article thumbnail

The return of the Old Man

10,000 Birds

Sadly, they no longer breed in Algeria, while in Turkey no free-flying birds remain. (In Storks, Ibises and Spoonbills of the World states that “disturbance by local people, tourists, and egg and zoo collectors has similarly reduced the colonies, and more protection is vital”. In 1890 an estimated 3,000 pairs nested in Birecik.)

Morocco 246
article thumbnail

What to Do at High Island When the Winds are South

10,000 Birds

Fortunately, as I found out over the next four days, High Island, the Bolivar Peninsula, the whole east Texan Gulf coast area is a place of diverse habitats, some protected, some accidental, all offering fantastic avian opportunities. Corps of Engineers to protect Galveston Bay at the end of the 19th-century. Clapper Rail.

Houston 261
Insiders

Sign Up for our Newsletter

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Trending Sources

article thumbnail

The Great Bustard Search is On (1)

10,000 Birds

Habitat destruction combined with hunting has pushed them away from their former breeding grounds. What remains of their range is currently protected as the Pastures of Great Bustard Special Nature Reserve, but in the last several years there are only a dozen birds left, and only one adult male among them. What treats do they face?

Serbia 118
article thumbnail

Definitively the Egyptians!

10,000 Birds

In short, the accepted view used to be that a small breeding population of Egyptian Vultures inhabited Southern Africa, but has vanished facing the spread of towns, roads and farms. In the 1970s we had two to four breeding pairs, in the 1980s one to two, in the 1990s it was zero to two (irregular breeding).

Sudan 252
article thumbnail

All my patches

10,000 Birds

, and at the same time not grumpy enough to make them draw their guns (yep – it’s a true story, but do not trust the first impression: they were rough on the outside and soft on the inside, e.g. being fiercely protective of stray dogs and cats – that particular guy kept about five dogs and 15 cats, and they all lived together peacefully).

Serbia 247
article thumbnail

Birds on Posts or Birding North Dakota

10,000 Birds

Over 80 percent of North Dakota’s prairie has vanished, but there are still millions of acres in North Dakota, under both government protection and private ownership. Since 1966, when the Breeding Bird Survey first began monitoring, numbers have declined 79 percent.

article thumbnail

Photo Essay: Green-rumped Parrotlets from Egg to Adult

10,000 Birds

The population of parrotlets they studied was located on one of the many huge hatos (cattle ranches) in the Venezuelan llanos, a vast swath of flat flooded savannah in the central third of the country that drains into the Rio Orinoco. You don’t really know a bird until you’ve studied it on its breeding grounds. The Auk 108: 863-871.

Eggs 269