June 13, 2006
Hot birding
On Saturday afternoon I met up with Stephane, with whom I had previously birded around the wonderful Lac du Der, for a trip to the Fontainebleau Forest. It has been 16 years since my last visit to this site, on my first ever foreign birding trip with our school bird club (Wood and Bonelli's Warblers as lifers on the same day!), so it was well and truly time for another visit. On a beer stop in a nearby village I took the opportunity to photograph this House Martin (Hirondelle de fenetre) nest-building.
Our destination was the scenic Plaine de Chanfroy, where we took an evening stroll again in the hope of Nightjars (Engoulevent d'Europe). The Nightjars started singing relatively early (10pm and still very light), and there were more of them than at the Angevilliers site. Indeed, this evening we succeeded in seeing two individuals rather distantly in flight. The full moon was large and extremely bright, and we cast a long shadow on our path back to the van.
We camped in the car park in Stephane's trusty Citroen Jumpy - fortunately a little warmer than our -7C camping spot by the Lac du Der in March! I fell asleep around midnight to a chorus of churring Nightjars, and woke up shortly after 5am to a singing Golden Oriole (Loriot d'Europe) - cool place!
We repeated our walk around the plain for diurnal species, and I was pleased to see good numbers of flowering Lizard Orchids all along the path.
Bonelli's Warblers (Pouillot de Bonelli) and Cuckoos (Coucou gris) were singing all over the place, along with smaller numbers of Melodious Warbler (Hypolais polyglotte), Nightingale (Rossignol philomele), Tree Pipit (Pipit des arbres), Redstart (Rougequeue a front blanc) and single Wryneck (Torcol fourmilier) and Black Woodpecker (Pic noir). This is one of many Red-backed Shrikes (Pie-grieche ecorcheur) we saw during the morning.
This Stonechat (Tarier patre) was banded, but it was impossible to read the ring in bright sunlight.
We were able to get very close to this Woodlark (Alouette lulu) with its beak crammed full of grubs.
While our 530 start time seemed early, by 830am it was hot and bird activity was already petering out! Stephane had a treat in store for us - a nearby quarry held a breeding colony of beautiful Bee-eaters (Guepier d'Europe). Unfortunately by this stage it was swelteringly hot (32C) and heat haze put paid to any hope of a decent photograph. Still, this shot gives you an idea of how outrageously colourful these birds are.
Fly-by Honey Buzzard (Bondree apivore) and Hen Harrier (Busard Saint-Martin) were good day birds, and a purring Turtle Dove (Tourterelle des bois) perched close enough to photograph.
Not long after 11am we decided we couldn't take the heat, so I returned home for gazpacho and a siesta... still, not a bad morning's birding!
Posted by rjhall at June 13, 2006 10:21 PM