Went on a 7 day trip to Bavaria last week and although the biggest higlights were all captive, I also saw some very nice wild animals as well! Quite some lifers including a bunch of species not found or way harder to see where I live and other species which I have not had luck with even though they are common where I live (Tufted duck, Common buzzard etc...).
That coupled with a surprising mammal lifer (seeing how they are common everywhere) made for a pleasant trip when it comes to animal sightings, both in the wild and in captivity.
22/11/2019 (Marienplatz, Münich)
BIRDS:
159 - Carrion crow, Corvus corone
23/11/2019
MAMMALS:
(München Hauptbahnhof, Münich)
8 - House mouse, Mus musculus
(Tiergarten Nürnberg, Nürnberg)
9 - Red squirrel, Sciurus vulgaris
BIRDS:
(Somewhere between Münich and Nürnberg)
160 - Canada goose, Branta canadensis
161 - Mute swan, Cygnus olor
(Tiergarten Nürnberg, Nürnberg)
162 - Eurasian jay, Garrulus glandarius
163 - Eurasian green woodpecker, Picus viridis
24/11/2019 (Englischer Garten, Münich)
BIRDS:
164 - Greylag goose, Anser anser
165 - Mandarin duck, Aix galericulata
25/11/2019 (Isar River & Tierpark Hellabrunn, Münich)
BIRDS:
166 - Tufted duck, Aythya fuligula
167 - Eurasian wren, Troglodytes troglodytes
26/11/2019 (Road to Neuchschwanstein)
BIRDS:
168 - Common buzzard, Buteo buteo
28/11/2019 (Zoo Augsburg, Augsburg)
BIRDS:
169 - Common kingfisher, Alcedo atthis
So 2019 ends up with the same last bird as 2018 but 40 places ahead!
All-in-all, this year was an amazing year birding-wise: I've reached my year goal of 150 bird species seen and I also nearly reached the new tally that I had set as a goal afterwards which was 170 bird species. Non-bird wise I've got some amazing species and lifers like Cuvier's gazelle, Striped ground squirrel, Lang's short-tailed blue or even Guadarrama wall lizard.
I saw 169 bird species this year of which 54 were lifers (~32%).
Some of them include common or very common species that I simply have had no luck with or didn't pay attention to in 2018 such as Red-rumped swallow, Goldfinch, Short-toed snake-eagle, Barbary partridge, Little ringed plover, Black kite, Common buzzard, Tufted duck and many more.
Others were much rarer species that I looked forward to see and had immense luck with such as Eleonora's falcon, Bonelli's eagle, Iberian azure-winged magpie, Red-knobbed coot, Yelkouan shearwater and a few others. Truly some of the higlights of an incredible birding year.
Twitching wise, I got really unlucky as I have dipped all the species I've attempted to twitch except one (Western reef-heron) which may end up not being valid as it could be a hybrid. I hope I get more chances at twitching awesome birds as soon as tomorrow and look forward to maybe finally twitch a countable bird
Other misses including missing, once again, those darn Marbled teals (which just seem to be a fake species at this point) that everyone sees but me although I've been in prime habitat for them. Species I've seen last year like Cream-coloured courser and Black terns are also missing but are understandable because they are uncommon while other much more common species I've seen last year but not this year such as Alpine swift, Grey wagtail, Bar-tailed godwit are much more hard to explain.
The highlights of the year, trip-wise, were definitely:
- My first visit of the year to Tamri that got me my first wryneck which turns out to be my first woodpecker (more about that below)
- Getting three lifers during and the days before and after my birthday
- My only visit to Massa of the year which yielded some lifers I had been sorrowfully missing
- My first cuckoo!
- My first true birding-focused trip out of the Souss-Massa region, getting some awesome species at Oualidia and Casablanca
- And finally, some very nice pick-ups at the three countries I've visited outside of Morocco: Spain, Turkey and Germany.
And to conclude up this awfully long post, my usual fun stat of the year: last year, terns were the subject of it as I had 6 tern species marked on my lifelist at the end of the year while I had none at the beginning. This time, it's about woodpeckers, since I had not seen any woodpecker before 2019 and I'm now at 4 species: Wryneck, Great-spotted woodpecker, Iberian green woodpecker and Eurasian green woodpecker.
