10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 16, 2015

They are large, scruffy looking kingfisher by ancestry, five species of that family founds across Australia and New Guinea. Laughing Kookaburras are social, so you can end up with an entire family of the things above your bedroom laughing away at all hours. Laughing Kookaburra by Fir002 (CC). As my mum points out all the time.

Australia 156

Australia New Zealand Guinea Hunters 156

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 5, 2017

Some birds are so familiar, even non-birders can’t help but know what they are, or at least what family they belong to. The only regularly occurring member of its esteemed family within the ABA boundaries, this cool bird exhibits the same sort of iridescence and striking looks that challenge us to stop gazing at any of the Trogonidae.

Costa Rica 115

Costa Rica Dominican Republic Kansas Guinea 115

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 14, 2012

True geese belong to the tribe or sub-family Anserini within the larger family Anatidae that encompasses ducks, geese and swans. And the Magpie Geese of the same country are believed to be neither ducks nor geese nor swans and are now placed within their own family Anseranatidae.

Geese 178

Geese Ducks Botswana South Africa 178

4 The Love Of Animals

AUGUST 30, 2011

I got my first pets, mice and guinea pigs, when I was 8. For these folks, I recommend a nontraditional pet like a rat or a guinea pig. Guinea pigs also do not bite, unlike hamsters and gerbils which can tend to be nippy. Pick a pet that fits your family’s lifestyle – Look at the purpose the pet will serve in your family.

Compassion 100

Compassion Guinea Pigs Purebred Animal 100

4 The Love Of Animals

JUNE 26, 2012

I had no idea what this little dog would mean to our family, the only thing I did know was that she was meant to be ours, and she was going to make sure that happened. Oh, and if you want to watch something funny be sure to check out their video, Pet Interviews- Guinea Pig. I would love to know, how do pets add to your life?

Pets 100

Pets Guinea Pigs Guinea Pigs 100

10,000 Birds

JUNE 2, 2020

It’s the bird family that most people don’t know is a bird family. The speaker turned out to be Tim Laman, and the topic was the incredible research he and Ed Scholes had spent years doing on birds of paradise in New Guinea. For many years it was thought the two bird families were related taxonomically.

Guinea 261

Guinea Birds Papua New Guinea Family 261

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 3, 2014

They are Ecuador for the Galapagos, Gabon for the bais, Madagascar, New Guinea and New Caledonia for everything. Given that they are a family of obscure deepwater whales that are very hard to see, I would imagine this is a contender for one that will never leave my list. A beaked whale. Any beaked whale. Hammerhead shark.

Sharks 170

Sharks Leopards Whales Whaling 170

10,000 Birds

JUNE 8, 2011

The Buff-banded Rail (simply Banded Rail here in New Zealand) is something of a tramp, ranging from the Philippines through New Guinea and Australia to northern New Zealand. That said I certainly did do some birding, and saw some great birds, one of which was the Buff-banded Rail ( Gallirallus philippensis ).

Tonga 165

Tonga New Zealand Samoa Fiji 165

4 The Love Of Animals

JUNE 14, 2009

Whether you’re visiting family or checking out a new vacation spot, does your cat or dog join you? Peggy Frezon, freelance writer and pet lover, has owned dogs, cats, rabbits, guinea pigs, hamsters, gerbils, hermit crabs, turtles and fish. Guest post By Peggy Frezon , Rensselaer, New York.

Pets 100

Pets Guinea Pigs Hamsters Battery 100

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 26, 2021

A lot of destinations were mentioned, with Central and South America leading the way, New Guinea, Indonesia and Australia appearing only at the middle of the list, and African countries (South Africa, Kenya, Tanzania and Madagascar) lagging at the end of the list.

Congo 264

Congo Africa South Africa Kenya 264

10,000 Birds

MARCH 11, 2011

That larger clade is in turn sister to a clade containing the four remaining totipalmate bird families, which do still seem to be related, and which needed a new order name once pelicans were removed. But meanwhile, let’s look at the four avian families that comprise the brand new order Suliformes.

2011 151

2011 Pelicans Papua New Guinea Birds 151

4 The Love Of Animals

APRIL 16, 2009

Disneynature’s first film, Earth , which comes out on Earth Day (April 22,2009), follows three animal families across the globe. It’s a beautiful film by the same directors that brought us the Planet Earth series. I was lucky enough to get a chance to speak to the directors and ask a few questions. Here they are!

Polar Bears 100

Polar Bears Bears Walruses Norway 100

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 7, 2014

Not, as Linneaus thought, an ostrich, nor even, as later scientists concluded, a distant cousin of pigeons deserving of family rank, it was an honest-to-goodness pigeon, deeply embedded within the family Columbidae. The bird’s skeleton bears similarities to New Guinea’s much smaller (!) ” Beehler et al.’s

Solomon Islands 273

Solomon Islands Guinea Mauritius Humane 273

10,000 Birds

APRIL 9, 2013

The amazing Ribbon-tailed Astrapia of Papua New Guinea sports the longest tail in proportion to body size of any bird in the world. These large seedeaters (belonging to the weaver family) are so named for the generally black plumage of the adult male, resembling a widow in mourning. Image by Cuan Rush/Rockjumper Birding Tours.

Papua New Guinea 233

Papua New Guinea South Africa Africa Zimbabwe 233

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 14, 2023

The Plain Sunbird is the plain vanilla version of the otherwise often very colorful family (ok, a very low-budget sort of joke). His somewhat dubious claim to fame includes a book describing his trip to New Guinea despite the fact that he never actually got to the mainland area of New Guinea ( source ).

Los Angeles 178

Los Angeles Birds Woodpeckers Owls 178

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 5, 2020

Other than these, in the wider region at the moment only Papua New Guinea has one 300+ hotspot, but it belongs to the Australian and not the Oriental region. Malaysia has 14 hotspots with more than 300 bird species, and I will focus here on #1 and #2, Fraser Hill (Bukit Fraser) and the Taman Negara National Park.

Asia 267

Asia Malaysia Papua New Guinea Thailand 267

10,000 Birds

JUNE 12, 2013

It is, instead, a member of the Petroicidae, the Australasian robins, a family mostly found in New Guinea and Australia but also reaching here in New Zealand and as far across the Pacific as Fiji. But my HBW actually splits this species off from the New Guinea species, which it names the Ashy Robin.

Guinea 154

Guinea Fiji Australia New Zealand 154

10,000 Birds

APRIL 8, 2012

Birds called catbirds include two species in the New World family, Mimidae, four from the bowerbird family, Ptilonorhynchidae, and one from the Old World babblers, Timaliidae. Both catbird species in the Americas are part of the family Mimidae along with the mockingbirds , thrashers, and tremblers.

Papua New Guinea 179

Papua New Guinea Ethiopia Guinea Cats 179

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 7, 2017

Working in an area for which there are few official checklists, no governing taxonomic body, and much new information on species relationships coming in, the authors were faced with a multitude of questions about family sequence, genus arrangements, English common names, and species taxonomy. Co-author Frank E. Species Accounts.

Indonesia 122

Indonesia Brunei Birds Malaysia 122

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 21, 2014

The duller Bowerbirds in the Bowerbird family produce much more elaborate bowers and the Great Bowerbird is rather dull compared to some of the more colourful Bowerbirds in Papua New Guinea. This is not a nest area, but a courtship area and they really do “aim to please”!

Papua New Guinea 166

Papua New Guinea Guinea Australia Collecting 166

10,000 Birds

MARCH 6, 2013

In celebration of the upcoming I and the Bird look at the heron family I invite you to consider the White-faced Heron ! White-faced Herons are attractive medium sized herons, originally from Australia, New Guinea, Indonesia, and New Caledonia. They are generally solitary and pretty easy to see in the countryside.

New Zealand 148

New Zealand Indonesia Cattle Guinea 148

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 1, 2015

Those are getting harder to find, so I was very happy when I was asked to review Searching for Pekpek: Cassowaries and Conservation in the New Guinea Rainforest , by Andrew L. Mack tells the story of how he set up a research station, and a life, in Papua New Guinea. Mack (Cassowary Conservation and Publishing, 2014) for Birding.

Papua New Guinea 178

Papua New Guinea 2014 Penguins Birds 178

4 The Love Of Animals

JUNE 8, 2012

Yes, responsible and caring individuals often treat them as family members, which seems essential and adorable. In particular, she was discovered on February 1944, at the height of World War II, by Americans in New Guinea. Is it possible to observe some features of humans in their behavior?

Guinea 100

Guinea Cleveland Pets 2005 100

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 1, 2021

Bowerbirds are a unique family of birds found only in Australia and New Guinea. A little while ago I watched a National Geographic documentary, about the Birds of Paradise and it claimed, in its introduction, that all such species were found in New Guinea. The males are more decorative and colourful than the females.

Guinea 260

Guinea Australia Birds Eggs 260

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 8, 2012

Dipping for fish An extinct endemic form of pelican in New Zealand would have represented another family lost, like the odd form of owlet-nightjar and New Zealand’s lost members of the hawk and eagle family. But it seems the story wasn’t so clear cut. So what were these Australian birds doing in New Zealand?

New Zealand 177

New Zealand Pelicans Solomon Islands Palau 177

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 24, 2012

It’s actually a member of the family Artamidae, which includes the woodswallows (not actually swallows), the butcherbirds (not actually shrikes) and the peltops (which actually are peltops, since there are no others). The Australian Magpie is not actually a magpie, a fairly common state of affairs for birds from the colonies.

New Zealand 148

New Zealand Birds Australia Kangaroos 148

10,000 Birds

APRIL 15, 2015

Most importantly the Upper Guinea forests, one of Africa’s two major rainforest regions (the other being the far more extensive Lower Guinea forests of the Congo basin and surrounding areas). Although this park was logged in the past, as a national park it is one of the few forests in Ghana that is really protected. .

Ghana 189

Ghana Hunters Guinea Gambia 189

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 12, 2012

Indeed it was part of that family. Until then the fantails were a family of rather personable flycatcher-like birds ranging from India to New Zealand. The family had a single genus and was very conservative in body shape, basically a short dumpy bird with a long fan-able tail and a bucketload of energy.

Horses 165

Horses France North America Fiji 165

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 7, 2023

Several, like the mocker and the hummer, were members of families I hadn’t encountered before, either. If, instead of seven trips to Kenya, I’d done just one, and gone instead to Peru, Ecuador, Brazil, Japan, China and New Guinea, it would almost certainly have passed the 6,000 mark. Fantastic!

Sri Lanka 228

Sri Lanka Kenya San Francisco Greece 228

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 6, 2011

Families that are endemic to the continent include such strange birds as Shoebill , Secretarybird , Hamerkop , mousebirds and rockfowl ( picathartes ) and delightful groups including bushshrikes, sugarbirds, rockjumpers, woodhoopoes, turacos and hyliotas.

Papua New Guinea 213

Papua New Guinea Madagascar Africa Equatorial Guinea 213

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 9, 2012

All occur in the Guinea-Congolese rainforests of Africa, with Red-headed being the most widespread. This group of 4 species (as well as all the remaining “weavers” that are covered below) are not even placed in the weaver family ( Ploceidae ) but in Passeridae – the Old World Sparrow family. Photo taken by Adam Riley in Ghana.

Tanzania 215

Tanzania Buffalo Kenya Namibia 215

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 15, 2012

This is a migrant from New Guinea, which breeds mostly on small offshore islands and flies each day to the mainland to feed. Another common member of the family is the diminutive Peaceful Dove. In the early morning they were everywhere in Cairns, but they were less noticeable as the day wore on and they dispersed around.

Alligators 166

Alligators Guinea 2012 Australia 166

10,000 Birds

APRIL 10, 2012

Originally they were all placed in the family Capitonidae , but over time taxonomists have determined that actual relationships between these barbets are far more complex. Gray-throated Barbet is one of the plainer members of the African Barbet family. Note the strange nasal tufts at the base of the bill.

Ethiopia 225

Ethiopia Tanzania Africa Uganda 225

10,000 Birds

MAY 30, 2012

This huge member of the Australian robin family is really tame in this carpark, making it probably the easiest place n the world to see the species (other than the Tableland it is only found in New Guinea). These attractive birds are quite the handsomest members of their family in Australia, and were just the thing to lift my mood.

Kangaroos 159

Kangaroos Guinea Pigs Turkey Guinea 159

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 1, 2018

Can the whole family live together in harmony during the school holidays? Speckled Pigeon – Columba guinea. Is it wrong of me to go birding to get away from the kids now that they are at home all day? August is the make or break month for relationships. Bravo if you have. Happy birding if you suddenly find yourself single.

2018 100

2018 Australia Woodpeckers Los Angeles 100