Just a few birds taken from the garden this morning.
Carrion crow
Male house sparrow
Starling
Magpie (being mobbed by crows)
No wonder the magpie looked worried
Starling
House sparrow
Wood pigeon
Collared dove
Author: martintayler
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2nd April 2020 – Self-isolation in Bristol
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1st April 2020 – Self-isolating in Bristol
Even though it hasn’t been as bitingly cold as yesterday it has been a very dull day and my trips to the end of the path didn’t produce much. I did see the house sparrows, which are making a nest in the eves of the roof of the house opposite, mating in a nearby tree but the light was so poor for a decent photo. More and more sparrows are appearing and starlings, crows and jackdaws are collecting nesting materials. The dunnocks have again been looking at themselves in car wing mirrors.
What was quite an achievement was to get a photo of a blue tit on the bird feeder – my presence nearly always frightens them off.
House sparrows mating
Starlings collecting nest materials
Wood pigeon
Blue tit on one of my garden feeders
Blue tit on the tree opposite my house
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30th March 2020 – Self-isolating in Bristol
It was very cold standing outside my house this morning. I didn’t get much exercise but I did get some fresh air and was entertained for an hour or so by nature.
Male sparrow
Starling
Collared dove
Collared dove
Collared dove and sparrow
Starling
Female sparrow
Female sparrow
Starling
Female sparrow
Female sparrow
Female sparrow -
28th March 2020 – Self-isolating in Bristol
I managed to get a short fix of nature this morning whilst self-isolating at home but I didn’t stay long outside as, with a strong north-easterly wind, the temperatures had plummeted.
The bird feeders in our garden continue to go down but I get little or no opportunity to photograph the birds on them because as soon as I go in to our small back garden the birds disappear. I can see them from the bathroom window but that’s too geeky for even me to photograph them from there. Consequently I am restricted to photographing birds discretely with a long lens in neighbours’ gardens or on nearby rooftops.
The wood pigeons were easy to spot but I didn’t see any of the collared doves which have been around recently.
There seemed to be more house sparrows this morning. It is very encouraging to see them as, although once quite abundant locally, they had disappeared in recent years.
Male sparrow
Female sparrow
I could hear goldfinches but didn’t see any today.
The dunnocks appeared again and instantly made for the car across the road to look at themselves in the wing mirrors or at their reflections in the car windows.
Dunnock getting ready for the day aheadOn the same wall I also saw a robin.
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European robin
In a distant garden there were a pair of blackbirds. I haven’t seen any locally recently but I have heard them. That’s the next thing – recording bird song!
The best I could manage of this male blackbird
On the roof tops there were jackdaws, crows and magpies.
Two jackdaws
Before going in I spotted a huge bee busy on a flowering red currant next to the back door.
I made a mental note to myself to learn the names of different types of bees. As Simon Barnes writes in the Sunday Times today:
” I can’t kiss you. I can’t buy you a pint. I can’t invite you to drop by and watch the football. All I can offer is the best thing in the world. Nature”. He goes on to say:
“It all starts with noticing. The second stage is seeking the name, and that will give a greater intimacy, as names do.”But enough was enough and I disappeared indoors to find some chores to do.
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26th March 2020 – Self-isolating in Bristol
We have been self-isolating at home all week. We had a 7 am walk in our local park last Saturday but didn’t feel safe as people, especially runners, came very close to us (even though I often pretended to be looking for a bird in the bushes). On Sunday we travelled to the Forest of Dean where we managed some exercise in isolation. However, reading what NHS workers had to say, and pleading with us to stay at home, we have remained at home. Neighbours and friends have helped with shopping. It has seemed very strange because it has always been in our nature to help others and now we find we can only help by staying at home.
To some extent I have enjoyed painting fences, building garden storage, cleaning the patio and so on as the weather has been wonderful for this time of the year. However, I have missed my camera (and nature) and today I self-indulged by taking photos from in and around our tiny urban garden. If I can’t go to nature, I’ll have to let nature come to me. I could see a herring gull, goldfinches, sparrows, dunnocks, wood pigeons and collared doves, jackdaws, crows, starlings, blackbirds, a robin (only heard), blue tits and great tits (only heard), bees and a peacock butterfly.
Unfortunately, all of the birds (except the blackbird on the washing line) were outside of the garden and I hope that neighbours don’t think I am being a voyeur with a long lens. I hope my photos are the proof of it.
Goldfinch
Dunnock
Wood pigeon
Jackdaw
Male sparrow
Male sparrow
Magpie
Female sparrow
Dunnock
Female sparrow
Jackdaw
Dunnocks
Dunnocks
Dunnocks
Dunnocks
Female sparrow
Female sparrow
Collared doves
Peacock butterfly
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22nd March 2020 – Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire
At the end of the first week of self-isolating due to the Covid-19 pandemic it was a sure delight to get out and about today. I have kept myself busy during the week doing jobs in and around the house but I have felt hemmed in (not surprisingly) and the lack of social contact was beginning to have an effect on my moral.
We were pleased to hear earlier in the week that the National Trust was keeping its outdoor spaces open but as people went there in their droves social distancing was clearly not possible and this decision was revoked. So we decided to give the Forest of Dean a go. We have been many times to the RSPB Reserve at Nags Head in the past and never seen many people. Fortunately again today there were very few people around and we could keep a good distance from them.
ErrorThis video doesn’t existThe aim of our sortie was to get some exercise and not particularly to do bird watching, which was just as well as we didn’t see many birds at all (we avoided the bird hides even if they had been open). It was a lovely sunny day and the beauty of the forest certainly lifted our spirit.
Although we didn’t get many sightings of birds we did have a wonderful moment when a bat flitted around above us. A managed one rather poor shot which might enable anyone who knows about these things to identify it. – a pipistrelle perhaps?
Right at the beginning of our walk a lone greylag goose mystically appeared from nowhere.
Greylag gooseThere were a few blackbirds, some coal tits and frequent noisy robins. We also heard woodpeckers, probably Great Spotted although Lesser Spotted are found here.
Blackbird
Coal tit
Robin
Robin
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16th March 2020 – Eastville Park, Bristol
It’s been a while since I’ve been able to get out and take photos and write a blog as its been very wet and I have also been sidelined with a poorly foot. As a septuagenarian the risk of Covid-19 will clearly limit my opportunities for a while. Hopefully I will manage a little exercise in the park and maintain social distancing.
It was truly beautiful this morning. The stars for me were a peacock butterfly, a wren, a chiffchaff , a couple of grey wagtails and a kingfisher but I also enjoyed photographing the ducks, geese and swans on the lake.
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27th February 2020 – Eastville Park, Bristol
It may seem a bit mundane reporting on the same walk around Eastville Park but its all we had time for and anyway there’s nearly always something interesting to see. Today’s highlight was definitely a tree creeper.
Tree creeper
We heard, and generally saw, robins all round the park. Early on we saw a goldcrest (sadly no photo) near Fishponds Brook.
A robin to greet us
Another robin half way round
On the lake there was a grey heron, a coot, a couple of moorhens, 6 mute swans, two Canada geese, lots of black-headed gulls and a couple of lesser black-backed gulls.
Grey heron
Mute swan
Canada goose
Moorhen
Black-headed gull
Lesser black-backed gull
A pigeon strutting its stuff
CrowFor the first time for a while we saw no cormorants but there were plenty of corvids, mainly crows and some jackdaws lurking in the trees and around the lake.
We saw the tree creeper along the River Frome. True to form it landed on the tree and made its way around the trunk out of sight. When it reappeared it hid frustratingly behind the small branches but then fleetingly gave me a chance to capture it. I’m sure my editing of the photos makes its stand out much more than we saw as its camouflage on the bark was quite amazing.
Tree creeper
On the way home we saw a jay, lots of magpies and several wood pigeons.
The other pleasing sight was the celandine which was quite prominent in the sunshine
A different robin to bid us farewell
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25th February 2020 – Eastville Park, Bristol
Back to reality! I decided not to be a wimp and got out for a walk this morning. Light showers were forecast and I must admit it wasn’t raining when I left home. But when I arrived at the lake at Eastville Park it began to rain and continued to pour until I got home. Light shower indeed!
I caught a glimpse of a kingfisher but anything moving faster than a hovering black-headed gull didn’t get captured by my camera!
The only way I could make any of the birds look interesting was to try and get in close.
The highlight was being able to see the tawny owl on the island and a pied wagtail which followed me around the lake. A coot and a moorhen came close too. What did the robin find to be so cheerful about?
Tawny Owl
Brightly coloured pigeon (it wasn’t the sun catching its plumage!)
Pied wagtail
Pied wagtail
Coot
Moorhen
Black-headed gull
Cormorant
Magpie
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Birds of South Africa January/February 2020
In this blog I have tried to compile a record of the different birds we saw on our holiday to South Africa in January and February 2020.
We started our holiday with a safari trip to the Thornybush Private Game Reserve in Greater Kruger. Although the main focus of the trip was to observe the animals in the park there were plenty of opportunities to see lots of birds.
We spent three nights at the Chapungu Lodge in Greater Kruger and took part in 6 game drives (3 in the morning from 5 am to 8am and 3 in the afternoon from 4 pm to 7 pm).
We then flew back to Johannesburg and then on to Port Elizabeth. From there we drove along the Garden Route to Cape Town stopping (for 2 or 3 nights each time) at St Francis Bay, Knysna, Oudtshoorn, Robertson, and Franschoek. When we arrived in Cape Town we spent 10 nights in Camps Bay.
We were due to do a bird watching trip up the Kromme River in St Francis but this was cancelled due to persistent rain. The only other organised bird watching trip was to the Kogelberg Biosphere Reserve when we were staying in Cape Town.
Not all our time was spent bird watching We managed to pack lots in to our holiday including seeing South Africa play England in a cricket ODI at Newlands and visits to lots of vineyards and botanical gardens.
I have tried to show a variety of the birds we saw at each place. Although I am very pleased with many of the photos others are not so good but are included for ID purposes. Currently there is no particular order to the birds but they are generally in the order in which we saw them.
Please note: I am still adding photos to this collection and continuing the process of identifying and labelling them.
Click on heading for each place (on the following pages there will be a link to return to this page or use the back button on your browser)
I would like to thank Larry Sweetland and David Swanepoel for help with identifying birds in this blog.
Birds of Thornybush Private Game Reserve, Greater Kruger
Birds of Strandfontein Birding Area, False Bay Coastal Park
Birds of Kogelberg Biosphere Reserve
Birds of Blouberg Strand and nearby lagoons
Birds of Kirstenbosch National Botanical Gardens
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10th February 2020 – Kirstenbosch National Botanical Gardens, Cape Town
We spent the last day of our wonderful trip to South Africa visiting the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden. Their website says “Kirstenbosch is acclaimed as one of the great botanic gardens of the world. Few gardens can match the sheer grandeur of the setting of Kirstenbosch, against the eastern slopes of Cape Town’s Table Mountain”. Indeed Kirstenbosch is one of our favourite gardens in the world. We have visited it several times and even visited it on this trip with some friends just over a week ago when we arrived in Cape Town.
It was a bit cooler today and even quite chilly as the cloud came down late in the afternoon. (Although, the other side of the mountain in Camps Bay, where we have been staying, it had been sunny and hot all day.
View across Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden from the Tree Canopy Walk.
Tree Canopy Walkway
Today we saw more birds than last week (clearly I must have been talking too much last week) and even saw a new bird for us, an Olive Woodpecker. But the stars of the day were the Lesser Double-collared Sunbirds which we saw several times feeding in the Ericas. We also had plenty of sightings of Cape Bulbuls.
Olive Woodpecker
Olive Woodpecker
Lesser Double-collared Sunbird
Lesser Double-collared Sunbird
Lesser Double-collared Sunbird
Cape Bulbul
Cape BulbulCape Bulbul
Forest Canary
Cape Robin-Chat
Juvenile Cape Robin-Chat
Fork-tailed Drongo
Red-winged Starling
Butterflies too!… and lots of beautiful plants:
What a great way to end our trip.
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6th February 2020- Kogelsberg Biosphere Reserve
For our last nature trip on our holiday to South Africa we booked our first ever guided birding trip through the company “Birding Africa” (https://www.birdingafrica.com/) to the Kogelsberg Biosphere Reserve.
“Birding Africa” were very efficient in their administration and our guide David Swanepoel was superb. David quickly assessed our capabilities and designed a programme which was very suitable for us. He clearly had an amazing knowledge of birds and was excellent at spotting and pointing them out to us (not an insignificant skill!). We really enjoyed David’s company throughout the day. He drove us safely and was most a most engaging and interesting character. We arrived safely back at our apartment in Camps Bay after a very full day, exhausted but exhilarated
I have taken the following article about the reserve from https://www.kbrc.org.za which I find most fascinating:
“Just an hour out of Cape Town at the southern tip of Africa, lies an area of such natural beauty and floral diversity as to be recognized as perhaps world’s greatest biodiversity hot-spot. Size for size, the 100,000 hectare UNESCO designated Kogelberg Biosphere Reserve is home to the most complex biodiversity on our planet with more than 1,880 different plant species … the next richest is the South American rainforest with just 420 species per 10,000 square kilometers!
Biosphere reserves are ‘new concept’ reserves: no fences to keep ‘people’ out and ‘nature’ in. It is the commitment of local communities, farmers, conservation agencies and local government that protects the magnificent landscapes and unique biodiversity.
The Kogelberg Biosphere Reserve begins in the Atlantic Ocean, 7.5 km off a rugged, rocky shore interspersed by glorious, golden sandy beaches. A zig-zag ribbon of narrow coastal plain is squeezed between the ocean and huge sandstone mountains. Contorted by their tumultuous birth some 300 million years ago, these awesome folded mountains and highland valleys are home to the more than 1,880 different species of plants. Seventy seven (77) species within the Kogelberg Biosphere Reserve occur nowhere else on earth. To put this in perspective, the whole of the UK has just twenty two (22) endemics.”
Our birding experience started at Rooi-els (about an hour and a half from Camps Bay) where we went looking for Cape Rock Jumpers. David heard them but they did not show themselves to us. However, we had very good views of Orange-breasted and Southern Double-collared Sunbirds, a Cape Bunting and several Familiar Chats, which was more than enough to keep us happy. As we walked along the pathway we also saw a Neddicky, a Cape Rock Thrush, a Cape Sugarbird and Red-winged Starlings. Even more distant up above us we could see a Rock Kestrel, White-necked Ravens and a Rock Martin.
Cape Bunting
Orange-breasted Sunbird
There’s no bird hiding here – I was just fascinated by all the different vegetation
Familiar chat
Rock Kestrel
Cape Rock Thrush
The path we explored at Rooi-els
Orange-breasted Sunbird
Cape Sugarbird
After a coffee break at Betty’s Bay we moved on to Stony Point (a former whaling station) to see African Penguins. We were also fascinated by the four different types of cormorant which we spotted (Cape, Crowned, Bank and White-breasted) We also saw Water Thick-knees and an African Black Oystercatcher amongst the rocks as well as dassies. These little furry creatures are, unbelievably, the closest living relative to African elephants.
Dassies
African Penguins
We also saw lots of Cape Wagtails, Kelp Gulls, Hartlaub’s Gull and a Sandwich Tern.
Kelp gull
Hautlaub’s Gull
Bank Cormorant
White-breasted Cormorant
Cape Cormorant
Crowned Cormorant
Water Thick knees
African Black OystercatcherAfter Stony Point we went to the Harold Porter National Botanical Gardens. Here David picked out all sorts of birds for us. For me the stand out ones were Orange-breasted and Southern Double-collared Sunbirds. We also saw Fiscal Flycathers, Cape Robin-Chat, Karo Prinia, Cape White-eye, Malachite Sunbird, Red-eyed Dove, Sombre Greenbul, Forest Canary, Cape Canary and an African Dusky Flycatcher. Flitting past were also Greater-striped Swallows and Black Saw-wing. I did attempt some shots but I would be too embarrassed to show the results.
Harold Porter National Botanical Garden
Water-lillies and frogs
Southern Double-collared Sunbird
Juvenile Fiscal Flycatcher
Cape Canary
Forest Canary
Orange-breasted Sunbird
Cape Canary
Southern Double-collared Sunbird
Orange-breasted Sunbird
Orange-breasted Sunbird
Orange-breasted Sunbird
Karoo Prinia
Cape White-eye
African Dusky Flycatcher
Cape Robin-chat
After the Harold Porter National Botanical Garden we returned to Betty’s Bay for a late lunch.
On our route back to Camps Bay we stopped off at at Pardeviei Wetland at Somerset West but the water was very low and, although we could see lots of birds (including Blacksmith Lapwing, Black-winged Stilts and Pied Avocets) in the distance, we felt that we had had enough and set off to face the Cape Town traffic.
The weather was not very kind to us as it was very windy and quite grey. In a way that may have been a blessing as we might have been even more exhausted if it had been a hot sunny day. Nonetheless an amazing day where we saw over 50 different species.
Martin's Bird Blog & Nature Photos 