Sound track advice: Stormy weather - Billie Holiday I’ve always considered myself a birder with a camera, rather than a bird photographer. What I do is functional, not aesthetic. I’m not particularly gifted in this department, nor am I interested in learning all about camera settings. But once in a while even an amateur like me makes a decent picture: for the first time one of my shots made it to the cover of a magazine Figure 1. Cover of Dutch Birding 41:5 with my European S

​​When the ladies from bird hospital De Wulp sent me the shots of the Grey-cheeked Thrush taken into care last year, it really knocked me off my feet for a few seconds. But when Rinse and I received this video mid-July we were equally shocked: (video by Sharon Lexmond / vogelopvang De Wulp) Black Woodpeckers colonised the country around 1915 and reached the western part of the Netherlands half a century ago (my father actually saw one of the first ones on my local patch in Me

In many respects autumn was remarkably slow. But November turned everything upside down! Like in spring (with an Alpine Swift), the girls from De Wulp delivered the highlight of the season (year!). On 5 November Lizzy sent me a WhatsApp message. She asked if I knew which species was just taken into care. Despite the pics showed a wet and scruffy bird, my pulse raised and I missed a heartbeat or two. Even I was left speechless for a bit. This was an American Catharus thrush! A

Every time I get to see one of those blackish, passerine sized seabirds during gale force winds, my heart misses a beat or two. I just can't grasp how such a small bird conquers the elements with such ease. But for a Dutch guy it's rather unusual to have a truly decent look at a Leach's Storm Petrel. Basically we only see them in the unfavourable conditions of a heavy autumn storm, when they pass by at quite a distance, in the mean time disappearing behind the waves half of t

There are probably not too many primary moult scores for Great Skuas from Holland. But I've got one now! Since we usually only see them on migration, at a fair distance, and immatures are in the majority, it was quite a privilege to study an adult at close range (upper pic: Sharon Lexmond/ De Wulp). This bird was taken into care at bird hospital De Wulp in September. Just note how bleached and worn it was! The 'pied' plumage easily gives it away as an adult. It was skin and b

On 14 July I stumbled upon a calling Iberian Chiffchaff (ca 45th record) in my hometown The Hague. Since calling birds are probably overlooked in The Netherlands, I wrote a short note on their calls. Upper and lower pic by Gerjon Gelling Quite amazing that I was lucky enough to find two of these birds within 3 months! Ageing this bird turned out to be straightforward. In July juveniles are very fresh, while adults are completely worn and usually in their post-breeding moult

On 21 June Gijsbert Twigt and I trapped a Spotted Redshank in Meijendel, Wassenaar - the first one ever to be ringed at the site, where ringing started back in 1927. This bird is obviously in sum plum and given the time of year, it's never gonna be a juvenile of course. Note the fairly fresh primaries. 2nd calendar year (cy) birds have very worn primaries, so this bird must be older. It has of course a lot of white fringes on the underparts, but an interesting feature to sex