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That Awkward Moment With Feral Cats and Family

10,000 Birds

I come from a large family: five sisters, two brothers and almost everyone has kids. Most of my family lives in Indiana, but thanks to social media we can easily keep in touch. Case in point: some of my family members have become active with feral cat colony organizations. I have mixed feelings about TNR.

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Ingrid Taylar: Bridging the Divide Between Cat and Bird Lovers

10,000 Birds

Years ago, I became a wildlife volunteer and advocate because of a cat who caught a bird. Now, he lay frightened and ruffled in my hands, his tail tattered, his feathers damp from the maw of a cat named Puck. Back then, I didn’t know enough about birds, but I knew a lot about cats. I scrambled for a box.

Cats 216
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Birding Shanghai in October 2023

10,000 Birds

Of course, that means that the birds I saw on September 30 are now somewhere in blogpost limbo, not having appeared in the September post but also not legitimately belonging in the October one. After this longish and completely irrelevant introduction, finally here is a photo of the first bird of September 30th, a Black-winged Cuckoo Shrike.

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Fur and Fangs rather than Feathers and Beaks

10,000 Birds

Memorable encounters with Mammals: Part I Most birdwatchers enjoy seeing mammals, but the trouble with mammals is that they tend to be much more challenging to see than birds. I remember the guide on my first Kenyan birding safari remarking that “birding groups always see far more mammals than those who come just to see animals.

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Birding Wawushan, Sichuan

10,000 Birds

In many ways, birding Wawushan is a nightmare for a solitary and crowd-hating birder like me. An unnamed bird guide called them “avoidless tourists”, which sums it up rather nicely. So, all this makes birding this place an occasionally less than pleasant experience. Never fails to startle them.

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Birding Tongbiguan, Yunnan (part 1)

10,000 Birds

Welcome to Birding Tongbiguan, part 1. The authors of the paper sound a bit helpless, stating that “At the time of discovery, both birds [two bee-eaters] were still alive, but it was not possible to free them from the net because the bees began to attack the ringer.” Of course, the same applies to pizza services for humans.

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Birding around Chaka, Qinghai, China

10,000 Birds

Fortunately, I share this preference with birds, which we found away from the lake, mostly in some semi-desert areas. “ Not the bird’s fault, I guess. Possibly my favorite bird on the whole Qinghai trip was this Mongolian Ground Jay – thanks a lot to Bella from Alpinebirding for finding it.

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