A good morning's birding today produce several swifts at the Bandiat along with swallows, house and sand martins. A beautiful male red backed shrike was hunting from a hedge there as was a hobby and a female sparrowhawk from above. A second hobby was hunting very low over the field which contained three stone curlews on the Lairiere Plains and nearby a few wheatears were present.
The Braconne gave Richard and I good views of bonelli's warbler and marsh tit and a frustratingly brief one of a black woodpecker flying through the trees.
Hi I am coming over from the Highlands of scotland to the Haute Charent (Montbron area) in July for a couple of weeks. I am keen to do a couple of days birding and wondered if you can recommend anywhere in particular. Was there last year and saw black redstart, cirl bunting, golden oriole and hoopoe so not too bad considering I was not really looking.
ReplyDeleteHello
ReplyDeleteJuly, as I'm sure you know, is not the optimum time for birding (south of the highlands) as most birds have become rather quiet after all the fuss of establishing territories and acquiring mates---and it's usually very hot here.
That said, there will still be plenty to find particularly in early morning. The 4 species you mention will still be about but species like nightingale may be more difficult to locate as they have largely stopped singing.
As for where to visit, I am not very familiar with the details of the Montbron area but it lies on the boundary between largely arable western France and the beginnings of of more wooded and higher pasture land. If you come a little further west, therefore, towards the N10 you will more likely locate hen and montague's harriers in the large open fields and you will probably hear quails there. Melodious warbler can be located anywhere and species such as bonelli's warbler are to be found in any woodland. Orioles can again be found where there are trees and they particularly like poplars so are often near water. Big forests like The Braconne which is north of Angouleme are worth a visit but there are no specific birding hotspots in these parts and almost everywhere is under-watched so who knows what can be turned up as species such as wryneck and red backed and woodchat shrikes can turn up anywhere including the garden. Earlier posts on this blog might be of some use. Let me know how you get on.
Thanks for that. Your advice will be useful I am sure and yes I know things are not great in the height of summer, but worth a look anyway, it is the only time I can get over there. Thuings are very late up here with all the cold and wet weather we have been having during April, but it started to warm up properly today, so I am out doing some bird surveys on croft land on Thursday, looking specifically at twite, linnet, lesser redpoll, yellowhammer, skylark and reed bunting, so that should be an early start but lots of fun.
ReplyDeleteI'll let you know how things go in France.
Iain