.  It was my first Israeli twitch. It was a very nice bird, and certainly one of the Wheatear highlights for me. 

 Semi-collared Flycatcher (Ficedula semitorquata), male. While I was suffering from sinusitis and lying on my bed with a vast headache the boys woke me up, guess what we have!! They showed a beautiful male Semi-collared Flycatcher. A species that is not caught annually at the IBRCE (unlike this year with more than 10 being trapped). This bird made my sinusitis more bearable for sure... What a stunner! We also saw quite a few at the Date palm plantations behind the IBRCE. Up to 5/6 birds during one single visit.

Caspian Stonechat (Saxicola maurus variegatus). This surprise we found in the mistnet is one hell of a bird too! Nice white rump, T-shaped tail.. you won't get a Caspian better than this!

Crested Honey Buzzard (Pernis ptilorhynchus). Pictured above: the famous female that has been wintering in the Eilat Northern Date Palms for the past few years. The Crested Honey Buzzard was one my wish list, we first saw this female on 8-3, but I got very poor views of the bird, I couldn't tick it yet.. Then the next day we were extremely lucky to see the bird fly in between the two date palms. Normally we were only able to see it glide through the palm tops, having a very short observation. This observation however, was of longer duration! A few weeks later, we had an adult male Crested Honey Buzzard flying over the Southern Date Palms. First we thought it was an Osprey, then a Bonelli's Eagle and then: oh sh*t! Crested Honey Buzzard. Of course one of those moments during which you've left your camera at the ringing station..

Continueing with the Nightjars:

Egyptian Nightjar (Caprimulgus aegyptius), a memorable night we had in March at Yotvata. We observed several Egyptian Nightjars and were able to ring two of them! Other than the Egyptians the evening trip held lots of Stone Curlews, a Pharoah Eagle Owl, a Barn Owl and Jackals not to forget the Pallid Harrier we saw hunting on hundreds of Short-toed Larks in the evening!

European Nightjar (Caprimulgus europaeus). On the last day of my stay in Israel we ringed two European Nightjars at the JBO. We'd caught one in Eilat too but catching European Nightjars in the middle of the city of Jerusalem is much more special...

Nubian Nightjar (Caprimulgus nubicus). This was a very special night. After a long drive to the Dead Sea, resulting in, eventually, a broken car, we had a crazy night with first Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters catching insects above our head and then as it started getting dark displaying Nubian Nightjars. To see (and ring) this endangered species was incredible!

Hume's Owl (Strix butleri). Together with Nubian Nightjar, these were my two target species for my trip! Walking in the dark in a deserted wadi, only light coming from the stars and moon and then... a singing Hume's Owl, showing off on a cliff just above our heads!

Scops Owl (Otus scops). Cute little owls, a pleasure to catch!

Common Bee-eater (Merops apiaster). Many Israeli bird ringers won't agree that this is a nice bird to catch, since they can be a plague for farmers and then the ringers have to catch them and take them to some other place! To me it's one of the most beautiful birds to have in hand.

Eurasian Bittern (Botaurus stellaris). When we got the report of a heron sitting in a small pool in one of the big hotels near the North Beach we'd never expected it would be a Eurasian Bittern! The bird was not weak at all, and after release it lingered around the IBRCE for quite some time! It's quite a rare bird in Eilat and its surroundings.

Hoopoe (Upupa epops). It would be a crime to leave out the National bird of Israel, the Hoopoe! 

Chaff- and Greenfinches

My last post was almost 1,5 months ago, far too long ago! Now I have some time again and I will post some blogs again :)

The past weeks the weather has been very bad, with lots of rain and wind. I've done some ringing the last month in the garden, not much of interest but last monday I had quite a decent morning with Greenfinches and Chaffinches.

Lots of Greenfinches and Chaffinches have been coming to our feeders which is nice. Usually when I put up my net I catch a Greenfinch and then all the Greenfinches know the net and I won't catch them anymore during the session. Due to the dreary weather last monday the net was hardly visible resulting in an increase of Greenfinch catches. This gave me a chance to have a close look at them again. They're certainly not the easiest to age, so it's a nice practice to catch some. Chaffinches usually see the net very well, they fly towards the net and just in front of it they bend off..

I managed to catch:

Blue Tit 4 - 2

Chaffinch 3 -

Greenfinch 5 -

House Sparrow 2 -

Total 14 - 2

 Greenfinch (Carduelis chloris), adult male

Two wing photos of both adult male Greenfinches

Compare those to the wing photo of this 1 cy male Greenfinch:

Greenfinch (Carduelis chloris), 1cy male; note the difference in the pattern/colour of the tertails, secondaries, greater coverts, primary coverts and alula's compared to the adult males.

I ringed three Chaffinches, 2 adult males and 1 cy female.

 Chaffinch (Fringilla coelebs), adult male

Tail of an adult male Chaffinch

Pretty little things

After some weeks of no ringing I felt like doing some bird ringing again. On Saturday morning I joined Hans, Gerrit and Tammo for some ringing along the IJssel. I arrived a little bit later but I didn't miss anything so far. Blackcaps were around in good numbers with some 40 ringed in the early morning. So were the tits. Groups of Coal tits mixed with Blue and Great Tits came by, of which we were able to catch some. About 30 Coal Tits came by, but only two responded well enough to the tape to end up in the nets. They don't seem to respond that well to the tape then they usually do.. Anyway, another pretty surprise was a sweet Firecrest. It had been a while that I'd handled one (not if you take all the Golden-crowned Kinglets into account that I ringed last year). We ended the morning with a decent total of ~85 birds.

 Firecrest (Regulus ignicapillus), first year male

Coal Tit (Periparus ater), first year birds

Bienvenidos a Lanzarote!

We're having a great time on Lanzarote! A small posts here, with a few pics. Birding wise it's quite succesful already. Two lifers so far: amazing views of already 8 Houbara Bustards, 2 Eleonora's Falcons. Not many bird species here on Lanzarote, but most of the species you see are special and you are able to get wonderful views of otherwise more difficult species in Europe, such as Stone Curlews and Lesser Short-toed Lark. On the cultural/ non-birding aspect it's enjoyable as well, with a trip to the Timafaya National Park - the place on Lanzarote where the biggest volcano eruptions took place three hundred years ago - that was made today. 

Houbara Bustards (Chlamydotis undulata fuertaventurae), totally unexpected, four birds were discovered  from a driving car on our day of arrival! What a start!

 Eleonora's Falcon (Falco eleonorae), light morph, this stunner flew past while standing in the harbour of Orzola.

 Stone Curlew (Burhinus oedicnemus), extremely easy to see and photograph on the plains of La Jable.

 Timafaya Parque Nacional

 Another view from Timafaya Parque Nacional

Geiser at Timafaya Parque Nacional