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Grassy Green Space in the Central Valley- Trash Habitat or Prime Real Estate for Oddball Birds?

10,000 Birds

Some call them trash, tours might not visit, but they can host more than the expected and common species. Some such vegetated spots can also attract oddball birds, species that wander to find a home in urban circumstances. Three species of seedeaters sing from the tall grass, one of them being the Yellow-bellied Seedeater.

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“The Wise Hours” — a review

10,000 Birds

An Englishwoman, she thought, originally, that she would stay within the British Isles, to see the five or six native species. As she notes, Eastern Europe contains significant pockets of agriculturally undeveloped land, and thus has a far greater diversity of species “from invertebrates to large carnivores” than in Northern Europe.

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Leaping Foxes

10,000 Birds

We call it a “mouse gradation year” I was not able to find a catchy English term for “gradation year” – it’s what happens when a certain species showing population cycles reaches a peak year. If however you are a larger “mouse”-like rodent you are a rat. No “gophers” etc.

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Acclimatisation Societies of New Zealand

10,000 Birds

There are the endemics, which are odd in their own way, and then there introduced species, which are so varied in their type and origin that you get the feeling you’ve arrived at the aftermath of a small zoo that escaped. What is surprising is quite how many species did end up here, and how economically unimportant they were.

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Sani Pass – a Drakensberg birding gem

10,000 Birds

Here, thousands of Amur Falcons hunt for insects during the southern summer, Wattled Cranes and Denham’s Bustards may be seen, impressive Long-tailed Widowbirds display over the grasslands and the waterbodies are a haven to many hundreds of waterbirds, including Maccoa and White-backed Ducks. Image by Adam Riley. Image by Adam Riley.

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Can Nature Take Care of Itself?

10,000 Birds

A personal encounter with a wild species changes one’s perspective. Inserts in rodent poisons that assure the public they will not kill anything but the offending rats or mice pedal the same questionable claims as those of the snake oil salesmen of bygone days. Will the population of the species be affected?

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Big Ticks; What Was Your Last New Family?

10,000 Birds

Not that I don’t enjoy seeing new species myself, it’s just that they are an easy target and I am nothing if not lazy and mean spirited. Here in New Zealand te only potential big tick would be a lost vagrant painted snipe, and we’ve already established that I don’t enjoy that kind of vagrant hunting.

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