Dance off, Egret style

Monarch of all it surveys

One from the summer

Squatters! A gulp of cormorants in a heronry

Gull perched on a post

Black-necked cranes

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I had the opportunity to visit the Black-Necked Crane Information Centre while I was touring Bhutan. While there I realised that I have had the opportunity to see these birds at both ends of their migration route - from Tibet in the summer, over the Himalayas (at very great altitude), to Bhutan in the winter.

In the first pictures they are in Tibet feeding up in late summer in preparation for their migration southwards. Those in the snow are late leavers from Tibet, with winter just around the corner.

The last pictures show the only crane in Bhutan while I was there. All the other birds would have been in Tibet for the summer.

The bird in Bhutan is a rather sad story. It was injured by a feral dog, and has had to be retained in an enclosure, while it heals. The bird has been in its enclose for nearly two years. My guess was that it has healed, but is unlikely ever to be able to fly (you can see that the injury to its left wing is extensive, and seems to have set badly), and so will not be released to the wild.

These cranes are sociable animals and use the crane dance for mating, but also for all sorts of social interactions in groups of up to a dozen. While, like most wild birds, they can be frightened by humans near by, there is some evidence that they recognise men in the Bhutanese national costume, and are less scared by such individuals. This individual bird seems to have adapted somewhat to its living conditions, and will tolerate humans at fairly close quarters. It also, on occasion, does the crane dance when there are people there. I was very fortunate, that it did the dance for me.

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A Tale of Two Teasels

Keeping squirrels away

Teneral damselfly

Soaring

We just want to be alone

Welcome to the world of flight

My first dragonfly of the year.

Kestrel aloft

Incoming!

Big white bird

I was going to post pictures of a great whit egret, which is another bird that has proved elusive. It continues to elude me, as my pictures are not good enough to share. So instead here is another big white bird, a swan in flight.
 

Mallards

Shhh......

Off to sunnier climes

Sandpiper set

Today, I saw and photographed a green sandpiper. This completed my set of common, non-coastal, British, sand pipers - common, green and wood. Like the other photos I have taken of these birds, the actual bird is tiny within the picture. The pictures below of the green and common sandpiper do show their size. Those of the wood sandpiper are so small I can't make any decent picture from them. They are good only for identification purposes (with a magnifier). So I have a full set of birds but not pictures. Pictures will have to wait until I next see a wood sandpiper.

Green sandpiper

Common sandpiper playing with the big boys

The wood sandpiper's understudy has had to step in. This bird at Marston Vale, is disadvantaged by the lack of colour. The bird was near, but not with, the large flock of other cormorants.

Leucistic cormorant

Bad neighbours