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Showing posts with label Firecrest. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Firecrest. Show all posts

Wednesday, 14 January 2009

Snow shoe birding in the Alps / Tirol

Christmas time saw great weather in the mountains - we had had fresh snow just before Christmas and lots of blue skies since. I tried to play in the snow every day - skiing, sledding, walking and - thanks to Father Chistmas - show shoe hiking.


It really is wonderful to spend hours of quiet and solitude in the tranquil mountains. There is something about the woods in winter - there is a stillness that the snow brings that I can't quite describe. It is as though everything is holding its breath, waiting for something.

Just before New Year's, I took a hike from Axams to Axamerkogel. The forest down near Axams was alive with life. Well, maybe not dripping with life, but pretty cool for winter birding at least. What I have noticed is that one can walk for long periods of time without hearing one little peep from a bird and not seeing anything anywhere, and then suddenly you stumble upon a mixed-species bird party. It seems that the birds form the roaving groups that can have as many as a dozen bird species in them, all feeding together. Common winter party-goers include Coal Tits, Great Tits, groups of Firecrests, Eurasian and Short-toed Treecreepers, and Eurasian Nuthatches (Tannenmeisen, Kohlmeisen, Wintergoldhänchen, Waldbaumläufer, Gartenbaumläufer, Kleiber). Sometimes one of the other tit species will join - Crested Tits, Blue Tits (Habenmeisen, Blaumeisen). The Long-tailed Tits seem to join these mixed-species feeding parties occassionally, but their association seems to be a lot more loose: groups of five/six Long-tailed Tits will move around foraging together, join a foraging party for a while, and then slowly drift off in their own direction...

Heading out of Axams in the morning, I saw a flash of a raptor (looking very Accipiter-like) through the trees but did not get a good enough look to make an ID. Later on, coming down the mountain, a beautiful, big female Northern Goshawk rushed through the trees overhead (Habicht). So the other, smaller Accipiter was probably the male.

I have seen a few Northern Goshawks lately - always deep in the forests and always rather shy. But lovely to see nonetheless.

The raptor life here is - at the moment - dominated by tons of Common Buzzards (Mäusebussards). Everywhere we go, we see them circling overhead, sitting in the fields and peering out from their telephone-pole lookouts. The Common Kestrels continue to pester the pigeons in town.

I have seen very few Golden Eagles recently. Their daily range is much increased in Winter and this may have something to do with it. But, a couple of times I have seen them right down low in the valleys - and on one occassion we even saw a pair circling over the Inn between Kematen and Zirl. It is very unusual to see them so low down. I wonder what they were doing...?

Winter might not be the most exciting time for birding in the Alps, but the beauty of the forest and mountains certain keep one entertained between birds!

Happy birding
Dale Forbes

Sunday, 20 April 2008

Goldcrests and firecrests flitting through the trees

There were a bunch of little goldcrests out this morning. Very shy, flitty little birds. Apparently they are the smallest bird in Europe. Well, they are certainly not large! While the rest of the BirdLife Austria group was chatting, I took some time to follow their movements to try to see a little of their characters. I found one little guy collecting nesting material - darting all about, here and there (they certainly are flitty little birds). I suppose this guy was building his nest in the heavy, leafy ends of one of the conifers - hiding the next generation away in its dense, protective cover.

Incredibly, the female goldcrest (Regulus regulus, Wintergoldhähnchen) incubates the eggs alone and is not regularly fed by the male and the total mass of eggs can be 50% more than her body weight (Haftorn 1978 Ornis Scandinavica 9)! Despite doing it all along, these little 5gram females are able to keep the temperature of her brood remarkably constant, by varying the amount of time she spends on the eggs (and away from the eggs)(ibid).

A very closely related species to the goldcrest, is the equally adorable firecrest (Regulus ignicapillus, Sommerhähnchen). Both are exceptionally flitty species; never sitting still and always darting from one branch to another. And even when they do seem to be on one branch for more than 10 seconds, they tend to flap and shake their wings. This is typical behavior of small insectivorous birds (willow warblers, tree creepers, white-eyes and many others also do this). By flicking their wings, the sharp movement tends to startle little well-camouflaged insects just enough to get them to move. And even if they move just a wee bit, the sharp eyes of the insectivore will spot them (and eat them for breakfast!). But despite looking very similar and both feeding on small insects, it seems that their territories can overlap extensively (no interspecific territoriality) and they differ in how they feed (Leisler & Thaler 1982 Annales Zoologici Fennici 19/4).

To tell these two little guys apart, birders look at their cheeks: the firecrest has strong black and white eye stripes (see left). Compare this to the plainer cheeks of the goldcrest above. But even easier than trying to look at their make-up is to just listen to them: they both have very distinctive calls. Try these links to the RSPB site to listen to how they sound!

firecrest
goldcrest


Happy birding,
Dale Forbes