Rose-ringed Parakeets - pics for a book

Friday, my editor informed me that we need a supplementary good picture of parakket to illustrate my forthcoming book on Garden Birds. So this morning I headed to Sceaux to photograph some parakeets there.

The pic for the book - my best of this morning, I thinl.


A male - not singing!


I also visited the local tawny owl which is apparently always at the entrance of its hole.


Numerous red squirrels were also arround, coming to the locals to be fed.


Portrait of a female

688: Eastern Stonechat, a lounge tick

The group of eastern stonechats recently gained specific status on the AERC list of WP birds, pushing my WP total to 688. I saw variegatus in Kuwait and Egypt, armenicus in Egypt and maurus in Kuwait and Eypt. All three are currentl included within Eastern (Siberian) Stonechat, separated from the European Stonechat (Saxicola rubicula, ssp rubicula and hibernans). African stonechats have also specific level (Saxicola torquatus).

A female maurus, photographed in Al Abraq in Kuwait on 5 May 2008.


A pale female maurus, Marsa Alam, Egypt, on 3 March 2010 (all following stonechats same place same date). All dark tail.


A male armenicus; it showed some restricted white at the base of the outer tail feathers, not visible on the closed tail, seen only when the bird was landing and spreading its tail. It was accompanying the female pictured in the following image.


A female armenicus, with some white at the base of the outer tail feathers, and dark on throat (apparently not infrequent in this taxon). The pale rump was neat, but the longest upper tail coverts showed a dark shaft streak.


A male variegatus, one of few seen in Egypt in March 2010. Note the obvious white base to the outer tail feathers.

Christmas 2011 at Méribel - French Alps

I spent the last week at Méribel for family holidays, enjoying skiing and snowboarding, between 1800 and 2800m. For birds, the commonest species were nutcracker and common crossbill.
A group of crossbills fed in front of our hotel during a few hours on 24 December, during a very windy snowing day. I managed to get some good pics despite the bad weather.
A young female with pale fringed juvenile wing coverts and new adult-type moulted ones


An adult female, with plain wings


This first-winter male is not full-red (this mix of brown and dark orange is more typical of young males), and has retained its first-generation wing coverts


The first-winter male extracting seeds from a cone


A first-winter female - note that wing coverts are of two generations


A pair, with the male feeding the female - an early start of the breeding season? or only season's greetings :-)


A beautiful adult male, with obvious red rump - a pity the picture is not fully focused


Snowfinches were easy to see at the top of the mountain, where the Pas du Lac ski-lift arrives,




snowfinches were aside alpine choughs at the summits


while an Alpine accentor was in residence at the snack were we stopped every noon.




Merry Christmas!

Long-toed Stint = 687

I went last Sunday (27th) at La turballe salt pans to twitch the first-winter long-toed Stint found there on 3rd November. Within a group of dunlins - and a few little stints - the LTS is moving in and out the lagune depending on waders' movements (sometimes flushed away by a flying-by sparrowhak or hen harrier). The bird arrived soon after sunrise at 9:20am, and was still on site when I left at 10:50am, while it started raining. On the pictures, the dark underwing bars, plainer and darker upperwing than in dunlins, and long toes projecting beyond the tail, are all clearly visible.
This was not a lifer for me, as I saw many in China in August 1994, but it was a WP tick - n°687.

still Ouessant - scarce birds

Two Snow Buntings at Pointe de Pern were very cooperative for photographers


One of the 12 Yellow-browed warblers I saw on the island in 6 days


A Red-backed Shrike - while scottland received a Brown and UK two Isabellines...gggrrr...


One Red-breasted Flycatcher was present on the island - a classic

A lifer: Olive-backed Pipit!

Ouessant island. First sighted two days before these pictures, this pipit was very elusive, always escaping good views, flushing from far away, landing in ferns or herbs. Finally it came back to the place it was found and spent a few hours skulking in long grasses where almost all birders managed to see it.

end October 2011: Ouessant, Brittany, France

Soon after arriving on hte island, Jean-Yves Barnagaud attracted me to a Dusky Warbler - a starnge one which was foraging in the trees, very active and moving quickly.



Then a few hours before leaving the island, a second individual was found, almost moribund though it finally survived... At least just after arriving it was pretty easy to approach, providing good opportunities for shooting - when not sleeping.