KINGFISHERS

5/12/09
just a quick post,on lickhill today,a ravern was heard,12 pheasant were on the vismig field,7 goldcrest,but the highlight was 3 kingfishers which shown very,very well on a small pond.i got very close to there favorite perch,here are a few videos of the kingfishers:

MB

DRAWINGS

have never posted some of my drawings on this blog so here are a few i have made previously,as you will proberbly see most of my inspiration comes from birds that i have recently seen so here is a taster:

so what do you think,

comments welcome

MB

BUTTER BUMP

or the eurasian bittern

28/11/09

my 3rd and last installment of this day,after leaving the plovers we headed to upton warren.the bittern had been showing on the north moors earlier in the day so that's where i went.no more than 5 mins into our vigial the BITTERN was flying across the lake.it landed in the reeds(see pic below) and continued to move about in the reeds;

but despite watching for another 15-20 mins we didnt see it again.

so we headed down to the west hide,the usual stuff was about here,consisting of shoveler(65) teal(2) pochard(36),water rail(5,3 seen), g c grebe(15c),little grebe(6),a kingfisher perched on the stick briefly and a female reed bunting was on the feeders before going to roost

a redwing and a l t tit perched on the bush just outside the left side of the hide in almost darkness

.the walk back to the car was more exiting,with the thrush flock again presant,and with cetti's calling.

but bar the bittern it was a rather quiet visit,but come on,you've still got to love the place.

MB

HORROR

just read this grusom post from london

just makes you wonder WHY doesent it
MB

MAGIC!

28/11/09

earlswood

must admit it isnt that many times i say that,but this 1 and a half hours at earlswood must surley go down as one of my best birding moments this year,just as we were preparing to leave at 2:45 i looked up to see how light it was and try to predict how much time we had at upton,but while looking up i noticed about v skeins in the sky,no not wild geese,frickin GOLDEN PLOVER, and not just a few loads of them,,i was standing out in the back garden,so bolted for the car to grab my bins,i got them and soon was joined by my dad as we watched them as they circled around, a MASSIVE flock,litterally covering the sky,they were everywhere,but after a few skeins had started circling over out heads ,more continued to pile in and within about 30 seconds about 1000 were in there,1000 of them,

i felt so privalidged to watch this as this year i had only seen 8 of them(not including the last slimbridge visit, as the total would go up to 158,kinda ruining the amazment),the flock the flew off west leaving my amazed at such a spectacle, but after a few minuites 300 of the flock flew back and again started circling,i used this time to get videos and photos(sorry all videos digi-binned and highly shakey,watch at your own risk),

to be honest i hadent been this exited here since i had the honey buzzard over here in 2007(well i think its 2007, a little story i was in the garden and i saw 2 buzzards coming in from the north,one looked odd so i looked at that one,only when it got about myhead did i know i was looking at a honey buzzard,as this was long before i knew birdguides existed or before i had any contacts i didnt take it any further,apart from gloating to my birding friend about it,only later that night my friend called back to say one was seen there earlier in the day over the lakes,and if i remember right it had a broken primary in its right wing or was it left)

back to the plovers,they then flew towards the hungry horse and looked to land butwithin 30 secs they were back up and flew north,and that was the last time i saw them,at around 3pm,and according to matt,the house where i do the job is in west mids so they were in the west mids(my first for that county) but also saw them fly into warwrickshire so 2 counties.

and finally i will take this op to thank matt for all the help he has given me about earlswood,and some birds he has seen,including black tern(before i saw my first) among other stuff,and matt is it ok to mention a certain bird in warwickshire a few months ago?

well anyway,one on me matt :-)

MB