Black-winged Pratincoles

After-work twitch today to Skrins to see the 2 BWPratincoles, great birds! One of them is clearly a juvenile, with pale fringes along flight feathers and coverts and streaked breast. The other one looks more like an adult.

distant digiscope

Lauwersmeer

Very bad things have happened last week, and I followed the news intensively. I will not comment here as this is a birding blog but only hope that oneday the exact cause of the event will come out. RIP.

The first autumn Caspian Tern has returned to Lauwersmeer and I enjoyed close views while it was fishing next to the boat. There will be more soon.

There have been reports in the local media about a commercial fisher who is decimating the Lauwersmeer fish population. Apparently 100s of fykes have been installed to catch the (endangered) eel, but killing also many other fish.

The yellow buoys mark the protected Natura2000 reserve. The fykes are inside the protected area.

Weltmeister & bouncing Kittiwakes

Should we become a province of Germany if we ever want to be Weltmeister... Maybe not a bad idea, as they have the strongest economy, make the best cars, and own Helgoland! Actually birding on Helgoland in july is fun, as was watching the final in Nordseehalle.

There is great activity at the birdcliffs, and the fledging Kittiwakes are most spectaculair. They do not have the feeling for level flight yet and their constant adjustments in the strong upwards winds results in a very funny bouncing flight. It must be the same feeling I experienced with my first hexacopter-flights:-)

 

Some of the Gannets have been equiped with GPS-dataloggers, a further implementation of NSA-technology in Germany.