Category: birds

Readers’ wildlife photos

July 26, 2026 • 8:45 am

We are in dire need of wildlife photos, so if you have some good ones, please send them in.

Today we have the sixth and last installment of Ephraim Heller’s photos from his recent trip to Namibia. His captions and IDs are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.

This is the last installment in my series on a May-June 2026 visit to Namibia. Today’s photos were taken inland, at the Ongava/Etosha region (where I photographed rhinos for last week’s installment) and at Nkasa Rupara National Park in the Caprivi Strip.

Most of the animals in this post are well known to readers, but the history of the Caprivi Strip is worth a digression on 19th century colonial competition in Africa. Here is a map (courtesy of WorldAtlas) of present-day Namibia. The Caprivi Strip is the odd extension in the northeast corner of the country that juts out to contact Angola, Botswana, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. It is 30 km wide and 450 km long:

Germany had established the colony of German South West Africa (modern Namibia) in 1884. Germany also had the colony of German East Africa (Tanganyika, the mainland portion of modern-day Tanzania). German Chancellor Leo von Caprivi wanted to establish a trade corridor between the two German colonies on the west and east coasts of Africa, but there was one problem: the British held colonies in between. He came up with the idea that if he could extend German South West Africa’s eastern border to the Zambezi River, there would be a navigable waterway linking the two German colonies.

This ambition led to negotiations with Britain and to the signing of the Heligoland–Zanzibar Treaty in 1890. Britain transferred the Caprivi strip and ceded the North Sea island of Heligoland to Germany. In return, Germany recognized British authority over the Zanzibar islands (now also part of Tanzania) off of Tanganyika.

All of Chancellor Caprivi’s scheming came to naught, however, because the Germans were not aware of a small obstacle to navigation in the Zambezi River known today as Victoria Falls, one of the largest waterfalls in the world (photo courtesy of Wikipedia Commons):

The cunning British, on the other hand, were well aware of the existence of Victoria Falls (David Livingstone having named them in 1855). Perfidious Albion, indeed.  As usual during the Scramble for Africa, the indigenous people were not a consideration in this deal.

Now, on to the animals. I’ll skip descriptions as most species will be familiar to readers:

Wahlberg’s striped skink (Trachylepis wahlbergii) peeking out of the skull of an African buffalo (Syncerus caffer):

Lion (Panthera leo) at sunset:

Black-backed jackals (Lupulella mesomelas) playing at dawn:

Angolan giraffe (Giraffa giraffa angolensis) coming to drink at the Linyanti River:

Shikra (Tachyspiza badia):

Nile monitor (Varanus niloticus):

Rock hyraxes (Procavia capensis):

More from the sunset photo series. A Burchell’s zebra (Equus quagga burchellii):

Red Lechwe (Kobus leche):

Vultures (species unknown):

Readers’ wildlife video

July 24, 2026 • 8:15 am

We have another short video from Tara Tanaka in Florida, whose property is a wetlands and also a wildlife sanctuary. Tara’s notes are indented below:

There is a large church property directly across the truck route from our wildlife sanctuary, and a developer is about to meet with the county to discuss building a 108-single family subdivision on part of the property. According to the neighbor who is working to inform those affected by the proposed development: “Any development of that size would have devastating impacts on the character of our surrounding neighborhoods. The traffic impacts would further clog our roads, making traffic even worse than it already is. The light pollution coming from a site with 108 new homes would disrupt our tranquil way of life. Water runoff from the site will only worsen the flooding we see after rain events, especially to our neighbors in Riverwood Acres. And no one really knows of the impacts a new development would have on the wildlife we currently enjoy year-round.”

Some in the neighborhood are meeting with a reporter from a local TV station to make people aware of what is happening, and I was asked to provide video footage of some of the wildlife that nest, spend time in, and pass through the sanctuary, and I wanted to share it here as well.

How many species can you identify?

Readers’ wildlife photos

July 12, 2026 • 8:15 am

We’re running out of wildlife contributions—I suppose we always are, but this is the last batch on hand. You know what to do if you have good photos.

Today we continue with Ephraim Heller’s photos from a recent trip to Namibia.  Ephraim’s captions are indented, and you can enlarge his photos by clicking on them:

Today I continue my series on a May-June 2026 visit to Namibia. I’m organizing the posts by habitat, in the order of our visits, so that you get a sense of the ecosystems. Today’s post features the Skeleton Coast, yet another coastal desert region.

Stretching 500 km along the Atlantic, the Skeleton Coast is where the cold, nutrient-rich waters of the Benguela Current collide with the Namib Desert, producing dense coastal fogs most mornings. The indigenous San once called the region “the Land God Made in Anger.” Portuguese mariners knew it as the Gates of Hell.

The name “Skeleton Coast” has a dual origin. It first referred to the vast quantities of whale and seal bones that once littered the beaches, remnants of the 19th- and early-20th-century whaling industry. Over time the moniker also came to encompass the skeletal remains of the ships wrecked along one of the most dangerous coastlines in the world. There are about 300 recorded shipwrecks, with a total of >1,000 estimated over centuries. Persistent, dense fog reduces visibility to near zero for days at a time. Strong, unpredictable currents and heavy surf pound the beaches. Offshore rocks and poorly charted shoals lie just beneath the surface. Before modern navigation systems, the featureless desert coastline offered almost no landmarks, and any shipwrecked sailor who managed to reach shore faced a waterless, nearly lifeless desert.

One of the most dramatic wrecks occurred in late November 1942 and the story was told in the book “Skeleton Coast” (John Marsh, 1944). The British refrigerated cargo ship MV Dunedin Star, carrying passengers, crew, and war supplies, struck a submerged obstacle. The master beached the vessel about 550 yards offshore. A motor lifeboat managed to ferry 63 of the 106 passengers and crew to the desolate beach before it was disabled by the heavy surf, leaving the remaining 43 people stranded on the breaking-up ship and those ashore with almost no supplies. What followed was a >2 month rescue operation that itself was plagued by bad luck and the difficult conditions of the Skeleton Coast. Here’s a photo of the Dunedin Star (courtesy of bluestarline.org):

Within hours of the distress signal reaching Walvis Bay, the South African tug Sir Charles Elliot and the minesweeper HMSAS Nerine set out, soon joined by the cargo ships Temeraire and Manchester Division. A land convoy of trucks departed from Windhoek and crossed the roadless desert to reach the survivors on the beach.

South African Air Force Lockheed Ventura aircraft flew supply drops, many of which were swept away by the wind and currents. One aircraft landed on what appeared to be firm ground only to sink into a salt pan, becoming stranded. Several weeks later, a recovery party returned for the plane. After on-site repairs and several days of digging the plane free, they managed to get it airborne again on January 29, 1943. The aircraft flew for about 43 minutes before one of the engines failed and it crashed into the sea. The crew survived the ditching, swam ashore, and were rescued by the returning land convoy a couple of days later.

While all of the Dunedin Star passengers and crew survived and returned to port by late December, 1942, some of the rescuers did not return until early February, 1943. However, the tug Sir Charles Elliot grounded near Rocky Point while returning, with two crew members losing their lives.

Enough with the history lesson. Now for the animals:

Cape fur seals (Arctocephalus pusillus pusillus) are the most conspicuous animals on the coast, with breeding colonies reaching more than 100,000–200,000 individuals during the November–December peak. The colony that I saw numbered about 1,000:

Males establish and vigorously defend harems of up to ~50 females, fasting for weeks while defending territory:

We saw (and smelled) many pup carcasses. High pup mortality from stampeding, predation, and starvation is the norm. The carcasses are the primary food for scavenging jackals and hyenas:

Black-backed jackals (Lupulella mesomelas) are one of the most basal extant wolf-like canids, with a fossil record extending back 2-3 million years and relatively little morphological change since the Pleistocene. On the Skeleton Coast their diet is opportunistic: they take seal pups and afterbirth, scavenge carcasses, and hunt birds and small mammals. Their kidneys are adapted to water scarcity, allowing them to thrive where freestanding water is absent:

Brown hyenas (Parahyaena brunnea) are the rarest of the living hyenas (global population 4,000–10,000) and is listed as Near Threatened. Sightings are rare, as they are shy and nocturnal. I was very lucky:

Along the Skeleton Coast they are beachcombers, ranging long distances at night to feed on seal carcasses, abandoned pups, and whatever jackals or other predators leave behind. Their jaws and dentition crack bones that many other carnivores cannot process. They live in small, stable clans (typically 4–6 related individuals) but forage largely alone. All clan members help provision cubs at communal dens:

Just inland from the beach begin the sand dunes. In this apparently sterile environment, I found a tractrac chat (Emarginata tractrac):

I normally don’t post lodge photos, but the lodge at which I stayed was remarkable both for its architecture and isolation. At over 120 km to the nearest village and over 400 km to the nearest paved road, I believe that it may be the most remote place I have slept. The buildings have a nautical motif:

Readers’ wildlife photos

July 11, 2026 • 8:15 am

Please send in good wildlife photos if you got ’em. The bad news is that I’ve run out of contributions. The good news is that Scott Ritchie of Cairns, Oz, gave me permission to steal photos from his Facebook page, and he’s a superb photographer.  This one shows a visit to an area that has black swans. Scott’s captions and IDs are indented, and you can enlarge his photos by clicking on them.

I went to Melbourne during the middle of January to visit friends. Of course, birds are my feathered friends. This report cover a visit to the WTP, Western Treatment Plant, at Werribee, Victoria. These names pass mythically from the lips of Australian birders. I’ve been there before and really enjoyed it, but this past trip was wild. WTP is a series of quite large, secondary sewage treatment ponds, and lagoons. These abut along the great Southern Ocean and you get this wonderful interaction of freshwater and saltwater wetlands and associated birds. These are used, particularly in our summer, as overwintering sites for migratory shorebirds. But there’s a lot of resident waterfowl and waders there too. The WTP is so valued that you have to have a key to the gate for access to the site. Fortunately, my friend David was a key-carrying twitcher.

The weather was crazy, with 45 KPH winds. One of the first things I discovered was that strong winds can really mess with a telephone lens. My lens was being buffeted by the gusty, easterly winds to the point where I had to remove the lens hood to stabilise the camera. But a few interesting things happen because of the wind. It was a great opportunity for BIF shots; birds in flight. Birds generally take-off and land into the wind, and because it was so strong, they were moving quite slowly. So I got nice shots of normally very fast birds such as terns and sandpipers as they came into land. Attached are some fun pics.

The next day I did a short walk through Banyule Flats Reserve, an urban Melbourne wetland. The highlight was to see the oh so cute Owlet Nightjar, as well as a family of Tawny Frogmouths. Shout out to Lyn Easton for leading the tour

A Black Swan (Cygnus atratus) Beach. The high winds packed the east facing beach with seagrass. And the Black Swans made for the buffet:

A beach of Blacks Swans, necks writhing like snakes.

Amazing!:

“Ahh, now that feels good.” An Australian Spotted Crake (Porzana fluminea) enjoys the breeze up its bum:

“Bugger off!” But is not happy with the hordes of shore flies:

An immature Black-shouldered Kite (Elanus axillaris) gives us the eye:

Whiskered Terns (Chlidonias hybrida) cruised flew slowly against the wind, providing good views for the camera:

. . . and another:

A Black Kite (Milvus migrans) swings down to pick up a dead little bird that was hit by a car:

A large flock of Australian shelducks (Tadorna tadornoides) fly into the WTP. It was great to see large numbers of waterfowl darken the skies:

I had fun shooting, small short birds they say, came into land against the wind at adjacent pool. This is a Red-necked Stint (Calidris ruficollis):

And here comes a Sharp-tailed Sandpiper (Calidris acuminata):

A family of Tawny Frogmouths (Podargus strigoides) greet the day at Banyule Flats Reserve:

But he poses stoically, “You can’t see me!”  Frogmouths sit still, imitating dead branches and stumps:

A bit of a loose feather gives him away:

An Owlet Nightjar (Aegotheles sp.) peeks out of his hole hollow. He stared at all the photographers down below. We must’ve started him because then he just disappeared. But we waited and waited:

“Come on, take your pictures!” He suddenly popped up, posing nicely:

Readers’ wildlife photos

July 8, 2026 • 8:15 am

Ecologist Susan Harrison is back with some bird photos from California featuring rookeries (there are some lovely shots of chicks and juveniles).  Susan’s notes and IDs are indented, and you can enlarge her photos by clicking on them.

Rookery Scenes

Recently I visited two local rookeries where colonies of large wading birds breed in early- to midsummer.   It was fun to watch the nest building, egg tending, and varied interactions among adults and young birds of mixed ages.   In some cases (like the Cattle Egrets), it appeared that young birds were competing with each other to be at the head of the feeding line.

Western Cattle Egrets (Ardea ibis), Black-crowned Night Herons (Nycticorax nycticorax), and Snowy Egrets (Egretta thula) were breeding at Sacramento’s North Natomas Regional Park.

White-faced Ibis (Plegadis chihi) were rearing their young at the Woodland-Davis water treatment ponds, which in spite of their unprepossessing title, are our county’s top eBird hotspot and the subject of much ecological enhancement for migratory birds and other wildlife.

Cattle Egrets:

White-faced Ibis:

Black-crowned Night Herons:

Snowy Egrets:

Readers’ wildlife photos

July 3, 2026 • 8:15 am

Today’s batch of photos comes from Kevin Krebs, who’s been busy banding birds in south-central British Columbia. Kevin’s captions and IDs are indented, and, as always, you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.

Since 2018, the Vancouver Avian Research Centre (VARC) has been involved in Bluebird Box Monitoring around the city of Merritt in south-central British Columbia.

Like almost all birds, bluebird numbers have been declining, and we’ve recruited many volunteers to maintain and monitor over 400 nest boxes.

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to join some compatriots checking nest boxes and banding bluebird nestlings.

Mountain Bluebird (Sialia currucoides)

Mountain Bluebirds (Sialia currucoides) are found throughout Western and Central North America. The males are a brilliant cerulean blue that is almost impossible to capture in a photograph. Imagine a small piece of the most vibrant blue sky you’ve ever seen growing wings and flying free.

They’re medium-distance migrants, with some breeding into Alaska, and wintering down into Northern Mexico. They are cavity nesters and rely heavily on old woodpecker holes, often facing significant competition. North American Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) data from 1970–2014 shows an estimated overall population decline of 21%. Recent research suggests a more complex picture, with some populations declining, some stable, and some increasing.

Next box and Mountain Bluebird eggs

On the left, an example of our nest boxes. Most are located on fenceposts, while a handful are placed on trees and stumps.

On the right, an active Mountain Bluebird nest with four eggs. Their nests are made of dried grasses beautifully woven into a cup, with a few feathers often mixed in. Their eggs are pale blue and slightly glossy.

Tree Swallow (Tachycineta bicolor) eggs and young nestlings

In addition to Mountain Bluebirds (and rarely Western Bluebirds (Sialia mexicana)), these nest boxes are frequently used by Tree Swallows (Tachycineta bicolor).

Somewhat similar to bluebird nests, Tree Swallow nests feature significantly more feathers in their construction. On the left is a nest with eight eggs — matte white and much smaller than the bluebird eggs (my fingers give a sense of scale).

On the right: a nest with six very young Tree Swallow nestlings.

Tree Swallow nestlings

Another Tree Swallow nest with at least six older nestlings. Their eyes have yet to open, so they’re probably only a few days older than those pictured above. The comically large and bright mouths are selected to draw as much attention from their parents as possible, ensuring they get fed.

Adult Tree Swallow

An adult male Tree Swallow (Tachycineta bicolor) who started out as one of those little eggs.

Northern House Wren (Troglodytes aedon)

Another bird that occasionally uses these nest boxes is the Northern House Wren (Troglodytes aedon). There’s no mistaking their nests as they have a profoundly different style of nest-building, packing nearly the entire box with dozens of twigs.

On the right, a peek into the nest revealing the feather-lined cup with seven mottled eggs.

Mountain Bluebird nestlings

This is what we were looking for: Mountain Bluebird nestlings. These birds are 9-10 days old, making them old enough to band. We can’t band them when they’re much younger as they store fat in their legs, making them too large for the metal bands we use.

Banded Mountain Bluebird nestlings

Two Mountain Bluebird nestlings in the hand.

Before anyone panics: yes, I am trained to do this and am operating under a permit! I don’t think I need to tell any of you not to try this yourself.

The bird on the left is around 12 days old, while the one on the right is approximately 15 days old — probably within a few days of leaving the nest.

Note that we use federally numbered bands, anodized with a different colour for each year. This allows us to identify adult birds to the year they were banded, even if we can’t get the band number.

Banding in progress

A photo of me in the process of banding some nestlings. The bags on my lap contain birds to be banded and that have been banded. Once they’re all completed, we carefully and quietly place them back in the nest box.

Not pictured is when I sat directly on top of an ant nest while getting ready to band…

Readers’ wildlife photos

July 2, 2026 • 8:30 am

Send in your photos if you got ’em, please!

Today’s photos continue the series taken by reader Ephraim Heller in Namibia. His captions and IDs are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.

Today I continue my series on a May-June 2026 visit to Namibia. I’m organizing the posts by habitat, in the order of our visits, so that you get a sense of the ecosystems. Today’s post features Damaraland, a 48,000 km² region in the northwest of the country.

Damaraland is not a formal administrative region, but a geographic and cultural designation. It is a jumble of granite kopjes, basalt plateaus, flat-topped mountains, broad gravel plains, and eroded canyon systems. Like much of Namibia, it is desert. Here is an aerial view, taken from the window of a small airplane:

Life is sparse here. A handful of ephemeral rivers cross Damaraland, cutting westward from the interior highlands to the Skeleton Coast along the Atlantic Ocean. These rivers flow above ground for only a few days per year following significant inland rainfall, but each bed sits atop an alluvial aquifer that retains water from flood events for months to years. This subsurface water sustains a few trees, shrubs, and animals along the riverbeds. Here’s another aerial view showing the path of an ephemeral river:

By far the coolest critter I found was the longleg armoured corncricket (Acanthoplus longipes), which has superpowers. It is a large, flightless katydid brandishing big, spiny legs and a heavily armored (American spelling) pronotum. When attacked, individuals autohaemorrhage, shooting a jet of toxic hemolymph from the leg joints toward attackers. I wish I had a superpower like that:

Naturally, any creature with such a magnificent superpower fluoresces under UV light:

Frankly, the rest of this post is anticlimactic. What could possibly beat a longleg armoured corncricket? Not a pretty brush jewel beetle (Julodis humeralis):

A Namib rock agama (Agama planiceps) doesn’t beat a longleg armoured corncricket, not even when it is chowing down on a bug:

One night I went on a walk to see what would fluoresce under my UV light. I found this gecko. Sure, fluorescence is cool and I wish I could do it, but does this gecko autohaemorrhage? No, it does not. The folks at iNaturalist couldn’t identify it – apparently one needs the visible spectrum to make a positive ID:

This is tentatively identified as an orange lesser-thicktail scorpion (Uroplectes planimanus), another critter with the minor UV-fluorescence superpower. Interestingly, researchers do not know why scorpions evolved fluorescence.

Now for the birds. Sadly, they have no superpowers at all. Our lodge had a water feature that was the only surface water for miles around. I spent hours watching the birds bathe and drink.

A violet-backed starling (Cinnyricinclus leucogaster). The color is produced not by pigment but by thin-film interference: stacks of hollow melanosomes in the feather barbules refract light at specific wavelengths. The male can modulate its apparent coloration through posture:

A black-fronted bulbul (Pycnonotus nigricans):

A Namaqua dove (Oena capensis):

A red-headed finch (Amadina erythrocephala):

The southern masked weaver (Ploceus velatus). Egg color varies among females, allegedly as a defense against brood parasitism by the Diederik cuckoo. Because the cuckoo cannot know egg color before entering the nest, color polymorphism in the weaver population raises the probability of parasite detection and egg ejection. Not a superpower, but cool nonetheless. I just like the bokeh in this photo:

Finally, the requisite Namibian desert night sky photos: