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Eurasian Wryneck Jynx torquilla

10,000 Birds

There are two species in the Old World woodpecker genus that sounds like birds that birders would never be able to see. Neither even makes their own nesting cavities; they use the abandoned holes of other woodpeckers. They are literal jinx birds in that their genus name is “ Jynx.”

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Birding Sarokház Panzió – An Airport Hotel in Budapest

10,000 Birds

Having jumped around a bit while writing up my trip to Hungary – sharing a few galleries , a trip to find an elusive woodpecker , and the most exciting news in optics since Galileo discovered Jupiter’s moons – I thought it was time to go back to the beginning of the trip and proceed chronologically.

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Northern White-breasted Hedgehog Erinaceus roumanicus

10,000 Birds

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. Fine, my best bird was a White-backed Woodpecker , alright? …

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Five Things I Learned While Birding in Hungary

10,000 Birds

I do try to experience and learn as much as I can on every trip and my week in Hungary was no exception. Rather than force you to go all the way to Hungary to learn on your own the five main lessons I learned I figured sharing them here on the blog would be worthwhile. Common House Martins have feathered legs and feet.

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Searching for a White-backed Woodpecker

10,000 Birds

The White-backed Woodpecker is the hardest resident woodpecker to find in Europe. So how did I manage to lay eyes on the most difficult-to-see European woodpecker? This means that there were nearly thirty of us making our way up the dirt track past long-abandoned quarries to get the area where the woodpeckers are normally found.

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The Wryneck: Biology, Behaviour, Conservation and Symbolism of Jynx torquilla: A Book Review

10,000 Birds

The Eurasian Wryneck is the woodpecker that doesn’t look like a woodpecker, the bird with the portmanteau name that is also a medical condition (and which may remind some people of a Nora Ephron essay). But they are woodpeckers: the genus Jynx of the subfamily Jynginae of the Picidae family. It’s an open question.

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The Eurasian Nuthatch

10,000 Birds

And while I can still remember the first time I saw one in 2007, in the company of Jochen and Hendrik in a pine forest on the coast of the Baltic Sea, it took until this year’s trip to Hungary before I managed to get a decent image of one. The woodpeckers never showed but I did enjoy photographing the nuthatch.

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