CES 2

Today was the second CES day. The weather was fine, with a wind coming from the east.
We caught a total of 44 birds over 16 species, thats not bad for this time of year.

Great sp. Woodpecker 0-1
Willow Warbler     2-1

Chiffchaff              2-5
Blackcap              8-0
Garden Warbler 1-0
Blackbird              2-0
Song Thrush         1-0
Reed Bunting     7-0
Long-tailed tit       0-1
Blue tit                 1-1
Great tit               1-1
Marsh tit              0-1
Dunnock              2-2
Wren                   1-0
Bullfinch             2-0
Short-toed Treecreeper 0-1
Total  30 new 14 recoveries

HOOPOE!

Yesterday I discovered an Eurasian Hoopoe at my own local patch on the Hoog Buurlosche Heide, the "Braamberg''. We first heard the bird singing/calling oep-oep-oep-oep-oep. Wonderful! And then suddenly I saw the bird flying and landing in a birch and it was posing on a brench! What a stunning bird.
Then it flew off in northeasterly direction and dissapeared. While it was on his way again the Hoopoe paused a few times by sitting along the edge of the forest. Afterwards it disappeared.
Listen to the song of a Hoopoe: Song of a Hoopoe
This definitely is one of my best findings in my county!

For the entire count check out http://trektellen.nl/trektelling.asp?telpost=277&land=1&site=0&

In the evening we went to a place where Middle-spotted Woodpeckers are currently nesting/displaying. This place is only 20 miles away from our home so it was worth a try! I'll add some photos of the woodpeckers. I even saw the pair of Middle-spotted woodpeckers couple! But I'm sure you have experienced this as well: your autofocus (of the camera)  never works on a critical moment! So I missed the chance of photographing them!
At the Yperenplas near Deventer we also saw eight Summer plumage Little Gulls!

 Middle-spotted Woodpecker at nesting hole

''flavissima'' Yellow wagtail & Red kite

Went to the Rammelwaard near Zutphen on sunday and saw a nice male Flavissima Yellow wagtail and a Red kite (my fourth this year already)

Hoog Buurlosche heide: An interesting site during the evening!

Yesterday I had a good ringing day, I came home around 4 a.m. I was tired (I had to get up at 4.30!) and did not feel like birdwatching anymore. So we had dinner and then my dad said he would go for a check on Hoog Buurlo. I did not feel like going, but in the end I figured that it would be smart to go with him! It has been proven that Hoog Buurlo can be fun at night. Tim de Boer, for example had 8 Cranes two weeks ago, dropping in and (trying) to stay overnight at the Gerritsflesch. (This did not happen however, because of some agressive Greylag Geese!)
So I went with my dad. We arrived there around 18.45. It was a beautiful evening with a clear sky! Nowhere, one could find airplanes in the sky, wonderful. Eventually we did see one airplane however, but this was a Testflight from KLM, making a trip above the Netherlands, to see if the ashclouds had dissapeared. And to check if there was any ash in the motors. Very funny to hear afterwards, the plane you saw was for a testflight. Nevertheless, back to the birds. We went to the old sheep-fold. This was the former sheep-fold on the Heide, but they moved it elswhere. Fortunately there a lot of Rabbits taking care of the grass, so that the meadows will be maintained (for birds' sake ofcourse!) We had 5 Ring Ouzels, all five of them were males, and even some of them were singing quietly. I had never heard a singing Ring Ouzel before, so this was a scoop for me. Furthermore the meadows held 15 Songthrushes, about 10 Mistle Thrushes and some White wagtails. 3 Swallows were flying around as well.

And then suddenly, from out of nowhere, a male Merlin rushed us, chasing the Swallows! A very nice sighting, it was short, but very satisfying.

It is a recordshot.. but you can still identify it as a male Merlin(i cannot say that from my Ospreyshot..) : a small falco, short tail, pointed wings and orange underparts combined with grey upperparts and on black on the outer parts of the wing.

We decided to walk on towards the Braamberg(''blackberry mountain'') to see if we could come across the hunting Merlin again, we didn't but did see another raptor. An Osprey. The bird came from the south and was following the edge of the forests towards the Northeast. This was at 19.33. We can conclude that seeing a migrating Osprey is also possible in the evening!

This is probably the worst shot of an Osprey I ever made..

In addition we had (I presume) a pair of Cuckoos and 4 Snipes.
A succesful evening!

CES 1

It was a beautiful day today!
Today was the first ringing day of the CES season (Constant Effort Site)
We caught an average amount of birds for this decade, a total of 44 birds.
White Wagtail 1-0
Goldfinch 6-0
Chiffchaff 8-2
Willow Warbler 1-0
Long-tailed tit 2-1
Great tit 0-2
Blue tit 1-0
Blackbird 1-0
Song Thrush 3-0
Dunnock 2-1
Robin 1-1
Blackcap 5-1 (control Brussel ring!)
Wren 4-1
Total  35-9

Willow Warbler

 Male Blackbird 2cy, note the unmoulted brown greater coverts

White Wagtail, Male 2cy

Goldfinch male

Long-tailed tit

Patridge & Icelandic Godwit

In the afternoon some good photo oppertunities of both Patridges and Black-tailed Godwits:

The ringing season is comin'

Yesterday we went to our ringing location again to check the place and to get our new clap-net ready. We optimized our clap-net (no  broken wires :D) and I decided to see if we could lure some Meadow Pipits. Surprisingly there was not a lot of migration, maybe because of the wind direction (n 2). Eventually we got 5 down on the ground walking around the clap-net, waiting for them to go on it, and a few minutes later 2 walked on it and : bam, de clap-net clapped over and closed! We caught 2 of them.

Here you see two Meadow pipits near the clap-net

Trapped & Ringed.

 Furthermore I sighted: 15 swallows, 37 shovelers, 2 great white egrets, 1 goshawk

After that we went to the IJssel where we saw 3 Icelandic Black-tailed Godwits

And as a nice surprise on our way back to home we found an adult Tawny Owl together with 3 youngsters(takkeling in Dutch)! Very nice to see!

A long Easterweekend on Schiermonnikoog

It was Easter last weekend, and this always means: Eastercamp on Schiermonnikoog! Every year I go to Schiermonnikoog during the Easter holidays with the JNM (Jeugdbond voor Natuur-en Milieustudie). Schiermonnikoog during spring is always fun. It was a pity that the Easter holidays were a bit early this spring season because if it falls just two weeks later (mid-april), it can be fun! You will have lots of warbler/wagtails/pipits/swallow + raptor migration. But fortunately this Easter camp wasn't bad ! From all the Dutch islands, I like Schiermonnikoog the most. It has got a lot of different areas. You have the Westerplas (a large pond). On the Westerplas there are always tons of Ducks present. Often Pintails, Shovelers, Teals, Goldeneye's, Gadwalls, Shelducks, Little Grebes and occasionally Greater Scaup. We had all of these Ducks except for Garganeys which was strange because there are always Garganeys present! Furthermore one can find good numbers of Bluethroats, Sedge Warblers, Sand Martins and also later on in April Ring Ouzels. Then you've got the Westerstrand, this is a long stretching hoarse of a couple of miles. During fall, winter and early spring this can be a good spot for Twites, Snow buntings and Lapland buntings as well as Horned Larks, Short-eared owls and Jack snipes. In Spring this is definitely the best place for Kentish plovers. When you go West you reach the Banckspolder, this is a polder where lots of geese are present each year. Often including scarcities such as Red-breasted geese, Lesser White-fronted geese, Black brants and Pale-bellied brants. I estimate that there were at least 3000 Barnacle geese and 1000-1500 Brants were present this Easter. Amongst all the geese we had an incredible amount of Red-breasted geese, namely 5 birds! Probably a pair, a single bird (male) and 1 adult + one 1st winter present. What I love about Schier is that all the geese aren't shy at all! You often see them at several meters distance.





 Here you see the pair

And here the adult + 1st winter bird







The other geese we found on the island were 2 Black Brants and 1 Tundra bean goose (scarce):

Surprisingly there were no Pale-bellied Brants present. The Banckspolder is always a good spot for Pied Wagtails, Wheatears and for Ring Ouzels (NONE SEEN THIS CAMP). We also had a huuuuuuuuuuuuuge group of Golden Plovers. We estimated the group at at least 10000 individuals.

When you are finished with birds in the Banckspolder you have got a couple of other good birding areas: go to the forests to see Coal tits, Gold and Firecrests and other forestbirds, and in autumn search for Treecreeper, Yellow-browed or Pallas' warbler. Or you go to the Bunker (highest place of the island), this is THE place to watch migration raptors, you got an overview of the entire island. This camp we had a beautiful Red kite, a gorgeous White-tailed eagle and an early (distant) Black Kite! Not bad at all for early April!Then can you go to the Kobbeduinen, near the salt-marshes on the eastern side of the island. The Kobbeduinen are good for Ring ouzels, Rough-legged Buzzards, Short-eared owls. From here you can also see a couple of Spoonbills colonies, which is very nice. Furtheron you have Avocets, Little Egrets, Peregrines and a variety of Waders.
Oh, when the weather sucks you can also do some sea-watching near the Marlijn. Not very succesfull with nice weather, nevertheless, we had about 10 Gannets, 5 Red-throated divers, 200 Scoters and a Sandwich Tern.
I will now give you a list of birds seen this camp: