A couple of weeks ago I was out on my bike with my boys in Queen Elizabeth Park. We all needed fresh air and exercise and we all like going up and down the paths on our bikes even though it’s a small area even better when no one around like this morning!
It was overcast with mist and still. As we came through the centre of the park there was a frantic buzzing in the trees. I’m ashamed to say I’ve not checked what trees they are! They sounded like siskins. They were siskins! A couple came down from the heights descending into the surrounding gardens. Where the fence and hedges of the public part met the gardens I could their bright lemony yellowy colours interspersed with green. I stood with my bike between my legs watching them for a few minutes taking delight in their presence. Not having been out much recently to do proper birdwatching it was a treat.
When I rejoined the boys further up the path I noticed some redwing in the large lime trees towards the end of the park. I could hear one singing which was really special. Their song is not often something I have heard. It wasn’t as penetrating as a blackbird or thrush but had it did have the same richness.
Completely changing the tone now to something more exotic is the bird below:
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| White-eared Sibia (Heterophasia auricularis) image |
My old church has like most a monthly magazine and on the front cover was this bird. We still receive the magazine so I didn’t miss this treat. I emailed the church office to find out what it was and they didn’t know either! The photo had been found on a random search on the internet. Ironically it turns out that the bird is from Taiwan and the lady who put the photo on the magazine is not Taiwanese but Chinese. I found out from my Ornithologist friend what the bird was, he said that it is a kind of babbler. If you take a look on the internet too and put in the bird name above you’ll see other photos of this beauty. I’m not sure this was the same photo – it was in a cherry tree the one I saw on the magazine but that doesn’t matter it clearly is a stunner, whichever way you see it!
Finally back much closer to home. On the way to school with my youngest son we both smile as we watched a starling on the corner of a roof near where we live. These birds sometimes get lots of bad press because they can be quite noisy and greedy often dominating a bird feeder. This one we saw was stunning as it’s iridescent dark greenish plumage was all lit up by the light. It was standing erect with its mouth wide open spouting forth it’s mixed sound of whistles, bubblings, raspings and so on, whilst at the same time as what I call wind-milling. This wind-milling is where the bird whirls its wings around in what looks like a windmills sails, both wings at the same time which gives it a comic air! It seemed to be very proud but I probably read in human body posturing into that!