Innholdsfortegnelse for November 2016 i Bird Watching

BIRDWATCHING IS, above all, about seeing and enjoying birds, and our My 200 Bird Year campaign, launched on page 16, aims to help you do just that. Sign up, and join us in making 2017 the year in which you discover just how easy it is to find a huge variety of birds you hadn’t seen before. Our other features also have great ideas on birding your local patch, seeing birds in the big city, and finding a whole family of bird species in a single day. Of course, foreign travel is also a great way to do that, and our free travel guide gives you the lowdown on some astonishing ornithological hotspots, from Texas to Taiwan. And a reminder – our front cover this month, by Charles Joseph, is…

IN SOME WAYS, November is neither one thing nor the other. It is still autumn, but migration is much slower than in October. And it is on the cusp of winter, but without the potential freeze of the turn of the year. Birds are still coming and going, though, so there will be a few goodies to look out for. Here are five. RARITY RATINGS GOLDEN PLOVER Golden Plovers are upland, northern breeders in the UK. In the autumn and winter, however, numbers are greatly swollen by birds from the continent, until there are approaching half a million in the UK. Like many waders, they like to feed in groups. Unlike many waders, though, they are often found in large flocks inland on agricultural fields (often with Lapwings). Smaller than…

“Ducks, of course, can’t excavate holes in trees, so the availability of suitable cavities can limit the numbers that can breed in a particular area” CAN PUTTING UP nestboxes help birds? In many cases, the jury is out. Of course, a box will be very useful to those particular birds that choose to nest in it, and the great value of nestboxes is that they allow the success or failure of the nests to be monitored and recorded. In many cases, however, bird populations are limited by the availability of suitable food supplies, and simply increasing the number of nest sites available, while it sounds like it should help, will not necessarily cause the overall numbers of birds to increase. While nestboxes don’t always make a difference, for some birds…

“ There were huge snaking flocks of Glossy Ibis, numbering several hundreds at least... like mighty skeins of Norfolk Pink-footed Geese” I HAVE BEEN TO a couple of the great deltas of Europe this year. In the summer, I was floating around on the waterways of the Danube Delta in Romania; and last week, I was birding from dry land at the Ebro Delta, Catalunya (or north-east Spain, if you prefer). Both deltas are wonderful places to watch birds, but they are very different in character. One striking characteristic of the Ebro Delta region is the preponderance of rice paddies. In the damp fields, flooded areas, irrigation channels and ditches an unexpected feast keeps hundreds of thousands of birds well fed. The population of the introduced American Crayfish has exploded…

“Heading to the northern end of Dartmoor, we were confident of picking up another three species; the Magpie, the Jay and the Raven” I RECENTLY WENT ON a birding quest. It didn’t involve seeing anything particularly rare or counting up as many species as possible. It wasn’t even that difficult, but it was good fun, and it taught me a lot about a much-maligned family of birds. My quest was to see seven corvids in one day. The corvid or crow family is made up of about 120 species worldwide and they really are worldwide, with species only absent from the polar caps and the midst of our oceans. In Britain, we have eight species: the Raven, the Carrion Crow, the Hooded Crow, the Jackdaw, the Jay, the Magpie, the…

Inspired by Matt Merritt s wildlife pond over the last few issues, and also being faced with redundancy, I was searching for something to provide me with a positive nature project at home, to look forward to. I’ve always been keen on wildlife and been an avid birdwatcher since I was about seven years old. I decided on my own wildlife pond in a corner of my garden. After a day s digging with/by my 18-year-old son and three dogs, we added a liner, rocks and plants. I have gradually added native pond plants. I included a dry stone wall into the design to give amphibians a place to hide, log piles nearby and covered the liner edge with turf. Wildlife soon found it and I was thrilled to discover,…

I CAME TO LONDON from the Peak District via the Scottish Highlands to work as an environmental teacher and wildlife guide. As I made my way down the grey terraced streets heading for my new flat, it would be fair to say that I had my concerns about what birds I might see. My hopes were raised by a flock of small brown birds which suddenly flew overhead – a charm of Goldfinches, a wonderful sight to see. Adorned with vibrant red and gold, their jolly chirping carried clearly over the background traffic noise. A charm of Goldfinches. This first moment of unexpected wildlife discovery gave me confidence that London has more to offer than is often assumed, and I have continued to be surprised and delighted by the natural…

GARDEN BIRDS AND OTHER WILDLIFE Kate Risely and Claire Simm BTO, SB, £14.99 Kate Riselys monthly column has long been one of this magazines most popular features, and this book, co-authored with Claire Simm, is very much in the same vein, bringing together the latest information on garden birds, drawn from the BTO s Garden BirdWatch, while adding in extra information on mammals, insects and amphibians. It s packed with the sort of facts that are worth knowing for their own sake (how long do different species live, for example), as well as vital conservation information, and it also gets behind the figures, explaining how the data is gathered. There are lots of excellent wildlife gardening tips, too, to ensure that you can play your part in helping declining species,…

SOUTH WEST Highlights It was an exceptional month for rarities across the country, and the South West chipped in with its own ‘mega’, a Cliff Swallow, on St Mary’s, Scilly, on 6th-10th. It will only be the 10th example of this North American hirundine to have reached the UK, though the fifth on Scilly. AVON HIGHLIGHTS: Two Wrynecks were in a Yatton garden (3rd). A Sabines Gull flew past Severn Beach (8th). A Spotted Crake was at Chew (26th & 29th). PORTISHEAD AND CLEVEDON: There was a Spoonbill (10th), nine Avocets (21st), a Little Stint (17th), Grey Plover (21st) and Pied Flycatcher (18th). SEVERNSIDE: Waders included Spotted Redshanks on four dates, Curlew Sandpipers, a Wood Sandpiper (5th), with two (14th-22nd), Little Stints (from 6th), a Pectoral Sandpiper (11th-12th), 40 Golden…

Along with the Taiwan Blue Magpie and the Swinhoe’s Pheasant, the Mikado Pheasant is one of the most iconic, distinctive and well-known of Taiwan’s endemic bird species. It is a bird of densely forested mountains, with some open areas, found between 2,000-3,000m above sea level. As is typical for pheasants, it is only the male which has the spectacular colours. In this case, those colours are dominated by rich indigos and blues with black spots and wing feathers and a splash of a white stripe. The face is startling red and the long tail feathers are a similar colour to the rest of the bird. Only about 10,000 Mikado Pheasants survive in the wild.…

Herzegovina is not really on the birdwatching map. It’s the southern end of Bosnia and Herzegovina, with wonderful limestone landscapes, lots of birds, but only a handful of serious birdwatchers – there are about five! So, when you are birding, you don’t bump into hordes of birdwatchers, which for me, makes it an attractive destination! Getting there is easy. I flew to Dubrovnik, in Croatia, for less than £130, as a guest of Wild Herzegovina. I was met by Denis, my guide, at the airport. My Balkan birding bonanza, with one other guest, Dermot, had begun. Herzegovina has caves, underground rivers, spectacular plains, imposing mountains, extensive forested areas and glorious wetlands. Our programme started low, got higher, and then switched to wetlands. The pace was relaxed and the weather wasn’t…

Wildlife author James Lowen explains what sort of wildlife to see during November – including Grey Seals and Scottish Wildcat. Page 12 Paul Brook birds his local patch and keeps a year list. He explains how he got started and what birding delights hes seen. Page 26 Ian Parsons set himself the challenge of spotting seven corvids in one day. Not hugely difficult, but incredibly rewarding, as he reveals on page 36 Author and bird guide Dominic Couzens was shocked when he first heard a Cetti’s Warbler. Learn about its powerful song on page 48 Brenna Boyle reveals 10 bird species to look out for when you’re next in London. They include Ring-necked Parakeet and Tawny Owl. Page 76 Urban Birder David Lindo visits Sweden and finds the city of…

DUSKY THRUSH There have been just 11 accepted records of this Asiatic thrush in the UK, mostly appearing in the autumn or winter. Three have been November birds. Check out all those winter thrush flocks carefully for one, with black-and-white face and breast markings and russet-tinged wings. BLACKPOLL WARBLER One of the ‘commoner’ North American warblers over here, there have been more than 40 accepted UK records. Blackpolls look a little like the American warbler version of a Siskin, with a yellow throat and breast and green upperparts, plus two white wing-bars. Most appear on Scilly. PIED-BILLED GREBE There have been 43 Pied-billed Grebes in the UK (though some of these refer to returning individuals). A bit bigger than a Little Grebe, they may appear on similar bodies of water,…

Find the location closest to your destination and add or subtract the hours and minutes from the high tide time at London Bridge, below. SOUTH WEST Weston-Super-Mare (+5:05) Barnstaple (+4:30) Newquay (+3:32) Falmouth (+3:30) Plymouth (+4:05) Torquay (+4:40) Bournemouth (-5:09)* Portland (+4:57) St Peter Port (+4:53) Swanage (-5:19)* Portsmouth (-2:29) Southampton (-2:53) SOUTH EAST Ryde (-2:29) Brighton (-2:51) Eastbourne (-2:48) Dungeness(-3:05) Dover (-2:53) Margate (-1:52) Herne Bay (-1:24) Southend-on-sea (-1:22) Clacton-on-sea (-2:00) EAST ANGLIA FelixstowePier (-2:23) Aldeburgh (-2:53) Lowestoft (-4:23) Cromer (+4:56) Hunstanton (+4:44) WALES Colwyn Bay (-2:47) Holyhead (-3:28) Barmouth (-5:45) Aberystwyth (-6:11) Fishguard (+5:44) Swansea (+4:42) Milford Haven (+4:37) Cardiff (+5:15) NORTH WEST Whitehaven (-2:30) Douglas(-2:44) Morecambe (-2:33) Blackpool (-2:50) NORTH EAST Skegness(+4:29) Grimsby (+4:13) Bridlington (+2:58) Whitby (+2:20) Hartlepool (+1:59) Blyth (+1:46) Berwick (+0:54) SCOTLAND Leith (+0:58)…

“ Look out for upcoming events for your chance to boost your year listwith the Bird Watching team” DO YOU WANT TO enjoy your best birdwatching year ever? If so, #My200BirdYear is Bird Watching’s challenge for birders of all ages and abilities, encouraging you to see 200 species in the course of 2017. They can be anything from the birds you see on your back garden feeders, to seabirds passing offshore as you relax on the beach. There are no restrictions on where you do your birdwatching, and you won’t have to wait for your ticks to be approved by a committee – it’s all about enjoying new birds, and learning more about the wildlife all around us. Here at Britain’s best-selling birdwatching magazine, we want to inspire you to…

RSPB MOVES THE EARTH The RSPB has literally moved the earth to give nature a home at its Fen Drayton Lakes reserve in Cambridgeshire. Thanks to funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund, work has begun on re-profiling the lake shore, enhancing existing islands, and removing willow scrub to make the habitat of the reserve even better for threatened species such as Lapwing and Redshank. Other improvements include a new viewing area. PEREGRINE RESEARCH Peregrines may be using artificial light to hunt by, according to a study by Nottingham Trent University. The team studied three Peregrine nesting sites, including the University’s own Newton Building nest, and observed the falcons bringing food to the nest in the hours of darkness. The prey was mainly small to medium sized birds, and the team…

RAVEN Scientific name: Corvus corax Length: 54-57cm Wingspan: 84-100cm UK numbers: 7,400 breeding pairs Habitat: Uplands, coastal cliffs Diet: Carrion CARRION CROW   Scientific name: Corvus corone corone Length: 44-51cm Wingspan: 84-100cm UK numbers: One million territories Habitat: Found almost everywhere Diet: Carrion, insects, scraps, fruit, seed JACKDAW Scientific name: Corvus monedula Length: 30-34cm Wingspan: 64-73cm UK numbers: 1.4 million pairs Habitat: Fields, woods, parks, gardens Diet: Young birds, insects, fruit, seed, scraps JAY Scientific name: Garrulus glandarius Length: 32-35cm Wingspan: 54-58cm UK numbers: 170,000 territories Habitat: Woodland, wooded parks Diet: Small mammals, insects, fruit MAGPIE Scientific name: Pica pica Length: 40-51cm Wingspan: 52-60cm UK numbers: 600.000 territories Habitat: Farms, villages, urban areas Diet: Omnivore and scavenger ROOK Scientific name: Corvus frugilegus Length: 41-49cm Wingspan: 81-94cm UK numbers: 1.1 million…

We asked: How do you fit your birdwatching in during the winter? Make sure I get out as much as I can every weekend! Rita Jones By doing a bit of owl watching at dusk instead Thomas Banks I take a week off work every November and binge-birdwatch Simon Allen I took early retirement! Darryl Scholey Every lunchtime I have a 45-minute birding walk Sarah Jones By making sure I get plenty of customer visits in near reserves and birding hotspots Keith Gypps Getting out lunchtime till it starts getting dark. Sometimes see great spectacle of birds flying Euan Buchan By keeping an eye on the weather forecast and picking a day off to suit Naomi Foster Fortunately my office window overlooks fields and some woodland! Bob Smith Owl spotting…

SITE 2 HIGHLANDS MILES ON FOOT: 2 TIME: 2 HOURS CHANONRY POINT IS one side of a narrow gap on the Moray Firth, facing Fort George on the south side. It is a celebrated location for watching Bottle-nosed Dolphins close to the shore, especially on an incoming tide, where they come to feed on Atlantic Salmon. Numbers vary but you can closely watch up to 20 animals feeding if you are lucky. Smaller numbers of Harbour Porpoise are possible, but the dolphins are likely to attack them. This is also a great place to watch bird movement on the firth, with potentially exceptional numbers of Little Auk if the wind blows them here. More than 150 in one day is a wonderful sight to see. Gulls feature high on the…

SITE 5 SHROPSHIRE MILES ON FOOT: 3 TIME: 2 HOURS WITH THE HELP of a grant from the Worldwide Fund for Nature, Shropshire Wildlife Trust (SWT) was able to acquire this fascinating site as a nature reserve. It has an interesting history as squatting settlements and product of Parliamentary Enclosure but is now on a slope draining the north side of Catherton Common down to the brook called Cramer Gutter, that effectively drains the hill into the River Rea that flows down to join the River Teme in Worcestershire. It is on the north-east slopes of the Titterstone Clee hill, one of the highest hills in Shropshire with the Giants Chair part of the history. Botanically, there are more than 100 flowering plants and there is heather and bell heather…

SITE 8 BUCKINGHAMSHIRE MILES ON FOOT: 2 TIME: 3 HOURS BLACK PARK IS a well-established country park of some 550 acres at the western extremity of the Colne Valley Park, that runs from Rickmansworth to Uxbridge. It is named after the Corsican Pine, an abundant conifer grown in plantations that has distinctive black bark. Indeed, much of the site is covered in a wide range of trees, including many grand old oaks and Scots Pines alongside stands of younger deciduous trees. There are several open areas where heather, Gorse and Broom flourish, and it is here that you have a chance of seeing a wintering Dartford Warbler, particularly around the Five Points Crossroads in the north-east vector, which is close to Pinewood film studios. The park lake is a popular…

Owls are mysterious. They are the sort of birds you don’t tend to see every day. Indeed, for many of us, they are birds we don’t see at all during the year. Of course, the fact that all our owl species are essentially nocturnal adds to their mystique and the fact that they are relatively rarely seen birds. That said, of the five regular British species, three can often been seen in full daylight at the right time of year and place: Barn Owl, Short-eared Owl and Little Owl. Long-eared and Tawny are more tied to darkness and are most often seen roosting by day or in brief headlight glimpses at night. ID is relatively straightforward, except between the similar Long-eared and Short-eared Owls, which require a little close attention.…

SEPTEMBER SAW A deluge of rarities, with Ireland continuing to excel and the Northern Isles of Scotland taking a full hit. Records were being broken, with the total number of species recorded combined breaching 340, almost as many as were recorded in the whole of 2015. An incredible three new birds for the UK have appeared in the last month. The most recent was a magnificent Siberian Accentor on Shetland found in early October (more on this next month). The other two were Red-footed Booby and Eastern Kingbird, both in September. The adult brown-morph, white-tailed Red-footed Booby came hard on the heels of last month’s Irish Brown Booby. This individual was seemingly moribund, being picked up on a St Leonards Beach, near Hastings (East Sussex), after being watched for a…

“Unmistakably a falcon, proud head turned in profile: hooked beak, black moustachial stripe, large dark eye rimmed with yellow under a light chestnut supercilium. He was completely, utterly beautiful” IT COULD HAVE been a scene out of The African Queen: a flat-bottomed boat with iron railings and tarpaulin roof, plastic chairs on deck around a rusty steel-framed table, moored up with a frayed rope. The wide water was a sheet of glass, the lake deserted. Forested mountains sloped down to the lakeshore on either side, increasingly lovely the further we sailed from human habitation. A man who knew the nesting site of every vulture in Macedonia had agreed to take us on an expedition to look for Egyptian Vultures – with the promise of much more besides: a river trip…

There is certainly no better way to embrace TexMex species in all their colourful grandeur than by participating in the Rio Grande Valley Birding Festival (RGVBF). British expat Julian Hough, who lives in Connecticut, has become a leading light on the American birding scene, and helped introduce me to some of the Rio Grande’s most eagerly-sought birds, as I worked through a five-day itinerary of field trips that the birding festival organisers had customised to help me see most of the valley’s specialities. Leading a crocodile of birders – or should that be alligator in these parts – along the labyrinthine trails of the famous Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge, Julian was quickly pointing out birds that had been high on my wish list. Feisty Great Kiskadees with their bandit…

It was late afternoon at a guest house in one of Africa’s less well-known capital cities, Lilongwe. I was sitting opposite my guide, Abasi Jana, reviewing the day’s birding with cup of tea in hand. The last of the sunlight twinkled on the garden pool and a gecko roused itself from slumber to scuttle across the wall. Our attention was caught by a small bird in one of the garden shrubs. “Collared Sunbird,” called Abasi after the briefest scan with his binoculars. “That’s a new one for the day”. He was right, it was yet another. Much as I always think it’s rude of a new bird to appear when you are actually tallying your day-list, this intrusion was, in a way symptomatic of the happy profusion we had experienced…

The genius of Darwin was in the simplicity and clarity of his thinking. Tiny genetic mutations will result in slight differences in organisms’ ability to survive and reproduce. Given enough time, the pressures of selection will lead to the development of different species. When populations are isolated, such as on islands, the effects may become magnified and accelerated. For instance, Darwin famously noted the radically different bill structures of the apparently closely related finches of the different Galápagos islands. In extreme cases, where there has been considerable isolation, such as Australia, New Zealand or Madagascar, there are a large number of endemic bird species. But on little island groups, like the British Isles, which are close to, and formerly joined to, the continental land mass, we have just one (controversial)…

European birdwatching trips are not really supposed to be like this. One day, you are watching a Ural Owl and Chamois in the morning, a dozen close-up Brown Bears in the evening. And a couple of days later drifting along by a floating Whiskered Tern colony, with White and Dalmatian Pelicans overhead, enjoying more Squacco Herons than you can imagine. And, moored up at night, the frog and toad chorus is so loud that you can barely dream, let alone sleep. But Romania presents a different kind of European birding, offering several different worlds within its borders. I was there in June, accompanying a group from the Ramblers Worldwide Holidays. The trip was split between exploring the Carpathians and Dracula country in Transylvania; the steppe; and five nights sleeping on…

In the lower folds of Poás Volcano’s foothills, overlooking the city of Alajuela and Costa Rica’s Central Valley, Xandari Resort & Spa offers travellers what Forbes Magazine has called ‘a mountainside slice of paradise.’ The 40-acre property includes diverse tropical gardens and a forest reserve with several miles of trails that lead to multiple waterfalls – one of which is between 60ft and 70ft high. A total of 130 bird species have been reported on the resort’s eBird hotspot (an online birding resource, which you can view at http://bit.ly/2dpcyy1), but Xandari is a mere 20 minutes away from the country’s main international airport. Hummingbirds and tanagers flit year-round among the flowering bushes and fruiting trees, Blue-and-white Swallows commonly swoop down by the sunset pool to sip water. Strange vocalisations of…

Get in touch with Bird Watching Bird Watching, Media House, Lynch Wood, Peterborough PE2 6EA birdwatching@bauermedia.co.uk facebook.com/BirdWatchingMag twitter.com/BirdWatchingMag Herring Gull by 13-year-old Lauren Everett Camera: Fujifilm FinePix HS30EXR Lens: integral 24-720mm Shutter Speed: 1/300 Aperture: f/6.4 ISO: 100 Black-headed Gull by John France Camera: Nikon D500 Lens: 500mm Shutter Speed: 1/1,600 Aperture: f/5.6 ISO: 1,600 Short-eared Owl by Philip McHaffie Camera: Canon EOS 70D Lens: 400mm Shutter Speed: 1/1,000 Aperture: f/9.0 ISO: 1,600 Kingfisher and its pellet by Peter Sharpe Camera: Nikon D500 Lens: 600mm Shutter Speed: 1/1,600 Aperture: f/6.3 ISO: 1,250 Whitethroat: Andrew Armstrong Camera: Canon EOS 7D Mark II Lens: 500mm Shutter Speed: 1/1,000 Aperture: F/5.6 ISO: 1,000 WIN! Send us your best birding photos to birdwatching@bauermedia.co.uk every month to be in with a chance of winning a…

Keith Bettons article was interesting (airline birding, Autumn issue) but I am not sure that he has personal experience of using Malaga and Jerez airports. The former is hell in summer, with huge crowds and long waits for everything from immigration to car hire. Jerez, is the opposite, the back of beyond with poor car hire and access. The obvious airport is Gibraltar. Great facilities, with car hire and good hotels a short walk away in La Linea. All the birding spots are an easy drive and EasyJet, Monarch and BA all fly there from various UK airports. The other big advantage is that in certain winds, migration is overhead Gibraltar, or on the coast road to Tarifa. The birding starts immediately you land. What could be easier?…

LOCH STIAPAVAT Passing waders are always a possibility, and an impressive gull list can be seen here CRAMER GUTTER A common area for Sky Lark and also Curlew. Also look for Crossbill and Reed Bunting WERN WOOD Expect wren, sparrows, Sparrowhawk, Buzzard and other birds in this woodland BLACK PILL Gulls and wader flocks dominate this lovely Welsh birding site CHANONRY POINT Little Auks are possible and waders guaranteed, including Oystercatcher CAMPFIELD MARSH A winter trip rewards you with Merlin and Peregrine, plus Hen Harriers coming in to feed TRIMPLEY RESERVOIR The reservoir is a magnet for Goosander and Cormorant and Goldcrest breed here, too CONNINGBROOK LAKES This country park attracts a range of birds including Red Kite, Kingfisher and redpolls TRURO See commoner waders along with garden birds in…