January 2011

Stunning Agami Heron

Agami Heron. Colombia. Photo: Luis Francisco Cortes by Gunnar 31 January 2011

The most beautiful of the Neotropical Herons. I got these stunning pictures from Rafael Cortes – a Mexican birder now based in Bogotá – Colombia. The pictures are taken by his son Luis Francisco. 76 km north of Montería, in north-west Colombia,  is San Antero (or possibly Sarandel?) from where one can hire a speed [...]

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Featured Digiscoper: Jörg Kretzschmar (DE)

Thumbnail image for Featured Digiscoper: Jörg Kretzschmar (DE) by DaleForbes 30 January 2011

Dr Jörg Kretzschmar is one the digiscopers that I respect the most. He has a passion for photography and a remarkable eye for photographic art. And I love his creations. The photo at the top of this post beautifully plays with depth, movement and colour. I love the way the lines of the bird in [...]

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Featured Bird Blogger of the Week

Thumbnail image for Featured Bird Blogger of the Week by dAwN FiNe 28 January 2011

Dawn Fine presents this weeks birdblogger: Chris Petrak- writer for a Vermont newspapers birding column, Tailfeathers.

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The Evolution of Feathers

Thumbnail image for The Evolution of Feathers by Rich Hoyer 27 January 2011

The closest living relatives of birds, dinosaurs, and pterosaurs are crocodilians. Although these scaly beasts obviously do not have feathers today, the discovery of the same gene in alligators that is involved in building feathers in birds suggests that perhaps their ancestors did, 250 million years ago, before the lineages diverged. So perhaps the question to ask, say some scientists, is not how birds got their feathers, but how alligators lost theirs.

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Puffin Passion

Thumbnail image for Puffin Passion by Rebecca Nason 27 January 2011

One of the members of the Auk family,  Atlantic Puffin Fratercula arctica, is one of my all time favourite birds and probably the most photographed seabird in the world – but I don’t think you can ever have too many Puffin images! Who could not be hooked after their first encounter with one? their endearing [...]

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The Crazy Mix- Birds and People

Thumbnail image for The Crazy Mix- Birds and People by MartinGarner 26 January 2011

I have had some interesting encounters in recent days. Some scary. Some wonderful. And they are all around observations in  the strange middle ground where humans and birds meet. The photo of feathers above was one such case. But just  for fun- can you identify the bird species- even to age and sex? I found this individual with a broken wing having hit some (man-made) overhead power lines. Its could just about [...]

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Yet another British mega eludes the crowds!

Thumbnail image for Yet another British mega eludes the crowds! by TomMckinney 25 January 2011

So this is how 2011 wants to play? Ha! First it was a super elusive Slaty-backed Gull which vanished after just a brief visit to London, then late news of a Dusky Thrush in Manchester, and now a dead American Purple Gallinule has been found in a garden in Devon.

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Of Marine Iguanas, Flightless Cormorants, and Penguins

Thumbnail image for Of Marine Iguanas, Flightless Cormorants, and Penguins by Rich Hoyer 25 January 2011

A day of birding and snorkeling the coldest, richest waters in the Galapagos. I’ve been slowly posting photos from the WINGS Galapagos cruise aboard the Integrity this past November to my own Birdernaturalist Blog but decided move the topic over here. Everything is so easy to photograph here, even with my little Canon PowerShot point-and-shoot, [...]

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Short-tailed Albatross breeds on US soil

Thumbnail image for Short-tailed Albatross breeds on US soil by Gunnar 24 January 2011

Short-tailed Albatross back from the dead Although it is far too soon to say danger is over, the Short-tailed Albatross Phoebastria albatrus has made a remarkable recovery. In 1949 it was believed to be extinct. It was rediscovered in 1951 and in 1954 only 25 pairs were counted on Torishima, Japan. Today there are 426 [...]

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Xeno-canto featured on Treehugger

Thumbnail image for Xeno-canto featured on Treehugger by Gunnar 24 January 2011

The popular bird song data base has just been featured by TreeHugger – one of the most popular eco-sites in the world. Treehugger.com has over 300.000 unique visitors per day – 1000 times more than Birdingblogs. It will be a massive boast of traffic for xeno-canto.

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Notable mentions: Digiscoper of the Year 2010

Thumbnail image for Notable mentions: Digiscoper of the Year 2010 by DaleForbes 23 January 2011

What a stunning photo of a Madagascan Helmet Vanga (Euryceros prevostii) by Pete Morris – just one of the 2000-odd photos entered in to the 2010 Swarovski Digiscoper of the Year competition. There were tons of awesome photos but, naturally, not every great photo can be amongst the winners (see the DOY Backstory here; and [...]

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Stunning bird photography.

Thumbnail image for Stunning bird photography. by Gunnar 21 January 2011

Flying birds at 1/8000s. Roy Hancliff takes shots of birds at 1/8000s speed. It freezes the picture. Roy explains: When I take the shot its so quick I don’t see it. Our eyes simply aren’t fast enough to register all the action that is happening right in your own back garden. It’s only afterwards when [...]

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What A Turdus!

Thumbnail image for What A Turdus! by Rebecca Nason 21 January 2011

I have just seen a new post ‘ A Tremendous Turdus’ uploaded today by Ian McKerchar on the Manchester birding website. This post is an account of the incredible sighting and gripping IMAGES of a stunning Dusky Thrush – seen briefly by non-birding plane spotter Ian Reynolds in his garden in Leigh on the 8th [...]

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Featured Bird Blogger of the Week

Thumbnail image for Featured Bird Blogger of the Week by dAwN FiNe 21 January 2011

Dawn Fine presents this weeks birdblogger: Jerry Jourdan – who is not only a fantastic digiscoper. …but also generously share his best digiscoping tips in free tuturials. Jerry Jourdan’s birding adventures are illustrated with beautiful bird photos.

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Feels so empty without Lee!

Thumbnail image for Feels so empty without Lee! by Gunnar 20 January 2011

The Punkbirder are famous for (among many things) putting birding lyrics to popular songs. Remember, the Gyr Crakes video “Thou shalt always bird” we shared a couple of months ago. The Punkbirder made the original lyrics for that one as well. Well, here is an excerpt of the latest hit – a cover on Eminems Without [...]

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Want to see the Marvellous Spatuletail displaying?

Thumbnail image for Want to see the Marvellous Spatuletail displaying? by Gunnar 19 January 2011

Marvelous Spatuletail Loddigesia mirabilis. The Marvelous Spatuletail is an endemic bird to Peru. One of the most spectacular things to witness in the birding world is the display of  the males spatuletails.  Our guide (then) Roger Ahlman together with our protegé Santos Montenegro were the first to witness this remarkable lek in over a 100 [...]

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The Rufous-winged Sparrow Bed-and-Breakfast

Thumbnail image for The Rufous-winged Sparrow Bed-and-Breakfast by Rich Hoyer 19 January 2011

A visit to the Oasis B & B north of Tucson turns up a rare hummingbird. I’ve been meaning to visit this place for a couple of years. There are very few bed-and-breakfast establishments in the Tucson area that cater to birders, and I had heard that the butterfly gardens here were amazing. OK, so [...]

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Interview with the Digiscoper of the Year 2010

Thumbnail image for Interview with the Digiscoper of the Year 2010 by DaleForbes 16 January 2011

The results for the Swarovski Digiscoper of the Year 2010 competition have just been announced: http://digiscoperoftheyear.com/ This year’s winner is the biologist Óscar J. González Hernández, of Salamanca in Spain, with a stunning image of a European Bee-eater (above). I managed to get hold of Óscar and ask him a few questions that were at [...]

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The Fauna and the Fora

Thumbnail image for The Fauna and the Fora by Guest Post - Greg Neise 15 January 2011

In this guest post, Greg Neise from North American Birding gives a break down of the benefits of using a forum for connecting with other birders – and how to use them.

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Hawfinch Haven – 2 Days in Sweden

Thumbnail image for Hawfinch Haven – 2 Days in Sweden by Rebecca Nason 14 January 2011

I have just returned from a brief but very enjoyable 2 days bird photography trip to one of my favourite locations, the Black River Valley area of Svartådalen in Southern Sweden. I have been to this stunning area 5 times before since my first visit in 2003 when I visited as a guest of the [...]

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