Great Backyard Bird Count!

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This weekend is the Great Backyard Bird Count organized by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and Audobon. Traditionally this was just a North American count, but now it’s been extended worldwide, meaning that I can participate too! I just signed up to Cornell’s fantastic eBird site, which not only keeps track of my observations, but also makes them available to scientists.

You can watch a beautiful display of observations entered worldwide here. The little grey dot over Berlin is me!

And here are links to my counts so far:

Today from my balcony

Today from my kitchen window

Yesterday from my balcony

My first recording

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In my quest to learn bird songs I have decided to enlist technology. Happily there is wonderful and free technology out there for aiding birders to recognize songs and calls. I just downloaded Raven Lite from the wonderful Cornell Lab of Ornithology. With this software I can record bird sounds and then get a visual impression of them.

The song of a cute little Blaumeise recorded from my balcony looks like this:

Blaumeise2 SpectrographThis visualization is called a spectrogram. I think it is really fantastic because it provides a ready visual aid for the sounds, which will certainly help in remembering them. Unfortunately I can’t upload sound to this blogging site, but you can hear my recording here at the wonderful website xeno-canto.

Greyness, and a wren

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Crows in greyness
The last few days have been exceptionally grey here in Berlin. So to cheer myself up yesterday I went to visit my old colleagues at Allianz Climate Solutions for lunch.

Allianz tower I used to work near the very top of this tower, the tallest building in Berlin. I had an incredible view from my office and would see many birds, migrating or hanging around in the Spree, making concentration rather difficult! After lunch yesterday I decided to spend some time with the birds that I used to only watch from afar. Treptower Park is right next to the tower, so I took a little walk there. Continue reading →

Birds these days…

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are getting very loud, and starting to get on my nerves.

Unfortunately, today was not a day for wandering around in the park, but a day where I needed to stay inside and get some real work done on the computer. To help me out, some bird stayed outside, in the same spot, all day long, and sang for me. He chose to sing the same song for the entirety of the day. This song he chose consisted of only two notes, his favorite notes of the highest pitch, and never, ever, varied. It went something like this:

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Stranger in a Strange Land

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Condor
About once a month I walk past the zoo on my way to the Asian grocery store, where I fill up my backpack with food. On my way today I had the pleasure of seeing this Andean condor sunning himself on a snowy stump. He stood like this for some time, turning himself around in the sun. When he stopped his sunning and folded his wings onto his back he did so with all the grace of a frustrated traveler attempting to fold up a large road map. Perhaps aired-out wings are like aired-out bedding, more difficult to fold. Notice how the feathers have been clipped on the interior of his wings.

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Listening

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red brush

It was very cold today, so what I had intended to be a long walk became a short meandering near my apartment. I decided to go to a part of the Tiergarten that is nearest to us, but that is not well visited, except by strange old men. There is a shallow pond there that is always attractive no matter what the season. It did not disappoint today, surrounded by these wonderful bushes with red stems. I looked around very hard for birds but could only hear them high in the trees. “This is no problem!” I thought. “I’ll listen to their songs, remember them, and look them up later.” Fool. Continue reading →

Yet More Winter

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snow

This is the view from my window today. It really is quite beautiful, but has put something of a damper on my thoughts of spring. The birds have been keeping at it however, and it seems that every day I hear more songs from the males. Today a male great tit was singing quite loudly while his comrades were finishing off the peanuts on my window box. He only has two notes, but he makes good use of them. The great tits, or Kohlmeise (which I’m calling them from now on, thanks to the tit problem), are very similar to the blue tits, or Blaumeise, except that they are larger and have black caps. They are very frequent visitors to our fat balls. Continue reading →

Signs of Spring

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Image

This is the post I meant to put up yesterday, but life got in the way a little bit…

snowdropsToday, for the first time this year, I heard the voice of the male blackbird. During the spring and early summer one hears them constantly, and they certainly sing away in the dead of night. But by late summer they quiet down and the only noise that I at least can hear them make is a rustling around in the leaves. As I was returning from the post office yesterday I stopped to watch a female blackbird in the hopes of getting a good shot of her (I didn’t) when I heard the familiar voice of the male for a brief few seconds in the bush. Like a jolt it transported me to spring! Afterwards I came across these snowdrops and the daffodil shoots pictured above and was firmly convinced that spring might actually be a possibility. A week ago I wouldn’t have been so sure. Continue reading →

An Hour’s Walk

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Flying Coot

Today was the first full sunny day in as long as I can remember. We have had a few hours of sun here and there over the past few weeks, but it has always passed quickly and never seems to totally dispel the gloom. But today was different, and I took advantage of it by taking a meandering route on my errands. First I stopped by the gathering in the Spree, to check on the usual crowd. I didn’t see the little grebe this time, but everyone else was there. A man on the opposite bank was throwing bread in the water, so the whole mass of birds slowly moved into his vicinity, making quite a ruckus on the way. The coots are very funny when they decide to fly. They begin by running along the water, kicking it up behind them, and flapping their wings like mad. When they finally alight it seems a marvel that they can fly at all. Above is a photo of one of the coots about to take off. Continue reading →

Hunger

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Blaumeise

HamletThe bird that I see the most of here in Berlin is the blue tit (Blaumeise). These are bright and lovely little birds with yellow bellies and blue little caps and distinctive facial patterns. They are remarkably acrobatic and seem to enjoy twirling around branches, falling and catching themselves, and hopping upside-down along branches, as if gravity would be of no concern if one is just chipper and bright enough. I am always happy to see them on these dark winter days; they fly about in utter defiance of any gloom. Continue reading →