Brother- in- law George Graham has been getting more and more involved in observing, counting, and studying marine birds and fish off the coast of Massachusetts, so far as a volunteer. He sent this report and these excellent photos, as migration stretces its lines down the coasts. My only caveat is that George will have …
Tag: Birding
Osprey
John Wilson photographed this osprey near Magdalena. It is not the first I know of– I think I have seen three over 30 years– but it is the first photographed. But what is this semi- obligate piscivore doing 30 miles from any fish that is not in a freezer? “Lake Magdalena” (the sewage pond) has …
Moroccan Hawk ID
Terence Clark has been in Morocco for the Festival of Traditional Hunting, where he photographed some hawks. Most were Peregrines of the migrant race that they call Shahin Bari, “Bari” meaning “of the sea”– probably the far- northern Falco peregrinus calidus, which may have flown from as far as Siberia. But the young man on …
Wilson Photos
Relative newcomers John and Carolyn Wilson are becoming serious documenters of the phenology of local wildlife and photographers of same (with real lenses). They supply constant water on their forest- edge holding 12 miles from town, which has already paid off in photos of bandtail pigeon and goshawk. Now John has gotten a good portrait …
A Few Birds
Coming back this weekend after work, sick days, and generally too much, and that dull. (Why is it so hard to pay writers dammit???) We will have links, pix, dog news, poetry. I will finally review David Quammen. I will announce others. There will be…. MORE. Tonight though, good photos… as always, right or double …
Exciting Bird!
Today John Wilson and I took off at dawn and drove up past 10,000 feet on South Baldy in the Magdalena Range, surveying a rather unlikely habitat for the annual “Backyard” Bird Count. I doubted that we would see much more than ravens and a few boreal forest- type hardy songbirds of the general type …
Credit Due
Early last July, Stacia Novy, a young military career woman, biologist, and falconer, e-mailed me an excited message that she had just been instrumental in finding the nest of a very little known Neotropical raptor, the Solitary Eagle (Buteogallus solitarius), in Belize. She attached this picture. Unfortunately, since then, most published accounts have omitted her …
Another bird photo
California Condor in the Grand Canyon by Paul Domski. Hint: enlarge (click) and look at the length of its head proportional to the rest.
Bird ID
Bruce Douglas of Arizona, traveling, sent me this photo from the vicinity of Grand Coulee Dam. I am pretty sure what it is and sent him my thoughts, which I will blog in a little. But what do YOU think? Bruce said it was “huge”. Click to embiggen: UPDATE: Our take, FWIW: We (Lib came …
Avian Drama, Home Version
In remote, dirt- road Magdalena, wildlife comes into town. Deer track through the central arroyo, followed by mountain lions. An adolescent lion got himself cornered and darted in the High school yard a couple of years ago; a bear went up an electric pole and was electrocuted the same year. Coyotes challenge the hounds from …