10,000 Birds

MARCH 23, 2014

Big news about a small bird broke earlier this month when bird researchers from several nations announced that the species formerly known as Spotted Wren-Babbler ( Spelaeornis formosus ) — a tiny, secretive bird of montane forests from the eastern Himalayas to southeast China — is not a Spelaeornis wren-babbler at all.

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Family Comoros Asia Birds 272

10,000 Birds

APRIL 8, 2024

This post starts like every birding blog post should start – by showcasing some bulbul species. According to the highly successful book ” 7 Habits of Highly Successful Birding Blog Post Writers”, only about 50% of birding blog posts should start with bulbuls). Yes, I am joking.

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Birds Owls China Research 169

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 11, 2021

Early August is a bit of a dead time for birding in Shanghai unless you like your birds as little white spots at the far end of a telescope. So, I asked around and was told that Qinghai is the place to go to for birds in China in August. Going to Qinghai usually starts with a flight to Xining, the capital. But it is not.

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Birds North Korea China Woodpeckers 264

10,000 Birds

JUNE 20, 2022

T he Grey-capped Pygmy Woodpecker (Tengchong, China) is a tiny bit bigger and looks much soberer. The little red bit on the crown on this photo indicates that it is a male bird. A point in case: the Crimson-breasted Woodpecker (Tengchong, China). Supposedly, they smoke less than the Brown-capped ones, too.

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Woodpeckers South Africa China Singapore 262

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 23, 2021

Given the strict covid prevention measures here in China, I have not left the country in almost 2 years now. Fortunately, China still has lots of interesting birding locations left for me. But of course, it is also nice to remember past birding trips. That does not make much sense, I know. Or they are afraid of flying.

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South Africa Africa Lesotho Nigeria 263

10,000 Birds

JUNE 23, 2022

The main attraction for birders here are the hornbills – I have written about them before , so this post will be more on the other birds I saw there in 2017. Anyway, it is a very cute-looking bird if you are big enough not to be among its prey of (mostly) insects. I have written about the hornbills of this area before.

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Birds Myanmar China Chicago 147

10,000 Birds

JUNE 13, 2022

Some more photos of Australian birds mixed with irrelevant facts and mediocre half-jokes, as a way to pass away the time while being under lockdown in Shanghai (note: it is over now but this post was written during the lockdown). It must be a bit frustrating for a flower to be less colorful than the bird visiting it though.

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Australia Birds Feral Cats Kangaroos 242

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 15, 2021

It is a well-known birding hotspot, though access to some of its parts may be tricky without a local guide. There is quite a bit of construction going on, so in the future, the park may become much more accessible to tourists, and at the same time much less attractive for shy birds (and their birder followers). Birders, less so.

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Birds Pandas Mammals China 252

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 23, 2020

I feel that like most bird families (with the obvious exception of pheasants), buntings are somewhat underrated. They lack both the flashiness larger birds and the “I am more of an expert birder than you” appeal of warblers. In other words, they are my kind of birds. Pallas Bunting. Yellow-browed Bunting. Yellowhammer.

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South Africa China Germany Family 218

10,000 Birds

MARCH 18, 2021

A typical description of the family is that of “a tropical African and Asian songbird that typically has a melodious voice and drab plumage”, another is “small, dull-colored passerine birds of Asia and Africa”, yet another states that they are “often rather plain” Individual species get even harsher reviews.

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South Africa Malaysia Africa China 269

10,000 Birds

APRIL 30, 2020

Winter is not the greatest time for birding in Shanghai, and this year, there was no escaping to Southeast Asia due to Covid-19. In fact, if I were to leave China right now, they would not let me back into the country. The obvious local star of the bird world is the Reed Parrotbill. This includes spectacular birds such as.

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2020 China Asia Owls 226

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 12, 2020

China is not that well-known for its hornbills, but in Yunnan province, on the border to Myanmar, some species can be found. The bird in the photo is a male, as indicated by the yellow rather than blue throat sack – and by the fact that it is outside of the hole at breeding time (the female is in the hole). Visiting the family.

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Myanmar Singapore China Collecting 278

10,000 Birds

MARCH 31, 2022

While I am still not so sure about China’s sense of humor – though admittedly, the issue is mostly a mismatch between what I think is funny and what the average Chinese thinks is funny, an issue that I have had in other countries as well – the country sure has its fair share of Laughingthrushes. This post shows some of them.

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San Diego Malaysia China Zoos 252

10,000 Birds

JULY 9, 2020

As I simply saw too many interesting birds during my short Delhi birding trip in 2019, I decided to cover the trip in two separate posts. There is no ornithological rationale for which birds are featured in part 1 and 2 – it is merely a question of following the alphabet wherever it led me. One of my favorite bird species.

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Birds India Zoos 2019 193

10,000 Birds

JUNE 27, 2019

For a German living in China, bird names have some additional complexities. Most of the Shanghai birds I only know by their English names, as this is the language of eBird as well as the language shared with other foreign birders. Fairy Pitta: the 8-color bird. Collared Scops Owl – A Cat Head Eagle. Well, no more!

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China Eagles Cats Owls 203

10,000 Birds

JUNE 26, 2023

Here goes: Paradise Flycatchers are a genus in the broader (and rather large) family of Monarchidae. A characteristic of most but not all Paradise Flycatchers is the long tail of the male bird (tail length is thought to be a criterion by which females select their partners – please insert your own pornographic joke here).

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Japan China Guinea Germany 130

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 8, 2022

According to Wikipedia, the national bird of Australia is the Emu – which I have not seen yet. Duncan – in a 10,000 Birds post – apparently also thinks it would make a good national bird. Duncan – in a 10,000 Birds post – apparently also thinks it would make a good national bird.

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Australia Birds Parrots Ostriches 147

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 10, 2022

For some reason that I do not quite understand myself – given that I really rather dislike children and am not too positive about the rest of humanity either – I recently put up a little display of bird photos inside my Shanghai compound, which I share (as the only foreigner) with about 1700 Chinese. Some Birds of Shanghai.

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Birds Fish Germany China 162

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 4, 2021

Construction is still ongoing at Nanhui, there are constant rumors that key birding sites will be made inaccessible … you have to take every Nanhui visit as it is your last (yes, another clichee). Still, there were a few birds there this September. Still, there were a few birds there this September. A juvenile male.

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Birds LACS France Japan 262

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 17, 2022

Re-evaluate the songs Double-pack with a photograph Extra track (and a tacky badge) So sing The Smiths in “ Paint a vulgar picture “ As you can probably guess, the main purpose of my posts not centered on a specific location (e.g., “Birds of Shanghai”) is to reuse photos I have already used in such location-specific posts.

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South Africa Africa India China 251

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 22, 2014

For others, it is the desire to have a different birding experience from home without needing a passport. Andy Walker and I had the pleasure of visiting Doi Lang in late December of 2013 right on my birthday — so many birthday birds on that day!

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Thailand Birds 2013 China 169

10,000 Birds

JUNE 9, 2022

With the lockdown lasting until the end of May (ironically thus pretty much including the whole spring migration – the divine sense of humor is a rather malign one, I am afraid), June still had the freedom of birding anywhere in Shanghai, not just inside a smallish compound. Accessorizing for birds.

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Singapore Birds Mountain Goats Giraffes 147

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 20, 2023

This is the second part of a post showing some birds seen at Nonggang in December 2022, along with the usual (mostly irrelevant) comments. The poor bird’s Latin species name is macgrigoriae , apparently (HBW) named after Jane Grant McGrigor, the daughter of Maj. Sir James McGrigor (1771-1858) Director Gen.

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China Birds Pythons Eagles 262

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 2, 2014

The danger of reviewing a field guide to the birds of an exotic country you’ve never been to is that you become obsessed with visiting that country, no matter how far away and how expensive it may be. I’m already looking up birding tours of Borneo and pricing airfares. Borneo, the authors say, is under-birded.

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Brunei Birds Asia China 195

10,000 Birds

MAY 22, 2011

If you’re a British birder, or a birder looking in to British birding, you could be forgiven sometimes for feeling it bears all the hallmarks of a good soap opera depending on where you surf. They provide little in the way of inspiration to the average birder and offer little real insight into birding in Britain in the 21st century.

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Lithuania Denmark Birds China 218

10,000 Birds

APRIL 13, 2016

The scientists, who studied bird populations in Europe and China , speculate that urban areas may have some appeal for passerines that rural areas otherwise lack. Birds like cuckoos, who lay their eggs in songbirds’ nests, and whose young then off the hosts’ own chicks, tend to avoid cities.

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China Europe Research Falcons 104

10,000 Birds

JUNE 25, 2017

I was given my first real field guide to the birds of Europe by my parents, a guide beyond the species found at backyard feeders and city ponds. However, all my keen travel plans and strategies frequently hit a snag roughly two-thirds into the book when I got to the page depicting a fine, delicate bird: the Azure Tit.

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Europe Birds Kazakhstan Russia 100

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 21, 2014

It inhabits rather dry areas within a region notorious for being one of the rainiest parts of the world, and is thus patchily distributed from Burma through Laos, Cambodia, parts of Thailand and south China, all the way to Vietnam. A small brown bird. Boy, this pic (and bird) was surely worth the wait. So, move over Cassowary.

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Burma Laos Birds Indonesia 168

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 11, 2021

This is just one of the usual blog posts from me, trying to get you to look at some of my bird photos via adding some semi-funny words. Let’s start with band names referring to birds in general (and let’s keep in mind that this blog post only mentions music deemed of sufficient quality by the almighty writer).

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South Africa China Germany Birds 261

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 5, 2023

I also only managed to see rather common bird species at Shennongjia, a nature reserve in Hubei province, China. If this does not put you off from reading this post, you are hopeless anyway, so just proceed … The Brown-breasted Bulbul might well be the most common bird at Shennongjia, so it seems appropriate to start with it.

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China Birds Eggs Woodpeckers 209

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 27, 2012

One of the sweetest subsections of the duck family has to be the sawbills, formally known as mergansers. Mergansers are a family of diving waterfowl in Merginae , the seaduck subfamily of Anatidae. The sole sawbill of the Southern Hemisphere is down to 200-250 birds extant mainly because the habitat it requires is equally threatened.

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North America Thailand Russia Ducks 247

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 8, 2013

Jodi Swenson is a bird rehabber in Gloucester, MA. Her fine china repair business pays her bills, but her budget is often strained past the breaking point by the 250-300 birds she takes in per year – such as this Eastern Screech Owl , who is recovering after being hit by a car. And feed him. That’s why we’re always broke.

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Rescue Wildlife Rehabilitation Homelessness Wildlife 204

10,000 Birds

JULY 18, 2012

Its natural range in Europe was restricted the the surroundings of the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea, and in Asia it ranged from Asia Minor to central China. Within its European range, it was heavily hunted until the late 19th century, and the Mute Swan was subsequently a very rare bird to encounter in the wild.

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Feral Europe Asia North America 178

10,000 Birds

MAY 16, 2022

Not as interesting as birds, but easier to get photos of – see a few at the end of this post, just put there in an uncaring way as I really went to St. Lucia for the birds. I sometimes wonder why green birds are relatively rare. On the other hand, “at the same time birds want to blend in, they also want to stand out.

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South Africa Africa Saint Lucia Birds 246

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 29, 2011

The trick is to see the bird before you get too close. The easiest way to eliminate the Common Snipe is by noting the white trailing edge to the secondaries, but since this is not always conspicuous, it is not reliable if you fail to spot it on a fast moving, zig-zagging bird. Two male-plumaged birds were seen in this paddy.

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Agenda China Farming Humane 190

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 18, 2021

However, this is not what this post is about (though you could do worse than to search for the Larson cartoon “Stupid birds” online). Instead, I want to talk about those bird species that look like being drawn by a talented cartoonist even when in fact it is just me having taken a photograph. They were made by Wang Jing.

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Birds China Penguins Asia 262

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 12, 2024

” But of course, with this slight adaptation, it also works for blog posts and their writers, and allows me to plug another nice song by this underrated artist, before switching to birds. Maybe a source more focused on birds than the HBW might have provided more accurate information.

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Birds China Woodpeckers Breeding 221