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Jun 30, 2018

One in eight bird species threatened with extinction...

Photo: Rex / Rick Dobson
Startling claims in new 'Birdlife' report
The Independent newspaper in England has stated recently that one in eight of the world's bird species are threatened with extinction.   The Independent was quoting a new report by Birdlife International's State of the World Birds analysis of five years-worth of data.   Among birds threatened with extinction are Snowy Owls and Puffins.   In recent decades the populations of a number of species have declined by 90% or more.   In all, 13% of avian species worldwide (1,469 of 10,996) are described as vulnerable, endangered or critically endangered by the ICUN (International Union of Conservation of Nature).   75% of threatened species have been hit by agriculture expansion, the report said, due to land clearance and deforestation required for new fields, which is occurring most rapidly in the tropics.   Neonicotinoid pesticides "...clearly pose a serious risk to migrating seed-eating birds", researchers said, adding that "There is also concern that they may build up along food chains and be retained by soils and plants for may years'.   In the case of the critically-endangered Yellow-breasted Bunting, it has been said it was one of the most numerous species in Eurasia.   But since 1980, its population has plunged by 90% and its range has dwindled.   The report stated "Although oficially banned, large-scale hunting of the Chinese delicacy continues.   In 2001, an estimated 1 million buntings, a.k.a. the "Rice Bird", were consumed in Guangdong province alone".   The document also highlighted vulture disappearances from large parts of Africa, with numbers of seven species falling by 80 to 97% in the past 30 years.  Overall, 40% of species were in decline, compared to 44% that were stable, with 7% on the rise and 8% with unknown statistical trends.
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 29, 2018

Female Rose-breasted Grosbeak back at feeders

    Photos by BarrytheBirder
 The female Rose-breasted Grosbeaks have returned to the feeders after a 3-week absence.   They've been busy no doubt raising nestlings with soft food but are now in search of seeds and nuts, as well as buds, fruit and arthropods.   It nice to have them in the yard again.

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if you wish.

BarrytheBirder

Jun 28, 2018

Quiscalus quiscula


Photos and limerick by BarrytheBirder

The GRACKLE
A noisy bird is the grackle
Squawks and shrieks and raises its hackle
With its yellow eye glares
At anyone who stares
Then defecates a large spackle


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BarrytheBirder 

Jun 27, 2018

Near the Bay of Bengal...

Photo: Asit Kumar / AFP / Getty Images
A pair of Lesser Whistling Ducks (Dendrocygna javanica), a.k.a. Indian Whistling Duck, search for food in the polluted Daya River, on the outskirts of Bhubaneswar City in Odisha, India.
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 26, 2018

Eurasian Blue Tit

    Photo above: Kay Roxby / Alamy  
Photo below: Francis C. GFranklin:
Above is a fledgling Eurasian Blue Tit (Cyanistes caeruleus) clinging to a garden ornament in Stirlingshire, Scotland, United Kingdom.   At right is an adult.
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 25, 2018

Taking the sun in South Africa...

Photo: Kim Ludbrook / EPA
Egrets bask on trees as they warm up in the morning sun at Zoo Lake, in the centre of Johannesberg, South Africa.

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BarrytheBirder

Jun 24, 2018

Honeycreepers in the Pacific...

Photo: Alamy Stock Photo
A male Scarlet Honeycreeper (Vestiaria coccinea) is pictured on a bottlebush tree in Brisbane, Australia.  Honeycreepers originated in Hawaii, at the islands developed into their chain, eons ago.
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 23, 2018

First UK Swift Awareness Week

All photos: Nick Upton / NPL 
These excellent photos by Nick Upton were featured in a Guardian.com story this week about the first ever UK Swift Awareness Week.

A Swift chick calls for food


Feeding an orphaned Swift chick

Orphan Swift chick ready to fly

Massive Swift nesting tower in Cambridge

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BarrytheBirder


Jun 22, 2018

Avian mutations...

 Photo Jeremy Black
The yellow Cardinal (above) was spotted earlier this year, in the backyard of Charlie Stephenson in Alabaster, Alabama.  Best guess as to an explanation is a genetic mutation called xanthochroism.   Other causes could perhaps be  environmental stressors of poor diet. 

Photo Brian Peer
Also of interest to birders might be a Northern Cardinal with half female and half male plumage which was observed  and photographed many times, between 2008 and 2010, near Rock Island, Illinois, about 200 kms. west of Chicago.   The cause in this case of feathered fantasy is said to be a condition known as bilateral gynandromorphs.
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 21, 2018

Please excuse the momentary change of pace dear reader...

Photo: Chris Kleponis/Pool-Getty Images

NO MORE 
TRUMP ORPHANS
Thank God!
Maybe now he will
pick on people his own size.

Please comment if you wish.
BarrytheBirder


Jun 20, 2018

Home to 30,000 puffins...

Photo: Rebecca Naden / Reuters
ATLANTIC PUFFIN
(Fratercula arctica)
An Atlantic Puffin, a.k.a. the common puffin, is seen above, on the island of Skomer, near Pembrokeshire, Wales, carrying sand eels in its bill.   The island is the breeding ground for more than 30,000 Atlantic Puffins.
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 19, 2018

Common Moorhen chicks...

Photo: Willem van den Noert / Alamy
Photo: Shantanu Kuveskar
Here's another one of those photos (above) depicting babies, of questionable beauty, that only a mother could love.

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BarrytheBirder

Jun 18, 2018

Not surreal birds - but 5" mayflies...

Photo: Zsolt Czegledi / EPA 
Freshly hatched Tisza Mayflies (above) crowd the surface of the River Tisza, near Tiszacsege in north-east Hungary.   The Tisza is the longest mayfly in Europe - up to 12 cm...almost 5".
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 17, 2018

The one and only Mandarin Duck...

Photo: Yuri Smityuk / Getty Images
Mandarin ducklings are seen (above) on the Solyonaya Protoka River, outside of Vladivostok, Russia.   Below is a family of Mandarins.   The Mandarin Duck (Aix galericulata) is native to east Asia and closely resembles the Wood Duck of North America.   The two ducks are the only members of the genus Aix.

Photo:  Christopher Smith
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 16, 2018

Grand-looking bird with a common name...

Photo: Phillip Cull / Alamy Stock Photo
COMMON CRANE
(Grus grus)
A Common Crane is seen with a chick at WWT Slimbridge, in Gloucester, UK.   I guess I've never understood why large, long-legged birds like cranes, or herons, or ostriches, etc.,  etc., seem so very much larger and taller than their chicks, compared to most smaller birds and their chicks.   Or am I mistaken thinking there is a different proportional scale for large and small birds with their young? 
Please comment if you wish.
BarrytheBirder

Jun 15, 2018

Room service?

Photo: Dominic Robinson / Alamy Stock Photos
GREAT CRESTED GREBE
(Podiceps cristatus)
A Great Crested Grebe is seen feeding a chick on a parent's back at a nest in Walthamstow Reservoirs in London, UK.  The young grebes are very distinctive because of the black and white striping on their heads.   When young grebes are on their parents' backs, the parent dives under the water leaving the chick to float and paddle on its own.   The parent then surfaces and the chick climbs back to the parent's back...lesson learned.
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 14, 2018

It's autumn down-under...

 Photo: Lukas Coch /AAP

Photo: Flagstaffotos.com.au
An Australian Wood Duck (Chenonetta
jubata) above, forages through autumn leaves at Lennox Gardens in Canberra,
the Capital city of Australia.

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if you wish.

BarrytheBirder

Jun 13, 2018

Antarctica succumbs...

Photo: Paul Hilton / Greenpeace
GENTOO PENGUIN
(Pygoscelis papua)
A Gentoo Penguin is seen at Brown's Station, Paradise Bay, In the Antarctic this week when it was revealed that plastic had finally reached the world's last great wilderness of Antarctica.
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 12, 2018

Gathering gannet...

Photo: Jane Barlow / PA
NORTHERN GANNET
(Morus bassanus)
A Northern Gannet picks up seaweed on Bass Rock in the Firth of Forth, in Scotland.   Thousands of the seabirds gather nest material here as they gather nest material to prepare for the new breeding season.   It is the largest single-island gannet colony in the world.
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 11, 2018

My favourite finch...


Photo: RonEdmonds

          How smart the American Goldfinch
          To hang upside down in a pinch
          Niger seeds give nutrition
          Whatever the position
          So downside-up eating's a cinch.
Limerick by BarrytheBirder
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 10, 2018

New book by Andrew Garn...

Photo by Andrew Garn
'Behind the Feathers'
Andrew Garn is a New York City photographer who has been photographing pigeons in the city for over a decade and who has now published a complete photographic record of the birds from newborn babies to amazing adults, in a new book titled Behind the Feathers.  Pictured above is a baby pigeon, orphaned at two days, but then hand-fed by a concerned bird-lover, and which at ten days became curious and confident.
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 9, 2018

Squirrel finds the sweet spot on hummingbird feeder

                                                                                                      Photo by BarrytheBirder
Pictured above is one the red squirrels in our backyard.  This squirrel has figured out how to get sweet hummingbird nectar by sucking the liquid from one of the tiny holes in the bottom reservoir.   I believe its tongue is too big to fit into the tiny holes, so it must be sucking the nectar out.   It spent quite some time in this position getting its fill.   According to the Arizona State University, scientists at one point believed hummingbirds drank nectar by sucking it up, like juice through a straw.   But it is now known that although the shape of the peak helps the bird reach deep into a flower, its long, thin tongue does the real work.   A hummingbird licks nectar up, like a dog lapping at a bowl of water.   Moreover, a hummingbird can lick up to 13 times per second.   I've been known to do this after accidentally spilling a martini.
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BarrytheBirder 

Jun 8, 2018

Voice: High-pitched descending scream with a hoarse quality...unmistakable

Photo: Matt Campbell / EPA
RED-TAILED HAWK
( Buteo jamaicensis )
A Red-tailed Hawk takes flight from a dead tree as it scouts for prey in Orleans, Massachusetts.   Very common and widespread in the genus Buteo.   Certain western hawks, with dark brown, slightly banded tails were once considered a separate species that was called 'Harlan's Hawk'.
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BarrytheBirder

Jun 7, 2018

Good news for bee-eaters ~ bad news for bees...

Photo: Mei Yongcun / Barcroft Images
Blue-throated Bee-eaters
Merops viridis )
Blue-throated Bee-eaters perch on a branch in Luxia Town, Nanping City, in China's Fujian Province.    They are also found in Cambodia, Brunei, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.   The I.U.C.N. Red List identifies them as of 'Least Concern'.
Please comment if you wish.
BarrytheBirder 

Jun 6, 2018

Good news on Christmas Island...

Photo: Ian Montgomery / Christmas Island Tourism Council /AAP
An endangered Abbott's Booby (Papasula abbotti) is seen on the Australian territory Christmas Island.   The birds have had a reprieve after the Turnbull government changed its mind about a controversial phosphate exploration proposal on the island.   Amen.
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BarrytheBirder  

Jun 5, 2018

A pigeon and a monkey...


I do not know who took this photo, or where or when it was taken.   Also, I have no comment to make about it.  However, I do hope that you enjoy it as much as I do.
Please comment if you wish. 
BarrytheBirder

Jun 4, 2018

Mute Swan transformed by twilight into black swan...


Photo: Vasily Fedosenko / Reuters
   A Mute Swan (Cygnus olor) appears to be black, instead of white, while it swims during sunset, on a lake near the town of Vileika in Belarus.   Below, a pair of Black Swans (Cygnus atratus) show their true colour ( in full light - not silhouetted).  Black Swans traditionally bred in southeast and southwest Australia, where they were first described in 1790.   They were soon introduced to various countries as ornamental birds and many escaped to exist in the wild.   They have existed in flocks of hundreds and thousands in some places.

Photo: Dave Watts

Photo: J. J. Harrison
 In the photo above, a black swan is shown in flight and reveals it is actually a black and white swan, because of the striking presence of its white primary flight feathers, which normally do not show when the big bird is on the ground or in water.
Please comment if you wish.
BarrytheBirder

Jun 3, 2018

Rare Reed Parrotbills are to be found in eastern China

    Photo above: Waderworld                                            Photo below:DcvGamebirds.mc


Reed Parrotbill
(Paradoxornis heudei)

Reed Parrotbills are found in eastern China and Manchuria.
They are a rare birds species on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.  Because of rareness, the the Reed Parrotbill has been nicknamed 'the panda of birds'.   Their first recorded sighting occurred less than 150 years ago and they are now found and restricted to reed-bed habitats
which are in decline.

Please comment.
if you wish. 

BarrytheBirder

Jun 2, 2018

The headless penguins of Antarctica...


Photographs of penguins that appear to have no heads can be found all over the internet.   Single birds, twos, threes, four birds...everywhere.   But despite the many of these photos as I have seen, I am still always captivated by the images.   My old neck is stiff most of the time now, and I greatly envy the flexibility of these unique captivating creatures. 


Photos: Monique Joris / Cater
               News Agency


Please comment
if you wish.

BarrytheBirder

Jun 1, 2018

Another wee bird near extinction...

Photo: Chris Tzaros / Birds Bush and Beyond
King Island Brown Thornbill
(Acanthiza pusilla pusilla)
A King Island Brown Thornbill is a passerine normally found on King Island, about halfway between Tasmania and Melbourne on the southeastern coast of Australia.  There are almost 20 species of thornbills native to Australia but King Island Brown Thornbills are only found on the island of the same name.   Residents of King Island believe the bird may be almost extinct.
Please comment if you wish.
BarrytheBirder