10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 12, 2022

White-tailed Kite in action- a classic airport species in Costa Rica. Turf farms in wooded regions are wide open oases for grasspipers and other species adapted to natural lawns. These are the three main species that urge us to scan a grassy field with puddles in September and October. Odd habitats attract odd birds.

Costa Rica 162

Costa Rica Ecuador North America Peru 162

10,000 Birds

APRIL 7, 2020

It didn’t occur to me till I started reading The Falcon Thief: A True Tale of Adventure, Treachery, and the Hunt for the Perfect Bird that there was also a possible threat to the eagle herself: poachers, who steal raptor eggs and chicks. McWilliam realizes he’s dealing someone special, a career falcon egg-thief.

Falcons 200

Falcons United Kingdom Zimbabwe Eggs 200

10,000 Birds

JULY 4, 2017

The guide presents 69 species and 1 subspecies, from “NEW WORLD VULTURES: Cathartiformes” to “OSPREY: Pandioninae” to “FAMILY: Accipitridae” (Kites, Hawks, Eagles, Hawk-Eagles), to “FALONIDS: Falconidae” (Falcons, Forest-Falcons, Caracaras, Kestrels, Merlin). That’s a lot of visual information!

Mexico 155

Mexico America North America Falcons 155

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 21, 2011

.* Beautifully illustrated and well executed, Sibley’s Raptors of North America is a perfect decoration for nature centers, birders’ homes, and any other place where people are interested in identifying the hawks, falcons, eagles, and vultures that they are likely to see anywhere in the United States and Canada. The price of $29.95

North America 222

North America America United States Eagles 222

10,000 Birds

MAY 5, 2020

A Field Guide to the Birds: Giving Field Marks of All Species Found in Eastern North America was published in 1934 by Houghton Mifflin (note–Peterson was 26 years old), after being rejected by four publishers. Adding the 76 new species in the Hawaii section, this makes coverage of approximately 884 species.

North America 199

North America America Hawaii Birds 199

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 6, 2022

This is “the deep cradle of Western ornithology: the birthplace of bird study,” he tells us as he writes about gazing at the 8,000-year old depictions of “flamingos, herons, raptors, avocets and many other species” (p.

Dissection 209

Dissection Birds Research Europe 209

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 20, 2015

My various lists – life, ABA, county, yard – are collections of memories, each one precious. For instance, #400 for is Peregrine Falcon , which I first spotted in the Florida Keys. I tend to see things the other way around. For the most part, the birds come to you when they come to you.

North Carolina 188

North Carolina Falcons Florida Birds 188

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 21, 2012

There were once two species of goose, a merganser, and a pair of raven species. Today, by way of birds of prey New Zealand is somewhat deficient, having a small and attractive falcon and a floppy-winged harrier, and that’s about it. Right from the beginning the species was something of a mystery.

Eagles 101

Eagles New Zealand Bald Eagle Collecting 101

10,000 Birds

JULY 10, 2013

The 1,500 km route included a great diversity of habitat types, elevations along the west and east facing slopes of the Andes, jaw dropping landscapes, contrasting microclimates, cultural diversity and a potential list of well over 1,000 species. The competition turned tight and every species counted. That was a big help.

Peru 256

Peru Birds South Africa United Kingdom 256

10,000 Birds

JULY 22, 2017

Birds with white on them are much more likely to take the form of goodies like the Snowy Cotinga , or two species of tityras. In Costa Rica, even the super shy Slaty-backed Forest-Falcon is seen more often than the island pigeon with the snow-white cap. To make up for our collective absence, we did a trip there last weekend.

Costa Rica 100

Costa Rica San Jose Bats Birds 100

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 25, 2015

These arid hills, cloaked in a mosaic of deciduous scrub and desert vegetation, form a northern outpost for several Neotropical species while also harboring several key endemics and southwestern Nearctic species. I had point blank life views of this tricky species from within a few feet. Lesser Roadrunner with a cicada.

Mexico 186

Mexico Costa Rica Arizona Birds 186

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

Superficially similar to Fork-tailed Flycatcher, especially if you don’t know that this species exists! Most of these birds are escaped/freed pets who have established breeding populations, and many of these populations are growing; others could be falconer’s birds, or part of a zoo or private collection.

San Francisco 170

San Francisco San Diego Connecticut South America 170

10,000 Birds

JUNE 2, 2015

In the all too brief introduction to the book, they state, “This book aims to shed light on the family lives of birds, a topic that has captured our collective imagination and enriched our language despite being shrouded in mystery.”. Peregrine Falcon nests. Familiar is not necessarily common. The book is divided into three parts.

Eggs 263

Eggs Family 2006 New York 263

10,000 Birds

APRIL 13, 2016

The English language, or at least the adherents thereof with more time on their hands than sense, has bestowed us a great number of names to collective nouns for groups of birds. One website I found suggested a few others that may be true but I hadn’t encountered before, are young cranes actually called colts, or falcons eyas?

New Zealand 103

New Zealand Parrots Rats Bats 103

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 4, 2016

Over 3,200 photographs have been used, most showing species in their habitats. There is also text, distribution maps, a dark red bar “warning” about similar looking rare species, and conservation symbols. So, how do you find the species account for Kestrel if falcons are not placed between woodpeckers and parakeet?

Ireland 140

Ireland Birds Groups Falcons 140

10,000 Birds

JUNE 10, 2017

Miss that Red-footed Falcon , Pink-footed Goose , or Brown-chested Martin and we won’t let a dance partner catch us as we sort of do a pseudo fall, but we will have “dipped” Mention that you were “pishing” to a non-birder and they might give you a dirty look. Snowcap = Glass of Burgundy X Nonpareil candy.

Costa Rica 124

Costa Rica Unwanted Honduras Panama 124

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 30, 2011

Surely they couldn’t be the same species, across a continent. The Internet was prepared to offer plenty of information on what Carolina grasshoppers eat – grasses and forbs, mostly weed species but sometimes crops like tobacco,corn, and alfalfa. Manigault, Clemson University Donated Collection, Bugwood.org a.

Montana 164

Montana Cooking Texas Cattle 164

10,000 Birds

JUNE 22, 2011

He’s one of the managers of the specimen collection and loves a good dead bird mystery. He asked to take the pellet downstairs to do some comparisons to the collections. Oehlenschlager apologized that he couldn’t say the exact species of bat. There was also a mammal jawbone in the pellet too.

Bats 199

Bats Dissection Owls Minnesota 199

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 21, 2012

Neoaves contains the great bulk of the diversity and the species of living birds, from songbirds to storks and owls to hummingbirds. The latest of these, “ A phylogeny of birds based on over 1,500 loci collected by target enrichment and high-throughput sequencing ” by John E. That much we know. McCormack et al.,

Parrots 136

Parrots Falcons South America 2008 136

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 7, 2013

Seeing 525 species was nice, as was the fact that I birded in four countries, nine of the fifty states in the United States, and fifty-one counties. I want to reach 500 birds in the ABA, get my Queens list to 295, see a total of at least 500 species, and get my World Life List to 1,100. But how did I see so many species this year?

2012 142

2012 Czech Republic Hedgehogs Hungary 142

10,000 Birds

MARCH 30, 2012

Like several of my favorite NWRs, this one was established as a haven for migratory birds, most notably waterfowl, during the bad old days when uncontrolled hunting and habitat loss had put the future of even species we now think of as common in doubt. As a result, early migration season is an excellent time to visit.

Wildlife 165

Wildlife Montana Geese Bald Eagle 165

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 27, 2016

I didn’t have long to stay at the reserve so I did a quick walk through the ornamental pools near the entrance – as in many WWT reserves these are given over to the breeding collections of exotic species (although these are smaller in London than elsewhere. Common Moorhen.

Geese 100

Geese New Zealand Germany Ducks 100

10,000 Birds

MAY 7, 2019

So, for example, Essay #15, “Individual Variation,” uses Herring Gulls to introduce the concept that one species, even one species at a specific age, can vary widely in appearance. The Checklist is more than a taxonomic listing of species and chapter number and title; it also contains useful notes on each bird family.

Birds 114

Birds North America Breeding America 114

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 11, 2024

One always wants to see as many species as possible in a single day, whether on an ocean island with few species, or in Suffolk, England. It was in this latter region that he reports seeing 60 species on his first outing of this year. But how many species can one see over a few hours in the highlands of central Mexico?

Mexico 203

Mexico Birds Woodpeckers Sparrows 203

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 2, 2012

Third, Hawks in Flight was primarily illustrated by David Sibley’s excellent black-and-white drawings, supplemented with a collection of black-and-white photographs in the back of the book. Identification became more subtle, focused on subjective or transitory clues, and an element of uncertainty became acceptable.”

North America 215

North America Bald Eagle Birds Eagles 215

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 13, 2014

Instead of going on about zip lines and other modern, adventure tourism attractions, the birding crowd talks about taking photos of Resplendent Quetzals , seeing dozens of hummingbird species, and the seemingly odd absence of raptors in Costa Rica but nope, we don’t really talk about extinction. Resplendence.

Costa Rica 212

Costa Rica Species Panama Birds 212

10,000 Birds

APRIL 13, 2015

Its great diversity of habitats hosts an incredible bird count of over 900 species, including Africa’s 2nd highest list of endemics and near-endemics (after South Africa). It lies adjacent to Nechisar National Park, where the lone wing of the mysterious Nechisar Nightjar was collected in 1990. Yellow-billed Stork.

Ethiopia 235

Ethiopia Sudan Leopards Birds 235

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 28, 2014

This is a very hot and dry region known as El Chaco where many interesting bird species can be found. Another crested bird adding to my collection. This road trip took us south-east moving away form the mountains and to lower flat land which had been converted to farmland. The closer we got to J.V. Crested Hornero. The cute couple!

Argentina 179

Argentina Farming Chile Birds 179

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 12, 2022

In most years, that wouldn’t be all that special — the lake is normally where I can see the most species in a single day, so I usually go there first. These photos exaggerate the size difference between the two species, which is actually so minimal as to be almost useless for ID purposes.). A very distant Harrier.

Falcons 177

Falcons Abandon Abandoning Abandonment 177

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 6, 2023

As mentioned in many other posts on this blog, the avifauna of Trinidad & Tobago consists of several species and family groups occurring very interestingly, in threes. Short-tailed Nighthawk (above and below) Overall, this species seems to be poorly known, which is understandable given its habits. Well, kind of.

Trinidad 130

Trinidad Bats Falcons Groups 130

10,000 Birds

MARCH 17, 2022

And in my customary environmentally friendly approach to recycling bird photos, I have collected some of them in this post. Should you be impressed by this list and the underlying ambitions, take a look at the migration route of the Amur Falcon ( Wikipedia ). ” If in doubt, just classify species as LC?

Falcons 233

Falcons Japan China South Africa 233

10,000 Birds

APRIL 2, 2012

It was a Benguela Nino year, and pelagic seabirds were in super-abundance in the south eastern Atlantic, with the total of species by variety and number exceeding all expectations for the birders on the inaugural trip as we pitched and wallowed about in the rolling swells on our way out to the trawling grounds.

Albatross 177

Albatross Penguins Dolphins Whales 177

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 5, 2021

The distance to the coast for the pair of Brahminy Kites to collect fresh fish is not far. Both bird species fish in the same locations around Broome, though. One more bird species with serious talons in the north of Australia! We are very lucky here in Broome that 333 bird species have now been recorded in the area.

Fish 193

Fish Eagles Australia Falcons 193

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 25, 2021

Anyway, so I started checking my bird photo collection for photos of species starting with an A (after all, this is a bird photo blog, though I sometimes tend to forget this). Maybe there was a time in the history of ornithology when some bird named Ashy was very popular, resulting in more species named in the same way.

South Africa 310

South Africa China Nevada Africa 310

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 6, 2018

Covering 1,261 species with data and taxonomy current up to August 2017, the field guide is an exciting achievement. And, then there are the more familiar birds–Wood-warblers, sandpipers, hawks–some species migrants, some species with a wide range. Can you guess which of the species cited above are endemic?

America 211

America El Salvador Costa Rica Honduras 211

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 30, 2021

From there, we entered a side tributary full of Ringed and Amazon Kingfishers , with Chestnut-fronted and Scarlet Macaws in flight… and then the noise: groans, croaks and grunts… and the smell… of this 65 million years old species, so old that the last dinosaurs must have fed on them! Nor will there be, as our skipper has assured us. –

Dolphins 256

Dolphins Colombia Otters Birds 256

10,000 Birds

JULY 26, 2012

Falcons split from hawks to join parrots and songbirds Unanimously, the committee voted to remove falcons (Falconiformes) and parrots (Psittaciformes) from their current positions in the list and place them before the songbirds (Passeriformes), more closely to reflect the relationships between these three great orders.

Falcons 171

Falcons Parrots California Breeding 171