Trip to Latvia

As I mentioned in one of my previous posts, I was on my way to Latvia. Well here I am. I was accommodated in a hotel Centra. It is meant to be a four star hotel but... I wouldn't give it 3 :) The welcoming was a bit strange. I had booked it via booking.com and the price was a bit higher than from the hotel website. So although I had booked and payed for the hotel I was asked at the reception for my credit card number. MMMM? Rather strange. I have never been asked something like this. They wanted "a deposit" for the mini bar". This is the first time ever that I have been asked something like this. I asked my colleague who stayed in the same hotel and he hasn't been asked. I came back to the same hotel for the last evening of my stay and I wasn't asked about the card number either. Was it something wrong with the guy at the reception I don't know. Next to him there was a pretty looking young blond girl who was definitely not working in the hotel. She looked like she was waiting for something... Well This whole thing made me to be a bit superstitious so to calm down the atmosphere we agreed that I would just leave some cash for a deposit and that would be it. On the next day everything was fine. I was given it back but it was quite an experience. So have it mind when travelling.

On the next day I met my colleagues and here we are on our way around the bogs, marshes and coastline of Latvia. Beautiful scenes. The plan was to do some birdwatching in the bright part of the day and do the work discussions when it is dark. Since it is now the end of November the day isn't going be quite long. At this time of the year it is usually around  7-8 hours long.

The first place where we went was Kemeru-smardes bog national park which has a lovely logo. I was wondering why it is a woodpecker since the area is mainly a bog but then I realised that in the area you can see all the 9 species of woodpecker species in Latvia.
In spring the area is good for the breeding wood sandpipers, golden plovers, cuckoos, skylarks, tree pipits, yellow wagtails and other birds. Now, it was totally empty. The forest at the entrance of the part had a couple of Great spotted Woodpeckers and Goldcrests but that's about it.

We walked along a recently renovated trail in the bog and went back. This bog is so called 'raised'. On the scheme below you can see what that means. The bog was formed in the preboreal age from a lake that must have existed at that time. The trail was built using well connected pieces of wood which seem to be mobile. Now it was very dry but in spring I would image the bog is rather wet and the water level raises. Thus the trail should not be left under water ;)

the entrance to the national park

a new nicely designed trail in Kemeru-smardes national park leads into the bog

Kemeru-smardes bog national park

A part of the bog which is quite dry at this time of the year and totally short of birds now

After looking around the bog we went to the visitors centre of the national park. It was closed but at least we saw what the building was like. The area is suitable for all the 9 species of woodpeckers you can find in Latvia. For a couple of minutes that we stayed around we saw only the middle spotted but there were singes of lesser spotted and a table suggesting the distribution of all the species.

Visitors centre and administration of the National Park

Here is a lovely map of the area with a few birding locations ready to download as a pdf.

After the national park we headed towards the coast where we expected to find more birds. Before that we stopped in a lovely place for lunch (57.3397, 23.1184).The food was great and owner of the place speaks good english and seems to be a great character with nice sense of humor. We had some pork fillet with mushroom and a meatball soup. After this fairly heavy meal I couldn't move much. It was so heavy that I didn't feel like having dinner at all.

We went to the coast to a place called Mērsrags. Finally some birds. The long expected Long-tailed ducks were nicely sitting nearby. A couple of Red-breasted Mergansers and quite a few Mute Swans and Goldeneye were all that we could tick at this spot.

Well that was about this day. Not much birding but lovely habitats. I quite enjoyed the flat country. There is some character in the setting around. Although it is meant to be a poor country Latvia looks well arranged with nice roads and higher standard than Bulgaria. The houses seem somehow "open" with big windows showing that people have some comfort and nobody seems to be disturbing them. Crime is perhaps not a big problem or at least not in the countryside. Well generally the local currency Lata is stronger than the EURO.

We finished the day in the field station on lake Engure managed by the local biology institute. People here are working mainly on ducks. The lake is known for its rich diversity of birds. A nature protection regime was established in 1957. The lake was included in the Important Bird Area list in 1994, in the Ramsar lists in 1995, and as part of the Natura 2000 network in 2004. A paper from 2012 discusses some of the factors influencing the number of breeding birds on the lake. It is mostly with data collected by the Laboratory of Ornithology, Institute of Biology, in the period 1948–2011. You can download it as a pdf from here or see the abstract only here.

Here everything is with a focus on birds, even the table cover was with bird paintings :)

table cover in the field station of lake Engure

The evening at the field station was fairly cold. We had a rather productive discission about the future if the bird id programme in Latvia, had a few drinks and soon went to bed. In the morning we had a look at a rather romantic floating house which was abandoned many years ago. We got the local stories for scientists that have been working through the early years of their career which revealed more of the identity of this place. About 50+ mute swans and about the same number of Goldeneye were swimming on the lake. At night we had a Bittern calling from the reed beds.

Soon we left to the airport. Our trip had to end. An exciting observation at a gas station revealed over a 100 Waxwings which I was hoping that we will see during the trip here. Beautiful birds!

Well that's about it for now. I will spend the afternoon in the old part of the city centre of Riga and have dinner in extraordinary restaurant where they serve dinner not on plates but on paper....

The dinner was pretty...interesting. We went to a place called "3 Chefs". Rather intriguing place. I have linked the name of the place to Trip Adviser for you to see some of the comments about the place. Generally it wasn't spectacularly delicious. Yes it was the most interesting and different dinner I have ever had. There was some 'welcoming' by drawing an abstract drawing by a variety of sauces on a piece paper right in front of you. The souse was edible so using pieces of bread you can collect it from the paper. I must say it was rather intriguing idea. I think the guy that was doing it was a street painter of graffiti or sprays. Then the main dish was a bit strange. I had duck breast with some vegetables. Well, like a 'smart' restaurant there were 3 pieces of duck breast, two pieces of potatoes and a plums souse which was giving a bit of acid flavour. Not my type of thing really but you might enjoy it :) Still it was a nice experience. The beer and the bread were nice ;) The services was also great.

Here is a checklist of the birds that we saw during the trip:

#	species
1	Mute Swan - Cygnus olor
2	Mallard - Anas platyrhynchos
3	Common Scoter - Melanitta nigra
4	Long-tailed Duck - Clangula hyemalis
5	Common Goldeneye - Bucephala clangula
6	Red-breasted Merganser - Mergus serrator
7	Red-throated Loon - Gavia stellata
8	Great Crested Grebe - Podiceps cristatus
9	Eurasian Bittern - Botaurus stellaris
10	Common Buzzard - Buteo buteo
11	Black-headed Gull - Chroicocephalus ridibundus
12	Mew Gull - Larus canus
13	Great Black-backed Gull - Larus marinus
14	European Herring Gull - Larus argentatus
15	Middle Spotted Woodpecker - Dendrocopos medius
16	Great Spotted Woodpecker - Dendrocopos major
17	Eurasian Magpie - Pica pica
18	Hooded Crow - Corvus cornix
19	Common Raven - Corvus corax
20	Western Jackdaw - Coloeus monedula
21	Bohemian Waxwing - Bombycilla garrulus
22	Willow Tit - Poecile montanus
23	Coal Tit - Periparus ater
24	Crested Tit - Lophophanes cristatus
25	Great Tit - Parus major
26	Goldcrest - Regulus regulus
27	Eurasian Nuthatch - Sitta europaea
28	Fieldfare - Turdus pilaris
29	Eurasian Tree Sparrow - Passer montanus
30	European Greenfinch - Chloris chloris
31	Eurasian Siskin - Spinus spinus
32	Hawfinch - Coccothraustes coccothraustes

Bulgaria publishes its results on the state of common birds for 2012.

A recent bulletin published by the Bulgarian society for the protection of birds announces summarised trends for the trend categories of common birds for the period 2005-2012.

The publication is in Bulgarian only. Feel free to download and distribute:

State of Canada's birds

A superb publication features the state of Canada's birds. You can download it from here:

http://www.stateofcanadasbirds.org/

Unpacking Bird Atlas 2007-11

BTO published a new Atlas of breeding birds in the United Kingdom and Ireland. Unprecedented work!

"...the magnificent new atlas of British and Irish birds is the most riveting bird book produced in Britain for years".

Mike McCarthy, The Independent

Visit to Latvia

New trip is on its way. This time it is outside Bulgaria. I will be visiting Latvia to meet with colleagues who want to start a new training scheme on bird identification based on a methodology developed by the Nord Trondelag University College in Norway (HiNT). The training aims to increase the number of skillful volunteers in the local breeding bird survey.

Two intense days of discussions and ... birdwatching are coming up. We shall be debating about the process of students recruitment, training implementation, sites selection etc. The discussions will be in the area of lake Engure - rich in birds Ramsar listed area where we are going to be based.

Recently I prepared a report that contains the results from a recent training in Bulgaria. The report will be used as a guideline to other countries willing to undertake identical programmes. Building upon the experience we had in Bulgaria our Latvian colleagues will aim to improve their bird monitoring scheme.

This training is a part of initiatives that I conduct as a part of my professional duties. If interested in implementing a training on bird id in your country please do not hesitate to contact me.

Will report on the meeting outcome and the birdwatching results in later posts.

New paper in Nature advices policy makers

A recent paper published in Nature magazine gives useful advice to policy makers on interpreting conclusions of scientists. It is well known that policy makers and scientists don't quite understand each other. This paper published by Bill Sutherland, a prominent professor by Cambridge university, and colleagues, gives some insight to the topic. The authors have given 20 concepts to policy makers and non-scientists about interpretation of scientific conclusions.

The paper is expected to facilitate the dialogue between the mentioned parties.

You can view and download the paper as a pdf from here.

Snow Bunting observation

The past weekend was pretty quiet for most of its part. General domestic things dominated. However on the Sunday afternoon I went out for a walk to a reservoir not far from Sofia. It is called Ognyanovo.

The road to the place was pretty quiet but a nice flock of 60+ Collared Doves, a couple of Buzzards and two Great Grey Shrikes made the trip  pretty nice and relaxing. When I reached the reservoir I scanned the water for some waterfowl. Pretty quiet. About 70+ Coots, some 40 Mallards and a couple of Great Cormorants. A nice Black-throated Diver made the things a bit more interesting. Flocks of Linnets, Yellowhammers and Goldfinches made it look a bit more lively. Then came the highlight. Approaching the bank on the southern site a small passerine bird took off right under my feet. Flashes of white on the upper wings made me shout out straight away: Snow Bunting. The bird flied away for some time and circled overhead rising higher up in the sky like a soaring bird. Once it got some height it flied away to SW of the reservoir.

This Snow Bunting is the first I see in Bulgaria. It was a female bird and although I couldn't quite have a proper look at the bird to enjoy it, these flashes of white are pretty typical and identifying it is of no question whatsoever. Unfortunately I couldn't photograph it.

This observation made the trip really productive. I recorded all the observation and will upload it in the database of the Bulgarian Society for the Protection of Birds / BirdLife Bulgaria.

BBC Natural World 2009 A Highland Haven

Superb video about the lifetime story of a few species from the Scottish Highlands: White-tailed Eagle, Black-throated Diver, Red-deer, Pine Marten and breath-taking landscapes.

Enjoy

The last minutes of the video are about the film. As always these minutes reveal curious information about the film making including how a phone trap was set up :)

Photography weekend

The past weekend wasn't meant to be quite as what it turned out to be :) I meant to just go to my grand parents and do some work there but plans always change. I scheduled something different for the Saturday and spent the day with the family. We did a lovely walk in Vitosha mountain which resulted in a few sunset images. I really missed going into the high mountains so the nearest and the easiest to do was the one next to our place - Vitosha. We started at lunch time and quickly ascended into the mountain tops. It wasn't long before we started walking in the lovely autumn forest enjoying large flocks of Bramblings counting at least 30 birds in a flock. These are the first for this winter that I see. Really pleasant. Also enjoyed some mossy deadwood stumps with little spruce trees starting from it to demonstrate the function of deadwood in a forest. Weather was quite warm understand about 15 degrees C, so we got ourselves a drink and spend couple of minutes on a meadow that was well lit by the Sun. Shortly after that we headed to a mountain top where I wanted to do some sunset shots. The area is quite pictures and presents superb opportunities for landscape photographers. I would image it would be great in pretty much any season. Here is a taste of it:

sunset from Vitosha mountains 

sunset from Vitosha mountains 

Since trekking up to the mountains for the sunsets took some time we had do go to the car in the darkness. It was rather pleasant actually. We enjoyed Sofia by night from the mountain top.

Sofia by night

On the Sunday I went to a large lake to the south of my place where I intended to spend the day in bird  photography and then go to my grandparents. The day at the lake was beautiful. Rather muddy terrain made the joy even grater :) By the time I reached the place for photos I got really muddy up to my knees. The tripod, the jacket, the backpack were all in mud. The shoes were not even visible what make they were. Anyway, I laid down and spent about 8 hours waiting for birds to approach me.

The result is satisfying. Birds didn't quite approach me as much as I wanted, but anyway I managed to get shots of about 10 bird species. The nearest that came was this nice male Teal:

Teal photography

Flamingo photography

Shoveler photography

Grey Heron photography

Avocet photography

Avocet photography

Avocet photography

Also a couple of Common Snipes were often landing in less than a metre so I couldn't get many shots of them. However, there was one which stayed in a good distance but amongst some rocks showing only its head. So the other birds I managed to photograph were a few Mallards, Shoveller, nice male Pintail, Great white egret, Grey heron, Greater Flamingos, Black-headed Gull, and a White Wagtail. A water pipit did land relatively close but it stayed amongst the stones nearby so wasn't good for a shot.

Anyway, it was nice to spend some time in the mud. I remember when I was about to start photographing I was pretty sure I will never do this. This heavy gear and laying in the mud is just not what I wanted. Now after I spent some time wading in the mud and seeing the results, I might be more inclined to do it in the future. See what happens.

NOTE: Please feel free to comment on the images. I am happy to receive feedback. Please be constructive and suggest practices or approaches to change what you don't like.

Waders photography in Bulgaria

Some time after the September session on Waders photography in Bulgaria, I managed to get some time and post process a few images more. Here are the first ones:

Redshank photography

Redshank photography

Little ringed plover 

Hope I will manage to get some more time and post-process a few more images.

Buzzard photography session coming up

This weekend I went to a site near Sofia where Buzzards are attracted with bait. There is a photography hide there and I hope that soon we'll be able to show some shots. As a part of its maintenance, a friend and I went to the spot to prepare it and put out the first pieces of bait so that the birds can start learning it. Also we mowed the meadow and set up a few new perches for the birds. In a couple of days I shall go there again to see what the results are and will put out some more bait. Looking forward to seeing the results.

In the meantime, I also managed to go to a reservoir nearby which has some extensive shallow flooded spots. There were quite a few Common Snipes which might be another idea for more photography opportunities. Birds will be there throughout the winter so even a tent might do.