The Common Buzzard – Buteo buteo is a hawk and the most common bird of prey in the United Kingdom. The name Buzzard will present no ambiguity to most Europeans but to those speaking English in the “new world” confusion will have immediately set in! The word “Buzzard” in the USA is a broad term […]
Stephen was at Madrid’s Barajas airport and was all ready and waiting with the minibus parked closely for a quick getaway when the group arrived from London. Travelling through the city and out onto the main road to Badajoz was really quiet…once we cleared Madrid! Birds were seen right from the start with Common Magpies, […]
If you want to see “Gators” in Florida, then visit Myakka River State Park in Sarasota. Albeit common everywhere in the Sunshine State, they are always intriguing and photogenic.Myakka River State Park website Hunted almost to extinction, the American Alligator (Alligator mississippienensis), has made an incredible recovery. Perhaps this is a good lesson for Conservation […]
The Ferruginous Duck (Aythya nyroca) is a duck from Eurasia. It is a medium-sized diving duck. Their habitat: marshes and lakes with a metre or more water depth. They breed in southern and eastern Europe and southern and western Asia. They are often migrating in the winter and fly to the south and into north […]
I don’t know what American grade school kids are being taught these days – I left Oakville Elementary a couple of decades ago (Okay, fine—several decades ago) and since I haven’t had kids of my own I don’t have access to 21st century homework assignments. But I’ll go out on a limb here and bet […]
The Common Loon or as known as the Great Northern Diver in Eurasia breeds in the northern portion of North America, Greenland, Iceland and Scotland. It winters on the seacoasts or large lakes of south Europe and the United States. Because of its migration habits, it is seen commonly in the waters off the Massachusetts […]
I stopped at the Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge a few weeks ago on the way back home from a Northern California Audubon Council meeting in Clear Lake and spotted a few Black-crowned Night-Herons (Nycticorax nycticorax) on the auto tour just before sunset. This juvenile was hunting from a irrigation outlet right next to the auto […]
A couple of weeks ago at Lema Ranch I came upon a Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias) fishing in Leah’s Pond. As is usual for this species, this heron was standing still and waiting for its prey most of the time and slowly walking through the shallow water otherwise, looking for anything that would fit […]