This Grey-faced Buzzard (Butastur indicus) flew through our yard here on Siargao yesterday and perched on this coconut frond. Unfortunately, it was mostly obscured by a large mango tree and it was difficult to get an open view. But thought I’d share a few photos since this medium-sized migratory hawk is not a common sight […]
These are photos I took in 2017 of seventy-five different species of birds on Siargao island in the Philippines. Regular readers of this site will have seen many of these pictures before but thought I’d do a year-end ’round-up’. You can hover over each picture to see the English and scientific name of each bird […]
On the morning of December 26th, Boxing Day, we decided to take a walk and work off some of the heavy holiday meals. We headed out for the village of Buhing Kalipay (also known as Borawin) here on Siargao island and for once it was a nice sunny blue sky day (it’s been pretty wet […]
With typhoon Lan (local name Paolo) passing by Siargao to the east and school canceled for the day, it seemed like a good time to go birding with The Teen and look around for vagrant or accidental birds blown inland by the offshore weather.
The Chinese Sparrowhawk (Accipiter soloensis) is a migratory winter visitor to the Philippines and other parts of Southeast Asia. While it breeds in China, the Korean peninsula, and Siberia this accipiter can be found around the Philippine archipelago from August to May. This one has been hanging around our Siargao yard hunting frogs all week!
The turnstone breeds in the high arctic and subarctic tundra but (understandably) heads south for the winter. We see it arriving on Siargao starting in September of each year.
My nephew Miljune came to hang out today; he really likes birds and lizards and stuff so we get along famously. Not long after he arrived we heard some noisy rustling of dried palm fronds behind the house. Not sure if it was a large bird or perhaps a sailfin lizard we rushed outside to check […]
Updates have been a little slow of late after I took a spill down a mountainside just after photographing that Handsome Sunbird nest. Being temporarily restricted to sedentary observation of our backyard birds, I thought I’d showcase those seen most commonly around our house these days. Looks like there’s some pelagic birding in store for […]
This Handsome Sunbird (yes, that’s really its name!) nest was spotted while climbing up a steep slope on the back of our property here on Siargao island early this morning. I found a spot nearby to sit, wait and watch for the sunbirds to return.
The Black-faced Coucal (Centropus melanops) is often heard around our backyard but until today it’s been a challenge to photograph. I was happy to get a few shots of this Philippine endemic cuckoo as it moved around the trees next to the river this morning.