WHITE STORKS

The white stork, Ciconia ciconia, is a common sight in much of rural Germany. In many towns, it is welcomed as a harbinger of Spring when it migrates back from Africa. It uses abandoned chimneys and similar structures in these towns to nest. While birding the Havelland area with Rolf, we saw several of these nests. Here are some photos of the birds at their nests.

This was the first white stork we saw. You can see two of her chicks crying out for food.

Job done, the stork prepares to leave

This nest was atop a building holding a house martin colony

This stork had a room with a view, perched atop an old church

A better view of where the stork has nested

BIRDING BERLIN: The Havelland Area

On our last full day in Berlin, my father and I went on a birding tour with Rolf from birdingberlin.com. We saw a wide variety of birds, most of which were new for us.
We first arrived at a railway station in the Havelland area, where Rolf agreed to pick us up. While in the station area, we saw a distant common buzzard. Interesting songbirds in the area included a serin and a female black redstart, though I only managed to photograph the serin. Soaring overhead was a distant red kite, as well as an equally distant Eurasian sparrowhawk. 

This serin was singing loudly from the top of a tree

This shot of a red kite really doesn't do the bird justice

We then visited a forest. Here we saw several new birds, though I didn't manage to photograph them. Species seen included house wrens, great spotted woodpeckers, a single wood warbler and several young blue tits. The main star of the visit to the forest was a pair of two distant common cranes. 

Through Rolf's scope, the beauty of these common cranes was far more evident

After that we visited a village filled with the nests of white storks. I will not put any stork photos in this post and will instead post a gallery of the storks we saw. There was also a colony of house martins. Singing in a nearby shrub was a lesser whitethroat, though we couldn't get a good look at it. Finally, while we were there two Eurasian kestrels flew into the village. One attempted to harass a stork, but to no avail.

A house martin at its nest

This Eurasian kestrel was perched high on a church, near the nest of a stork

The next stop was a wetland. Here the birds were quite distant, so again Rolf's scope was put to use. Through scanning the area we spotted red-necked grebes, mallards, gadwalls, Northern shovelers, Eurasian wigeons, little grebes, red-crested pochards and greylag geese feeding in the water. A distant western marsh harrier, along with a few soaring black kites and common buzzards, hunted over the area. Finally, in the trees on the far side of the wetland were 2 calling Eurasian cuckoos.

In this flock of waterfowl, coots, red-crested pochards, gadwalls and mallards can be seen

A distant red-necked grebe. We saw 2 of these grebes performing a courtship ritual

Another distant grebe, this time a little grebe

This Eurasian cuckoo was calling loudly, but only showed itself for a few seconds

In case you haven't seen enough distant birds, have a look at this Western marsh harrier

We had lunch and followed a trail to an observation tower. On the way to the tower Rolf found a small moor frog (Rana arvalis). This tower overlooked reeds on one side and a colony of common terns and black-headed gulls on the other. While watching the reeds we saw a variety of birds: reed warblers, greater reed warblers, reed buntings, chiffchaffs and sedge warblers were all present. Rolf and my father also got a brief glimpse of a penduline tit, but nobody else in the group could find it before it flew off.

The chiffchaff's only real distinguishing feature is its song

Moor frogs are common in much of Europe

The common reed warbler is smaller and not as loud as the great reed warbler

Several sedge warblers were flying in and out of the reeds

Black-headed gulls and common terns were in abundance at the colony

Our next stop was another observation tower. This tower overlooked a large protected grassland, where great bustards could be found. We had no luck with the bustards, but saw a variety of birds in the area around the tower. From the tower, several common cranes could be viewed through Rolf's scope. The tower itself was being used as a nesting ground by barn swallows, who squawked angrily at us as we walked up to the top floor. Yellow wagtails, white wagtails, corn buntings, skylarks and linnets were all present in the area around the tower, though of these I only got good photographs of the buntings. A small pond held a single moorhen. The best bird we saw from here was a distant male hen harrier, soaring leisurely over the grassland. 

Many of these barn swallows were calling at us

This corn bunting came quite close to the tower before flying away

On the way to our final destination, we stopped because Rolf had heard the call of an Ortolan bunting. We managed to get some glimpses of the bunting flying off, but didn't get any photos of it. However, we did get photos of a chaffinch who we initially mistook for as the bunting. We stopped once more to view a distant osprey nest. The nest was also being inhabited by some Eurasian tree sparrows, using the osprey's presence as protection from predators.

Though not an Ortolan bunting, this chaffinch was still a nice find

Our final stop was the Guelper See. This large lake held many Greylag geese, along with distant common terns, black-headed gulls and Caspian gulls. A single Northern lapwing could be seen far away, along with an even more distant black tern which we viewed through Rolf's scope.

Greylag geese are quite common in Germany

After that very successful trip, we took the train home. If in the area I would highly recommend Rolf's services as a guide: he knew the calls of all the birds, easily identified them and took us to a variety of habitats. You can find details about booking tours with him on birdingberlin.com.

BIRDING BERLIN: The Tiergarten

For the last week I was in Berlin with my dad, for what was primarily a business trip. However, I was allowed to tag along and go birding.
On most days, we went walking in the Tiergarten in the early morning. The Tiergarten is a large, well-wooded park in central Berlin. It was easy to access as our hotel was right next to it.
A wide variety of birds were visible in the Tiergarten. Common throughout were birds such as mallards, house sparrows, starlings and hooded crows, nothing particularly special. However, well-wooded areas held several other species. Among these were Eurasian nuthatches, European robins, great spotted woodpeckers and common woodpigeons. We also heard a blackcap singing, but couldn't track it down. Mammals in the area included many beautiful red squirrels, along with several European rabbits and a few larger European hares.

A young greater spotted woodpecker inspects a piece of wood for insects

The large and beautiful wood pigeon is a common sight in the Tiergarten

The European robin is very different to the robins here in Australia

I have seen hooded crows before in Austria, but they are always enjoyable to spot

In the mornings red squirrels were common throughout the park

Near water, a host of different birds also made themselves visible. The commonest of these was the aforementioned mallard. Many birds could be seen making their way down the canals intersecting the park. Also common were grey herons, silently standing at the banks of the canals. On one walk we saw a pair of mute swans swimming in the centre of a canal. Seen but not photographed were Caspian gulls and great cormorants flying down the main canal. Small ponds and lakes in the centre of the park held coots, Eurasian moorhens and introduced Mandarin ducks. An area of grass near water was being grazed by several Canadian geese on one walk. Finally, in the non-bird section, I spotted an introduced red-eared slider (a type of turtle) resting on a log in a canal.

This young grey heron was standing majestically in the grounds of the Berlin Zoo

A small colony of introduced Canadian geese lives in central Berlin

The Mandarin duck is another introduced species found in central Berlin

The Eurasian moorhen is closely related to Australia's dusky moorhen

We got close views of this majestic mute swan

The red-eared slider has been introduced to waterways in much of the world

Though we failed to spot any of Berlin's notorious goshawk population, the Tiergarten was still amazing to visit and provided a host of nice birds.

LONG WEEKEND IN MILDURA

For the Anzac Day long weekend this year, my family and I travelled to Mildura to meet up with cousins. Since there are several good birding sites in the area, I decided to visit one of them while I was there: namely, the saltbush around the suburb of Ned's Corner. On the way towards Mildura we stopped at Lake Tyrrell but didn't stay for long enough to see any birds.

Lake Tyrrell is Victoria's largest salt lake, it was beautiful in the setting sun

The area was extremely peaceful: while in the saltbush we saw only a single other car. We birded by driving slowly along, stopping when something interesting could be seen. The most prominent creatures in the saltbush were not birds, but mammals: Western grey kangaroos. Towards the end of our trip we also saw a small emu crossing the road! A variety of little birds fed in the scrub. Australasian pipits were most common, along with lifer southern whitefaces and an odd wren I'm identifying as a female white-winged fairy-wren. Where trees dotted the saltbush, we saw multiple lifer blue bonnets, though they were too distant to get any particularly good photos. On the way out we came across a gigantic flock of little corellas and galahs, along with several red-rumped parrots and crested pigeons.
We didn't have enough time to properly explore the area and it is certainly a site I will be visiting again.

Around Melbourne Western grey kangaroos are replaced by their eastern variant

A distant and blurry shot of a blue bonnet, a species of parrot found in saltbush

The lack of an eye-ring makes me believe this is a female white-winged fairy wren

Thankfully southern whitefaces are far easier to identify

Little corellas are very noisy birds and also extremely social

LORD HOWE ISLAND: The Pelagic

On our third day on the island, we went for a boat trip with Jack Shick and Ian Hutton, headed towards Balls Pyramid.
Our first stop was an area of rocks below cliffs on the northern side of the island. Here there were many breeding red-tailed tropicbirds. Apparently the wandering tattler is sometimes seen on these rocks, however we could only find a few ruddy turnstones. The next stop was Roach Island, part of a small group of islands off the shore of Lord Howe. There were many masked boobies breeding on the island, with terns such as common noddies, black noddies and even grey ternlets flying around the island's cliffs.

This shot of a distant red-tailed tropicbird was taken later on from land

This young masked booby swam near our boat after falling into the water

The area around Norfolk and Lord Howe Islands is Australia's only site for grey ternlet

When we came to the seas around Mount Gower, we saw a large amount of Providence petrels feeding in the water. We also got a great view of the cliff face of Mount Gower.

The forested slopes of Mount Gower were beautiful in the afternoon light

Thousands of Providence petrels nest atop Mount Gower: a few can be seen here

This blurred and cropped shot of a Providence petrel does the bird no justice

Later on, when we were nearing Balls Pyramid, we stopped and put chum (a mixture of fish guts) in the water. This immediately attracted many flesh-footed shearwaters, as well as a few white-bellied storm petrels.

As we neared Balls Pyramid we got a beautiful view of the rock stack

The white-bellied storm petrel is another specialty of Lord Howe

A white-bellied storm petrel flies over a flesh-footed shearwater

This flesh-footed shearwater was quick to fly towards the chum

When we circled Balls Pyramid there were many nesting black noddies, common noddies and grey ternlets, as well as flesh-footed shearwaters circling the boat. Several noddies and ternlets flew near the boat for a few seconds to check us out, before darting away.

Balls Pyramid was even more spectacular from close range

On the way back we saw a group of swimming Bottlenose Dolphins, some flying fish and a distant wedge-tailed shearwater.