10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 24, 2016

If you are not familiar with the story, it’s about an Anglo-Irish mercenary, Jamie Shannon (played by Christopher Walken), hired to overthrow the regime in a fictional Western African country (it was actually filmed in Belize, Central America) and prior to the real thing, he was doing a reconnaissance trip posing as a “rare birds photographer”.

Belize 235

Belize Birds Africa Dogs 235

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 20, 2015

I live in the southeast of Europe, for a while lived in the south of Africa and also have extensively birded western and central India. And I remembered that, back when I was a boy, I wanted to live in eastern Africa. Which leaves only East Africa. Some regions are politically unstable, e.g. most of Central and Western Africa.

Sri Lanka 257

Sri Lanka Botswana Africa Serbia 257

10,000 Birds

JUNE 16, 2021

In fact, the best known member of the family, Central America’s aptly-named Resplendent Quetzal , looks less like Michoacán’s trogons than, say, Africa’s Narina Trogon , or the Red-naped Trogon of Indonesia. Honesty requires that I confess to having seen none of these species.

Mexico 182

Mexico Indonesia North America Arizona 182

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 3, 2021

” And then I found out that bird song doesn’t just belong to the males, that there are female birds who sing too, only not so much in North America, and my mind was blown.**. Research experiments are described without citing the names of the researchers themselves or any other background information. And, that’s it.

North America 278

North America Research Birds Groups 278

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 11, 2012

I’m sure you’ve all heard of Africa’s famous Big Five , but do you know there is also an equally fascinating Little Five ? Africa is famous for its large, charismatic mammals, and the Big Five epitomize the most sought-after of these fantastic beasts. This blog post will discuss both the Big and Little members of these quintuplets.

Buffalo 201

Buffalo Rhinoceros Elephants Leopards 201

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 28, 2020

Every year along the Atlantic Coast of North America, from June to November, experienced birders anticipate the exciting possibility of finding rare, tempest-tossed seabirds blown in from the tropics far north of their usual range. Well, we seem to have this tern figured out, but what about the odd name of this week’s beer? Tamarindo Gose?

India 167

India Squirrels North America America 167

4 The Love Of Animals

MARCH 25, 2012

National Geographic’s “Digital Nomad”, Andrew Evans, is on a trans-Atlantic journey from South America’s Cape Horn to Africa’s Cape of Good Hope. Along his journey (as with most of his adventures) he stops to hang with local animals, and to share his experience in his blog.

Fur 100

Fur Seals South America Africa 100

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 23, 2014

Larry starts us off right with an owl that makes birders drool: I was able to see and photograph many great birds in 2014 but my Best Bird of the Year would have to be the Great Gray Owl , the largest Strix in North America. The experience, the place, and the bird combine to make this my BBOTY. I also blogged about that dreamy day.

2014 187

2014 Costa Rica South Africa Birds 187

10,000 Birds

JULY 23, 2012

After all, North America has no native hedgehogs and seeing something so outside of our normal experience was pretty exciting, even if the little guy quickly headed for cover and refused to show itself for Clay Taylor, who came upon the scene a minute too late. New Zealand has a host of hedgehogs but they are introduced.

Hedgehogs 169

Hedgehogs Hungary Opossums North America 169

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 26, 2017

I have just returned from Costa Rica, the country about which I knew very little, despite it coming under my radar all the way back in 1999 when the “Africa – Birds & Birding” magazine published some of John Graham’s experiences from his visit in 1993.

Costa Rica 179

Costa Rica San Jose Serbia Europe 179

10,000 Birds

JULY 10, 2013

Official presentation of our team: The Zululanders from South Africa. I teamed up with the Zululanders, a team from South Africa composed of Fraser Gear, Trevor Hardaker, Gavin Lautenbach and Ross Goode. Other teams had member with lots of experience in the western lowlands. Photo: Peru Birding Rally. Photo: Peru Birding Rally.

Peru 258

Peru Birds South Africa United Kingdom 258

10,000 Birds

MARCH 29, 2015

Excellent 10,000 Birds posts have been written about Pico Bonito and Honduras by Corey and Carlos , so I’m going to focus on some of my most memorable experiences. I had seen Thick-Knees in South Africa, but I was very excited to see this species, which is the only member of its family found in Central America.

Honduras 248

Honduras Birds Costa Rica Groups 248

10,000 Birds

MARCH 8, 2011

Growing up within an hour of one of the world’s premier shorebird destinations -- West Coast National Park in South Africa -- helped for sure. Consider Estero Lagoon for example… In North America there are nine regular plover species, ten if you include the more vagrant Common Ringed Plover.

Florida 188

Florida South Africa 2011 Africa 188

10,000 Birds

APRIL 25, 2019

Several times, the answer was “Africa”, which, being a continent and not a country, I excluded from the statistics, but will further comment below. 4%: Mexico, West Papua (Indonesia), New Zealand, South Africa, Kenya. Africa is a huge continent with varied landscapes and rich biodiversity. 8%: Brazil, Panama. 17%: Ecuador, Peru.

Papua New Guinea 214

Papua New Guinea America Costa Rica Sri Lanka 214

10,000 Birds

JULY 22, 2014

It was not a kitty cat, even though all of its relatives in the Americas were. The majority of wildcats live today in Africa, and virtually none of them have provided the DNA from which supposed histories of domestication have been constructed by researchers. But they don’t live in North America. Unless we put them there.

Feral Cats 254

Feral Cats North America Feral Cats 254

10,000 Birds

MARCH 15, 2012

He interpreted the bones, also at Klasies but other sites in South Africa as well, to indicate that human ancestors hunted only Eland until they became fully modern very recently, then they started hunting the much more dangerous and harder to hunt Buffalo. Eland are pretty darn hard to hunt. Perhaps we can discuss that some other time.

Humane 165

Humane Lions Buffalo Hunting 165

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 20, 2012

Crawford, in “Introduction to Europe and Diffusion of Domesticated Turkeys from the America (sic)”: A document dated 24 October 1511 was an order from the Bishop of Valencia for each ship from the Islands and Tierra Firme to bring to Seville ten turkeys, half males and half females, for breeding. According to R.D. Which would be weird.

Turkey 201

Turkey Columbus Spain Fowl 201

10,000 Birds

MARCH 31, 2014

That seems like an abnormally high risk for a seabird that makes its living picking up small fish from the water’s surface, but Sooty Terns are some of the most abundant seabirds in the world and spend most of their lives on the open ocean between South America and Africa, so it seems to be working for them.

Birds 177

Birds Florida Groups Breeding 177

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 29, 2013

This is like Sibley calling his bird guide “The Sibley guide to Birds of Massachusetts and North America” The latter sounds silly, right? I’ve never seen anything like it, and I learned a great deal from them – after having tracked animals in Europe and Africa already for nearly 20 years.

Europe 165

Europe Mammals Animal Birds 165

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 7, 2021

I birded savannas of Southern Africa, I birded India and Central America, and I always missed having a local mammal guide with me. Yes, field guides to other groups of organisms, as there’s hardly any room left in your baggage or the energy to carry it. Yet, those bird guides are hefty.

Madagascar 241

Madagascar Mammals Lemurs Seychelles 241

10,000 Birds

MARCH 18, 2011

What’s remarkable about this species is what we don’t see here: the extremely long migration that this species makes, with some individuals traveling from Sub-Saharan Africa to Greenland and back every year. Migratory Isabelline, Pied and Red-tailed Wheatears along with a non-migrating Hume’s Wheaterar!

Cyprus 145

Cyprus 2011 Deer New York 145

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 4, 2016

The book is produced by WILDGuides, Ltd, the excellent book company responsible for over a dozen photographic guides on Britain’s natural life ranging from dragonflies to plant galls as well as books on Africa, Australia and other areas we all want to visit, and was published this summer by Princeton University Press.

Ireland 143

Ireland Birds Groups Falcons 143

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 3, 2020

Each chapter focuses on a specific geographic area of penguin population: (1) Antarctica, (2) South Georgia, (3) Falkland Islands, (4) South Africa and Tristan de Cunha, (5) New Zealand and Australia, (6) South America and Galapagos. Plantema has travelled to every penguin location, some multiple times, over the past 42 years.

Penguins 278

Penguins Georgia New Zealand Albatross 278

10,000 Birds

MARCH 11, 2011

Ringer Anhinga and Darters (Anhingidae) The Anhinga and three darter species inhabit warm, freshwater regions of the Americas, Africa, Asia, and Australasia. The experience also inspired my column this month at 10,000 Birds, so check that out when you’re done: Meet Suliformes, one of the newest orders of birds.) [.]

2011 152

2011 Pelicans Papua New Guinea Birds 152

10,000 Birds

MAY 15, 2012

The name has always seemed to apply to a rather motley group of birds, from the exquisite Scissor-tailed Kite of east Africa, to the grotesque Hook-billed Kite of Central America, and various and sundry examples in between. This is a bird that does not mess around.

Mississippi 158

Mississippi North Carolina Raleigh Groups 158

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 2, 2012

(That’s Pitta, people, not Antpitta, which is what I foolishly first envisioned, having never birded beyond the Americas.) I get my own idea of the lunacy of Gooddie’s quest when I talk to a friend who has birded Asia and Africa. If it were just the birds, I’d grab my bins and be on the next plane to Asia or Africa. And leeches.

Hunters 192

Hunters Sri Lanka Asia Solomon Islands 192

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 20, 2014

The Arctic terns are very enduring and have the longest bird migration from their way across the Atlantic Sea to western Europe and along the west coast of Africa to the Antarctic waters. Their mission is to spread knowledge about all the adventures and extraordinary experiences Greenland has to offer: [link].

North America 176

North America Eagles Breeding Fish 176

10,000 Birds

MARCH 1, 2011

Veraguan Mango by Carlos Bethancourt Although the Neotropical region supports fewer bird families than Africa, there are considerably more bird species here than anywhere else on earth. This means that there are some astoundingly large families of birds in Central and South America.

Panama 205

Panama Costa Rica 2011 Cleveland 205

10,000 Birds

MARCH 4, 2014

Where did the Coney Island Gray-hooded Gull come from, Africa or South America? I kept wishing I had Rare Birds of North America , by Steve N. In this book, rare birds are species “for which, on average, only 5 or fewer individuals have been found annually in North America since around 1950.” And, not very often.

North America 252

North America America Birds United States 252

10,000 Birds

APRIL 8, 2012

Catbirds are not the unfortunate result of unwise experiments with radioactivity. The Gray Catbird Dumetella carolinensis is a common bird across most of North America, excepting the far west and northern Canada. Both catbird species in the Americas are part of the family Mimidae along with the mockingbirds , thrashers, and tremblers.

Papua New Guinea 182

Papua New Guinea Ethiopia Guinea Cats 182

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 20, 2014

The Hoatzin, which may have reached South America by raft , has resisted placement in basically every study ever done. Tyrannosaurus rex didn’t exist yet. Jarvis et al. OK, if you’re still following along on the tree , the next branch we reach is a novel proposal: Hoatzin as sister to Charadriiformes and Gruiformes.

Family 279

Family Parrots Birds 2014 279

10,000 Birds

MARCH 5, 2024

Elizabeth’s experience and ingenuity, for example, can be seen in her lithograph of Langsdorff’s Aracari; there was only a single specimen in a German collection and its tail was mutilated, so she obscured the tail in her plate by placing it behind a large leaf (pp. 168-168).

Australia 186

Australia Birds Europe Collecting 186

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 15, 2014

Typically, at least here in North America, we think of migration as a north-south affair. B95 and his Calidris canutus rufa kin may travel back and forth from South America to the Arctic, but another subspecies of Red Knot , Calidris canutus islandica , makes the journey up here from Great Britain and other parts of Europe.

Africa 195

Africa Somalia North America Nigeria 195

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 2, 2020

Its waterproof fold-able covers bring back childhood memories… I must have had some illustrated children book with similar covers – my fingertips remember the experience. The author, Otani Chikara, has travelled and birded extensively in Japan and elsewhere in Asia, Africa, Oceania and the Americas. What I don’t like?

Japan 222

Japan Asia Birds 2000 222

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 6, 2011

Adam will be leading 10,000 Birds readers on an amazing odyssey into Africa starting… now! To the uninitiated, Africa conjures up images of underdevelopment, poverty and hardship. I was fortunate to have been born and raised in Africa, and although I have traveled extensively around the world, it remains my home and in my blood.

Papua New Guinea 218

Papua New Guinea Madagascar Africa Equatorial Guinea 218

10,000 Birds

MAY 15, 2011

It made us reach for our field guide for North America, but that really does not compare to the real thing. I did not get to appreciate all that America had to offer for the birder until I returned with my husband, Grant, in 1989. We have never been to South Africa, but it is a lovely book to look at and dream!

South Africa 158

South Africa United States Austin Alligators 158

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 31, 2019

Despite having 30 illustrators, I do not notice much difference in style, which clearly was the case with Robson’s book (or even with National Geographic Birds of North America). The paintings are, no doubt beautiful, but how successful they are, I can judge only by checking those birds I have a lot of experience with.

Thailand 188

Thailand Zambia Birds Asia 188