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Ed Forum birdwatching 2008

Does this qualify as birdwatching:


23it5q8.jpg



:cool:
 
I'm trying to think of a smart comment along the lines of putting the cat among the pigeons, but it doven't work.
 
An interesting question, perhaps:

I was just talking to my girlfriend on Skype; she lives in Würzburg, Germany. Through Skype, I could clearly hear a blackbird, and when she turned her webcam around to let me look out through her window, there were some domestic pigeons flying by. Technically, I have thus observed two species in Germany, but I wasn't there are the time. Does this count? :D
 
EHocking said:
I'm trying to think of a smart comment along the lines of putting the cat among the pigeons, but it doven't work.
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Doves hey? And I thought they were pigeons!

What, exactly is the difference between a dove and a pigeon anyway?
And can anyone identify the doves in that photograph?

Here it is, cropped and "artistically" enhanced, to help with the detail:


5l9wty.jpg
 
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BillyJoe said:
What, exactly is the difference between a dove and a pigeon anyway?
And can anyone identify the doves in that photograph?
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Streptopelia chinensis perhaps?
I don't think there are any hard and fast rules as to what are called doves and what are pigeons but in general pigeons are big and stocky whilst doves are smaller and more graceful. But there are exceptions.
 
mummymonkey said:
Streptopelia chinensis perhaps?
I don't think there are any hard and fast rules as to what are called doves and what are pigeons but in general pigeons are big and stocky whilst doves are smaller and more graceful. But there are exceptions.
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Yep, we have those same doves all over our yard. I think these were added to the master list sometime in the first 5 pages of this thread.
 
mummymonkey said:
Streptopelia chinensis perhaps?
I don't think there are any hard and fast rules as to what are called doves and what are pigeons but in general pigeons are big and stocky whilst doves are smaller and more graceful. But there are exceptions.
Click to expand...

I read an article on co-evolution between doves and pigeons and their lice, and according to that article, it is only a size difference. The authors stated something along the lines of, "for simplicity's sake, we'll refer to all Columbidae as 'doves' throughout this paper, regardless of size".

Also: I'll be leaving for a PhD course in a matter of minutes, so have a nice week.
 
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Kotatsu said:
An interesting question, perhaps:

I was just talking to my girlfriend on Skype; she lives in Würzburg, Germany. Through Skype, I could clearly hear a blackbird, and when she turned her webcam around to let me look out through her window, there were some domestic pigeons flying by. Technically, I have thus observed two species in Germany, but I wasn't there are the time. Does this count? :D
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Don't think so, Otherwise I'd be able to add my Africa lists from 1996 just by visiting
http://www.zulucam.org/
http://www9.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/wildcamafrica/index.html
and my Northern Territory list from:
http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/kakaducam/ etc etc

:p

p.s. will get the webpages updates loaded this evening with the new country lists and more photos.
 
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My wife is so excited. She bought a Baltimore Oriole feeder, and sure enough, it attracted orioles. We've seen the Baltimore and Bullock's Orioles eating the grape jam, as well as cardinals and more common yard birds.

I realize this isn't impressive to an avid birdwatcher, but I thought it was pretty neat.
 
Thanks for that - had a bad link in there, wasn't you at all.

Pages updated plus additions to the gallery. I've also created country lists for Alaska and Hawaii broken out from "continental" USA.
 
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I love the picture of the cat bird-watching!

I've slowly taken up this bird-watching hobby - very informally. I bought a bird book this past weekend and a 2nd bird feeder, so perhaps I'm getting the bug. I've never checked into this thread before today though. The book I bought is "Birds of North America, Eastern Region" by Fred J. Alsop III - hope it's a good one.

This morning while walking across campus, I came upon what I think was a young Sharp-Shinned Hawk standing by a large trash can, walking around it one way, then the other, flapping its wings and leaning over to peer underneath. The can is on 4 legs, with a few inches of hiding space under it. A chipmunk was doing the hiding - running around under there at whatever point was furthest from the hawk. The hawk would periodically jump up on top of the can and peer down, waiting; or step a little further away into the grass and just wait. I got within 4 feet of the bird, who would just glare at me, then look for the chipmunk again. I took several pictures with my cell phone camera and this helped me identify it later, but I can't get the pictures off the phone. I felt bad for poor chippie under there, but I finally walked away to let nature take its course. By then, the hawk had flown to a branch of the tree closest to the can.

Tonight I am fairly sure I saw a chipping sparrow out back.

What fun!
 
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Ok - first attempt to include images in my post. I'm beginning to doubt my identification abilities; well, I didn't have much to start with since I'm so new at birdwatching yet. So I was hoping someone could see enough in these blurry images to tell me what type of hawk I saw. I had to take pictures of my cell phone to get them here!

Ok - hold on - I'm still figuring this out ... (Thanks Francesca!!)

22578484e568129cc6.jpg


(and I'll leave the others in Francesca's post that follows mine)
 
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Lilith said:
I love the picture of the cat bird-watching!

I've slowly taken up this bird-watching hobby - very informally. I bought a bird book this past weekend and a 2nd bird feeder, so perhaps I'm getting the bug. I've never checked into this thread before today though. The book I bought is "Birds of North America, Eastern Region" by Fred J. Alsop III - hope it's a good one.

This morning while walking across campus, I came upon what I think was a young Sharp-Shinned Hawk ...

Tonight I am fairly sure I saw a chipping sparrow out back.

What fun!
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Yet another devotee falls into the clutches of the cult of BIRDING....mwahahahaha.
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(ahem) welcome
 
Apologies, Kotatsu :(

Kotatsu said:
No, the colouring is wrong for a blue tit. The blue tit would have, for instance, a the white cheek bordered by a black line running through the eye and around the neck. Also, the bird in the picture lack a white eyebrow, and seems to have a blue-grey, rather than green, back.It almost looks like some subspecies of Yellow wagtail, but still not; the shape, for instance, is all wrong.

I seem to recall that BillyJoe is Australian, no? I base this on the observation of a Sulphur-crested Cockatoo earlier. Supposing that is correct, I would go for this species:
(Eastern) Yellow Robin Eopsaltria australis:
Mangoverde picture (there are more)
Birds in Backyard picture --- this seems to be a very handy page for common Australian birds.

It appears to have the correct colouration, shape, and wing-length, at least. A bit whitish on the throat, but not very apparent in BillyJoe's picture. There's a faint hint of something slightly darker just across the eye, with a whiter eyebrow, with wing covers steel-blue-grey and the wing feathers darker. If it also had a yellow back, this would, I think, seal the case for Eopsaltria.
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While waiting for the page to upload, my eye caught this post of yours.
Somehow I completely missed it back then.
You had this puzzle solved long before I found it in Google Images.

Very sorry. :o
 
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