Category: VERY BIRDY: birdwatching and birding nattering

There was a Blackcap in our garden through December and into early-March – in fact, my last record was of one singing on Tuesday 10 March (just as I was was packing the car to go to the races). I’d never previously heard a Blackcap sing in our garden in March (or through the winter)…

Hail to the Skylark – one of the finest songsters of all? Don’t you agree? You won’t find this species very often in your garden but if you live near farmland you may hear its song cascading over everything. This is a pretty unmistakable song – it goes on for ages, it’s loud, it’s musical…

Wrens are tiny – you’d get 45 Wrens to the lb and 100 to the kg – and yet they have a hell of a song. If a Robin sounds as though it is singing to another Robin about 10 feet away then a Wren sounds as though it is trying to reach the whole…

Now that April is here I can write about the Chaffinch singing on the orchard bough, although I’ve been hearing Chaffinch song , sometimes from our small apple tree, since February. This one was recorded in Brandenburg today! Whereas this one is from Yorkshire… And this one is from Lincolnshire… It’s a song that is…

Four years ago I was a team member rushing around the Negev desert and the area around Eilat in Israel spotting birds in an international bird race. What a daft thing to do! But we raised a lot of money for conservation of migrant birds in Greece (and, quite honestly, had a lot of fun)….

Smart bird, eh? The Champions of the Flyway project is raising money for Steppe Eagle conservation – see here. No species added to my day list in a mid-afternoon watch so I’m still on 28 species for today. But I’ll have one more look and listen as it gets dark.

The late morning birdwatch produced a good clutch of species. First was a Chaffinch followed by a couple of Buzzards. Then Long-tailed Tit and Goldcrest. A Common Gull flew over and then so did a female Sparrowhawk and, rather late in the day, a Red Kite. Blackbird Gadwall Robin Dunnock Wren Woodpigeon Jackdaw Collared Dove…

That’s another watch done – this time from indoors looking out while drinking tea and eating porridge. I was expecting to see a Chaffinch around the birdfeeders – but none yet. The four species I would expect to see today which are so far eluding me, are Chaffinch, Red Kite, Buzzard and Sparrowhawk. I’ll probably…

Another birdwatch, up to 0730 takes the list from 7 to 21 species. All of the species below are regulars except for the early watch’s garden lifer Gadwall and the sighting of a single Greylag Goose (3rd ever record). Blackbird Gadwall Robin Dunnock Wren Woodpigeon Jackdaw Collared Dove Greenfinch Goldfinch Starling Greylag Goose Rook House…

OK, so east Northants isn’t quite Eilat as a migration hotspot, and I’m restricted to my house and garden, but I’m supporting the Champion of the Flyways (cancelled) event by promoting their cause through the day (and I’ve donated). The cause is the conservation of Steppe Eagles in Kazakhstan and Uzbekhistan – a good, no…