News · 26. April 2016

April seems to have gone mad. A week ago we had temperatures of about 20 °C with blue skies and no rain at all, now we have 8 °C and an unpredictable mixture of sun, wind and snow showers. However, bird migration keeps still going on, almost as if it wouldn't even have noticed it. Sadly, my free time is now rather limited and I won't have many chances to go outside in the next two weeks, so this might be the last post for some time. We'll see. Originally, I didn't want to go birding this week...

News · 21. April 2016

What did I say about rarities not coming to Bamberg? Just two hours after I pressed the "Publish"-button I received a message that on a quarry pond nearby three Caspian Terns and two Avocets were seen. Both are at most very scarce migrants in the inland and neither of them was ever recorded in the district of Bamberg to my knowledge. Unfortunately, it was already dark outside when I got the e-mail and so I had to wait until the next day. As life goes it was already 2 pm when I finally could pay...

News · 18. April 2016

Here we are again. Every day now thousands of migrants come through and also the number of rarities increases from time to time. Well, perhaps not here in Bamberg but especially at the Altmühlsee some remarkable birds were spotted like two Black-necked Stilts and a Sandwich Tern. The last days have however been quite uneventful around Bamberg, mostly because I'm rather busy at the moment. Nevertheless, I spent an evening in the Luisenhain to find the potential Collared Flycatcher again, but...

News · 14. April 2016

Two days ago I got a new camera, more precisely a Nikon Coolpix P900 with 83x optical zoom (equivalent 2000 mm). This is quite much compared to my current telephoto lens (Tamron 150 - 600 mm) and also to the magnification of my scope. However, I had to wait until today morning for testing it under real-life conditions and not only through the window. When I arrived at 7am at the car park of the Luisenhain the sun was already shining brightly and a chorus of dozens of songbirds sounded through...

News · 12. April 2016

After an almost endless time without birding it was a real pleasure to spend two hours at the Hochreinsee today. This birding abstinence had the mere effect that a great range of migrants have yet been missing on my year list. Time to change that! Fortunately also the weather was just perfect on afternoon with a lot sunshine and almost no wind. So I could really enjoy to observe and photograph the birdlife there. In fact, I scored three year ticks, the first was a male Cuckoo, followed by a...

News · 09. April 2016

Over the last days a never seen influx of Alpine Accentors has been witnessed almost everywhere in Germany, which were sometimes accompanied by the even rarer White-winged Snowfinches. The first of these alpine passerines have already reached the coast, but at the moment chances are best at the highest low mountain ranges (Schwarzwald, Fichtelgebirge, Rhön, etc.). Unfortunately, I'm very busy at the moment and won´t have a chance to visit some of the potential resting sites. In Franconia...

News · 05. April 2016

It have only been five days since my trip into the Fichtelgebirge, but a lot has changed in the meanwhile. Now all common short-distance migrants have reached Bamberg and almost everywhere Blackcaps, Chiffchaffs, Serins and Black Redstarts can be heard singing. Unfortunately, my birding activities are currently restricted to my daily bicycle ride between Bischberg and Bamberg, where I only get aware of a small glimpse of bird migration. Nevertheless, in the last couple of days I encountered...