Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2025 i Bird Watching

This month we ask our contributors: what’s your favourite spring passerine? Amanda Tuke: "Hearing my first London Whitethroat singing always feels like a significant spring milestone." Stuart Winter: “Spring hasn’t sprung for me unless I see a passage Ring Ouzel on my local Chilterns patch.” Dominic Couzens: “It’s Whitethroat – just a bird that bustles with the energy of the season.” Ian Parsons: "The arrival of every spring passerine is special, but the first Swallow is always very special.” …and the Bird Watching team’s answers Matt Merritt: “Wheatear – smart, active birds, the passage is long drawn-out, and their name has a bawdy Anglo-Saxon origin.” Mike Weedon: “I do love a male Whinchat. We have even had a couple in song close to home in recent years.” Cover pic: Redstart…

twitter.com/BirdWatchingMag facebook.com/BirdWatchingMag RARITY RATINGS Common, widely distributed Localised – always a treat Very scarce or rare CUCKOO Though there will always be non-birders who tell you they have heard a Cuckoo already in March, rest assured that they will have heard Collared Doves. April is the month to hear the first Cuckoo of spring – usually the second half of the month for most of us. Only the males make the disyllabic ‘cuck-oo’ song. Females have a less well known but no less pleasing bubbling call (which is often associated with egg-laying). Though most Cuckoos, male and female, are grey above, a particular prize sighting is of a female of the ‘hepatic’ or ‘rufous’ morph (pictured above), where much of the upperparts are orange-brown (with many dark bars). Very beautiful.…

birdwatching.co.uk/my200 #My200BirdYear ticklist Download and print off our #My200BirdYear ticklist to track your progress… https://tinyurl.com/2025targetlist You can track your progress in #My200BirdYear by joining us on the Birda app, as featured in our recent Gear Guide. Download the app, sign up for the #My200BirdYear challenge, and log your sightings as you make them. While you’re at it, Birda’s monthly and geographically-based challenges are a great way of motivating yourself towards the bigger target, too, and by interacting with other users you can develop your ID skills. LISTEN UP It sounds exciting, melodic and uplifting – but there’s a battle going on. Many different battles, to be precise. Our Robins, Song Thrushes, Blackbirds, Blue and Great Tits, Dunnocks and Wrens have all staked their claim to a crook in the branches…

Chats in spring are some of the prettiest smaller birds we can regularly encounter at this time of year. Some are resident or partial migrants, while others appear in March to May, and are among the more prized of passage birds that regular patch-workers look forward to discovering in the spring months. They have an endearing habit of seemingly returning to the same area of suitable habitat each year, even though it may be a completely different bird discovering said habitat from previous years’! Spring is the best time to watch many of these species, as they are looking at their absolute best; in autumn, brighter feathers are often ‘masked’ by fresh buff tips to newly grown feathers. Anyhow, all you have to do is put a name to each…

In association with os.uk/osm MAX MILES ON FOOT: 2 MIN TIME IN HOURS: 2 This 156-acre wood belongs to the Woodland Trust and was bought in 1987. It has a mixed history, with standing stones on its edge suggesting a more open landscape, while oak woodland is around 170 years old, so the birdlife can be varied. JOHN MILES WHERE TO WATCH 1 Turning off the A69 you come to the car park for the wood. Here are a number of mature conifers and in cone years are ideal for finding Crossbill, Siskin and Goldcrest. 2 A level path takes you into the wood and a large pond has been constructed with a seat and viewing area. Here are a number of Mallard and Moorhen, with visits by Grey Heron…

In association with os.uk/osm MAX MILES ON FOOT: 4 MIN TIME IN HOURS: 3 The South Hams is a region of Devon characterised by rolling farmland, thick hedges and pockets of woodland. As well as open fields, this walk makes the most of some historic Green Lanes flanked by ancient trees, which thread their way through a variety of habitats. You may not encounter major rarities, but you should find a good variety of nice-to-sees – as well as a few ghosts from the area’s turbulent past! SIMONE STANBROOK-BYRNE WHERE TO WATCH 1 The walk starts from the far end of Modbury’s long-stay car park, where a footpath heads south, across fields and crossing the historic Mill Leat before joining a Green Lane going uphill. Jackdaw are likely near the…

Forget counting sheep, a great way to feel drowsy is to watch Dunlins going about their frenetic business. They are exhausting. They run fast, feed fast and fly fast; when airborne, they flock together, groups wheeling from one side to another. Dunlins are common around British coasts in winter and early spring, so if you cannot find a massive flock of wheeling Knots to get excited about, visit an estuary at high tide to watch the Dunlins instead. They often fly lower than Knots and faster, too. An hour or two of Dunlin entertainment is enough to make you want to lie down. As you watch the wheeling Dunlins going round and round, it can be a good opportunity to contemplate the circle of life. These supercharged, energetic world travellers…

The Moorhen is a common aquatic bird well known among British birders and urban parkgoers alike. There cannot be a park pond in the UK not populated by this loveable bird, with its cute, squeaky calls. However, if you live in Scotland outside of the south-east, depending on where you are located, it is a scarce resident to rare visitor. Moorhens are obvious and one of Britain’s most distinctive waterbirds; a colourful version of the dowdy and more brutish Coot. They tend to hug the reedy edges a lot and in some parts of their wider range, in the Baltics for example, they can be quite shy, skulking around within the reeds. I love pointing out the adult Moorhens to beginners, insisting that they look for the red garters at…

HAVE YOU SIGNED UP FOR 2025? #My200BirdYear challenge birdwatching.co.uk/my200 Spring is always an exciting time to be out birding, not least because all sorts of migrants will be flooding through, and turning up in unexpected locations. Our cover bird, the Redstart, is one of those species – every April I spend a lot of time scanning hedges for the flash of an orange-red tail that gives away the location of one of these beauties. Follow the advice in our Your Birding Month section, and the new-look #My200BirdYear pages of this issue of Bird Watching, and you should see them, and many more beautiful birds this spring. Also in this issue, on page 26 we take a closer look at the Dutch phenomenon of Total Birding, and discover that whatever kind…

MOTH OF THE MONTH Appearing in moth traps this month (if it didn’t already do so in March) is the Red Chestnut. This brick-toned noctuid moth is widespread across the UK, so can be encountered almost anywhere. But it is also declining: numbers crashed by three-quarters from 1970 to 2016, with its distribution compressing by a third. BEE Colonising afresh An insect to keep an eye out for this spring is the Grey-backed Mining-bee. After a gap of 60 years without UK records, this lovely Andrena bee was thought nationally extinct. In 2008, however, it was discovered in Kent. Since then, it has been spotted north (to Norfolk) and west (to Hampshire), suggesting it has quietly recolonised. Females gather pollen from willows and sallows, and can form dense breeding colonies…

In 2008, BTO added bumblebees to its Garden Birdwatch survey. With 24 species recognised as UK breeders, these charismatic insects occur in all manner of gardens. Some are widespread and easy to find; others are specialised and confined to particular habitats or regions. Despite severe declines, some are doing well. Common Carder Bees have increased in recent years, and in the early 2000s a ‘new’ bumblebee colonised the UK from mainland Europe. This species, the Tree Bumblebee, has continued to spread dramatically in the past two decades, exploiting a niche (nesting in tree cavities) that is rarely used by other UK bumblebee species. The most commonly recorded garden species is the Buff-tailed Bumblebee. It is often one of the first to be seen each year. The large queens are tolerant…

It’s 8am, the morning of Bonfire Night, and I’m well-wrapped up, but still shivering with cold, outside my hotel. Central Sheffield is teeming with people making their way to work. Given their outfits, this is both a stylish and hardy city, with a good dose of attitude, as you might expect from the historic heart of the steel industry, and the hometown of the Arctic Monkeys. My phone trills – Pete’s a few minutes away. When I do spot him on the other side of the road, he ushers me quickly to catch our bus to Orgreave Lagoons on the east side of the city. The 30-minute journey gives us the opportunity to get acquainted. Member and former chairman of the Sheffield Bird Study Group, and author of an entertaining…

In association with os.uk/osm MAX MILES ON FOOT: 4 MIN TIME IN HOURS: 3 Although never more than a mile from the car park, this area is designated ‘wild country’ and requires strong footwear, map/compass and wet weather gear, just in case. You get excellent views that are well worth the effort. The map says you can do a circular walk after crossing the footbridge over the burn gorge and joining the top path, but on our visit in February the connecting steep path was very muddy and slippery, so we did not attempt this, and did the two sections separately returning to the car park for lunch in between. STEVE NEWMAN WHERE TO WATCH 1 The car park is a good place to stop for a while. The flat…

In association with os.uk/osm MAX MILES ON FOOT: 3 MIN TIME IN HOURS: 2 Paxton Pits is a rich hive of habitats located just off the A1. The site has stunning lakes and reedbeds as well as scrub, woodland and meadows. A former, and current, gravel extraction site, Paxton Pits is best known for its Nightingales, plus Cormorants, wintering wildfowl and summer passerines. Dusk here provides an excellent spectacle of roosting birds including hundreds of Cormorants, Rooks, Carrion Crows and doves. The area is also fantastic for large groups of wildfowl such as Goldeneye, Pochard, Gadwall and Teal in winter. The colony of Cormorants have bred here since the 1980s and there is also a well-established heronry on one of the lakes. The site guarantees a healthy checklist of species to…

GET IN TOUCH birdwatching@bauermedia.co.uk facebook.com/BirdWatchingMag twitter.com/BirdWatchingMag Bird Watching, Media House, Lynch Wood, Peterborough PE2 6EA Brilliant Barn Owls March’s issue of Bird Watching certainly resonated with me, from the moment I opened the envelope to reveal the front cover with a beautiful Barn Owl on it. I am a ‘newbie’, having only taken up spotting four years ago, in my late 40s – but what a four years it’s been! Like Marc Abbott, I am still adding lifers to my list, but one of the greatest thrills for me is when I am lucky enough to see owls on my local walk. The Little Owl, once you spot him, will usually allow you to take a quick photo from a respectful distance. As for the Barn Owl, my photos so…

SOUTH WEST Highlights The undoubted highlight was a the reappearing pale-morph Booted Eagle in the Marazion area (Cornwall), which showed on most days after 12th. A Least Sandpiper was an exceptional find at Steart SWT, Somerset. AVON CLEVEDON-WESTON-SUPER-MARE: Fourteen Goosanders were on the Blind Yeo. Clevedon-Yeo logged 28 Avocets (19th), a Purple Sandpiper (5th-21st) and Brent Goose (21st). Uphill had five Sanderling (29th). Black Redstarts were at Weston-super-Mare (2nd) and Clevedon Pier (from 7th). Sand Point had two Brent Geese (2nd), three Gannets (24th), a Jack Snipe (11th), Crossbill (19th) and a wintering Whimbrel. SEVERNSIDE: There were 300 Turnstones, a Marsh Harrier, two Short-eared Owls and three Water Pipits. The River Avon had 58 Avocets (4th). Northwick Warth logged three Knot (5th), a Spoonbill (11th) and three Jack Snipe (14th).…

APRIL REDSTART In the home of Bird Watching magazine (Peterborough), the gorgeous Redstart is a scarce passage bird, usually seen in tiny numbers in the second half of April (and again in similarly small numbers, in August into September). If you live in the south-east and east of the country, you may think of them in the same way. So, you may be surprised that there are an estimated 135,000 nesting pairs in the UK. Most of the nesting goes on in the west (Redstarts love Wales) and north of the country, though there are pockets of breeding concentration scattered around other areas, associated with heathland habitats and the like. Spring and summer is the best time for seeing ‘chats’. They are one of several types of bird which attain…

On Friday 7 February, we had one of our Bird Watching Days, when a handful of readers drawn at random came to Peterborough for a day’s birding with Matt Merritt and I, together with our photographer, Tom Bailey. We were due to meet at BW HQ (in the south-west of the city) at 9am, but at just after 7am (long before sunrise!), my friend Don called me to say he had a diver, probably a Great Northern, at Ferry Meadows CP. So, naturally, rather than getting my stuff together for a day in the field with our lovely readers, I hastily chucked some clothes on, chucked some optics in the car and whizzed down to check out Don’s diver. To cut a long story short, I was on the scene…

Nearly four decades ago, living in London, I used to escape to the country at the weekends, most often with a friend. We used to stay at her mum’s in Bournemouth and go to the New Forest, the Dorset Heaths and beyond. She knew I was into birds and one day revealed that she loved birds, but being a born and bred Londoner, hadn’t seen many. I decided the best introduction would be Minsmere, still a place with an amazing variety of species and guaranteed to have lots of birds any time of the year, but perfect for April. So, a couple of rooms were booked in a B&B and off we drove on Friday night, ready for an early morning start. It was already a major success as we…

The packing list for many people heading for the beach comprises a bucket and spade, beach towels, a windbreak and – if you are a dog walker – a ball launcher. But not if you are a birdwatcher, and especially not if you are visiting the vast sandy beaches on the north Norfolk coast at the beginning of the year. Instead, we wore six layers of clothing, a woolly hat and heated gloves (what an inspired Christmas present!) and were armed with binoculars, telescopes, and camera. We had parked at Holme and followed the footpath across the golf course towards the beach. Cresting a slight rise, we looked down on an area of saltmarsh dotted with low scrubby vegetation, seemingly devoid of birds. However, closer attention revealed several Sky Larks…

In association with os.uk/osm MAX MILES ON FOOT: 1.5 MIN TIME IN HOURS: 1.5 Teardrop Lake (better known to birdwatchers as CEGB Reservoir), is a former brick pit, in an area south of Peterborough which is rife with them. Formerly blessed with a shore and extensive reedbed, it is now much deeper, so diving birds and passage terns are the main targets, as well as roosting gulls. MIKE WEEDON WHERE TO WATCH 1 South shore. Easiest acess is via Berrington View (park considerately). The tarmac track goes round the whole lake, but for much of the day, a view (using a scope will give the best results) from the south allows a view over the entire water surface. Scan for grebes, diving ducks (including the odd Common Scoter dropping in),…

When I first started photographing birds, my results were mediocre to say the least. I knew my way around a camera well enough, having started my photography life taking landscapes and general stock photography, but bird photography required a whole new skillset. It took me a while to figure out why my photos were not in the same league as those that regularly graced the pages of magazines like Bird Watching. Indeed, many people that I speak to share a similar frustration. I can’t wave a magic wand and transform someone else’s photography overnight, but there are a few things that I can share that will have an immediate impact on your results. In this article, I thought I would cover some of these in the hope that they will…

BIRDS OF COSTA RICA BY MICHAEL AND PATRICIA FOGDEN HELM WILDLIFE GUIDES, SB, £16.99 BOOK OF THE MONTH This series grows and grows, and in this case covers 40% of all the birds found in this region, with 350 species out of the 830 found there. The book covers the commoner species which you could bump into, but the size of the book means it is easy to take with you on your trips. A staggering 30% of the land mass of Costa Rica is given over for conservation, so a short site guide gets you to the best areas, then it is straight into the species, which are all pictured in colour, along with a description and where to see each one. HABITATS OF AFRICA BY KEN BEHRENS ET…

I collected bird’s eggs. All the boys did. Between the ages of about 9 to 12, it was a regular seasonal activity for us council house boys growing up in the Surrey edge of South London in the early 1960s. There was the football season in winter, then ‘nesting’ in spring and early summer. There was the marbles season around May, then the cricket season, followed by the apple scrumping season in September and the conker season in October. That was followed by the ‘Penny for the Guy’ and the fireworks season (you don’t want to know what we got up to with bangers), and then the run up to Christmas, with football resuming the cycle. So, our outdoor lifestyle had a rhythm inherited from previous generations and was entirely…