The Standlake Birder -

Brambling I recently discovered a site where Bramblings and Corn Buntings could be seen feeding on seed kindly provided by a local farmer.Wednesday this week seemed a good bet for a visit as at least some sun was forecast in between the seemingly everlasting progression of winter storms . An easy if boring drive had me on site by 9 am.  A weak mid-winter sun was struggling to clear an early morning mist which painted the whole landscape in a serene soft beauty, there is something very special, almost ethereal, about these misty winter mornings. It was soon obvious that I was in the right spot as numerous Bramblings and Chaffinches  were decorating the lane side tree giving it the impression of some mad addicted bird spotters Christmas tree.   There was ample corn on the grassy track and, using my car as a hide in the tried and tested fashion, grateful birds soon fluttered to the ground to feast on the free bounty. First in were 3 Red-legged Partridges quickly fo...

       Sunbittern After breakfast on the morning of the 14 th   of November we left the wonderful Laguna Lodge and caught a boat back to     the dock where our coach was parked. Today we were     heading to Rancho Naturalista our next home for just one night.   Along our way we drove back through the banana plantations and stopped  by some rather rustic looking cattle sheds where we hoped to see Great Cowbirds, a large iridescent black bird somewhat like a cross between a European Blackbird and a Rook. Paco soon spotted one and got everyone on it in amongst the many Great-tailed Grackles. As an aside there are currently two Great-tailed Grackles of debatable origin in England. Why debatable? Well because they are almost certainly boat assisted as they are non-migratory. This means that they will probably end up in category E, which somewhat oddly is for escaped birds,  when assessed by the relevant committees. Th...

     Distant record shot of the Killdeer in the January gloom I was just settling down to a relaxing coffee after early morning smallholding chores on Wednesday morning when the surprising news that a Killdeer had been found in Hampshire hit the bird alert services. I wouldn’t normally expect a “drop everything and twitch” moment in January, that’s much more likely in the spring and autumn, but, with three new UK ticks in the past two years and now the promise of a fourth, January seems to becoming the new October for me. After begging forgiveness from my long suffering wife, I loaded up the car and set off on the two and a half hour drive to Ripley.   Birds turn up in the most unlikely of places and this American beauty was no exception. It had been found on a small reservoir adjacent to a pig farm in the tiny hamlet of Ripley. I’m guessing that the local birder who found it must have thought that all his Christmas’s had come at once!   I thought parking was li...

    Green Heron After one final visit to the bird feeders and breakfast we left Selva Verde and made our way by coach towards our next port of call, Laguna lodge on the northern Caribbean coast.   On route we drove through a large banana plantation, where we saw the banana equivalent of a railroad crossing as huge bunch after bunch of bananas were pulled across the road on a very Heath Robinson looking contraption. This is a memory that I’m sure will float back to me the next time I am enjoying a Costa Rican banana.   Driving further along the road we saw a group of people looking up into a tree where a Two Toed Sloth was miraculously right out in the open munching on leaves. The others we had seen were more like big furry tennis balls curled up and asleep.   Two-toed sloths spend most of their lives hanging upside down from trees. Strangely, they actually can’t walk, so they pull themselves hand-over-hand to move around in their characteristic extremely slow ma...