One thing that I have learned from repeated spring visits to Cyprus is that no two years are ever the same. This April conditions were excellent for migrant waders, so there were plenty to see. The island’s largest salt lake, Akrotiri, is not a great draw for waders, but the range of large, shallow saline pools on its east side, along Lady’s Mile, were in perfect condition to attract a wide variety of species. Ruffs were by far the most numerous, with as many as 500 birds in view at once. Few birds sport such magnificent breeding plumage as the male ruff, but not a single bird showed more tha ..read more

Somehow, Steller’s Sea Eagle manages to look both fierce and slightly cartoonish. Maybe the latter is because the bird is so plump, or maybe it is because (at least to me) the head looks like it has been created by a somewhat amateurish wood carver. The species is listed as Vulnerable – the estimated number of individuals is 4600-5100 (HBW), of which about 2000 winter on Hokkaido.   Georg Wilhelm Steller (1709 – 1746) was a German-born naturalist, though it seems he spent most of his (shortish) adult life in Russia, participating in the exploration of the North Pacific regio ..read more

There are a few spectacles in the birding community that are high energy, happen quickly, and is worth any effort to experience it.  One such experience is a bird grounding event, sometimes called a fallout.  A fallout is usually reserved for more significant events, but there is no true gauge as to one versus the other.  Warblers, thrushes, buntings, and other migrants move across the Gulf of Mexico in an extremely stressful, marathon flight from the Yucatan Peninsula to the Gulf Coast of Texas, Louisiana, Alabama, and Florida before spreading throughout the flyways and headin ..read more

This is a made-up quote, much like we would like you to make up a blog post for 10,000 Birds as a guest. No long-term commitment, just the quick pleasure of writing a birding-related post and seeing it published almost instantly. Call it casual blogging. What’s not to like? Contact us if you want your life to improve … The post “Ever since I wrote a guest post for 10,000 Birds, my life has improved so much” first appeared on 10,000 Birds ..read more

I’ve been a regular visitor to the island of Cyprus for over 25 years, making around a dozen trips during this period, every one in search of birds. Tucked away at the extreme eastern end of the Mediterranean, Cyprus is regarded politically as part of Europe, but when it comes to birds it’s very much Middle Eastern in flavour, with a number of species that are hard or even impossible to find in Europe, plus a trio of endemics.  I made my most recent visit earlier this month, arriving with my three birding companions, Martin, Mike and Chris, on a warm spring evening. It was dark when we r ..read more

This week, I once again found myself car-challenged. So I went to another nearby site, Las Mesas, which did not offer any unusual narrative. Instead, in this post I will wax philosophical, while sharing a few nice photos from that outing. Clay-colored Sparrows In about a month, I will have my 66th birthday. In between now and then, I will spend a week and a half in California, in the land where birding may mean walking on paved paths, or even on a wooden boardwalk built through the middle of a salt marsh. But once I get back home to Mexico, I will be climbing hills on livestock trails once a ..read more

Dip (verb): [in birding] to miss seeing a bird you were looking for Many times when we speak about the trips we’ve been on we concentrate on the things we experienced, the ruing of missed opportunities tends to be saved for nighttime conversations after a few drinks perhaps. Visiting Guyana brought with it the unavoidable expectation of seeing some mind boggling species – some endangered, some emblematic, others downright bizarre. Before we boarded the flight to Guyana we already knew that probabilities of seeing one of the target species was slashed to near zero. I had long yearned of seeing ..read more

Ruili is a Chinese city right on the border to Myanmar, and a major border crossing. When I last visited the town almost 10 years ago, it had a Wild West feel, and Wikipedia claims that it is “an important location for trade with Myanmar, in both legal and illegal goods and services” but it seemed pretty tame to me this time. My major struggle in the city was with the equipment in a super modern hotel room, with instructions all in Chinese, preventing me from getting a hot shower and hot coffee in the morning. I admit this is not quite on the level of fellow writers’ posts describing birding ..read more

When waiting it felt like ages, but once I heard them it felt like they had returned way too early: Firecrests singing in our local park in Bonn. On the way to work in the mornings and on weekend walks, I was very glad to hear the songs of all the migrants arriving. In addition to the Firecrests, within a few days the songs of Common Chiffchaff, Willow Warbler, and Eurasian Blackcap started resonating through the freshly sprouting vegetation. I always love the feeling when migrants have just returned, knowing they just travelled thousands of kilometers, some from Subsaharan Africa. Then somet ..read more

Most weeks, I can blog about going somewhere a bit more exotic, and seeing something a bit more unusual for me. But this week, I had no car to drive, so I had to go on foot to the nature reserve on the far side of our neighborhood. This place, called Los Filtros Viejos (the Old Filters) because it used to be Morelia’s main water source, is actually a great place for birding. The only reason I don’t go there often, is that it is only lightly forested, is often hot (especially in April), and I inevitably end up walking a hard 10 km/6 miles on its very uneven, rocky pathways in order to see its ..read more