reddad

Joined: Sep 13, 2015 Last Active: Apr 24, 2024 iNaturalist Monthly Supporter since September 2023

Actually I'm a physicist, so I have no special education in biology. But since my youth I have been a nature lover. Now, when I'm retired, I have the time (and the equipment) to follow my desire for taking pictures of wild species. As everybody can see, I'm very fond of Roe Deer and, since they have become really rare in the area where I live, Brown Hare. My attempts at botany are mostly feeble and I appreciate the support from the community. In addition, since end of July 2016, I get support by a very valuable reference book:

  1. Henning Haeupler and Thomas Muer, Bildatlas der Farn- und
    Blütenpflanzen Deutschlands, 2nd Ed., Eugen Ulmer KG, Stuttgart, 2007.

Since June 11, 2014 I'm observing the birds on a birch tree in front of my windows that is a vantage point for the birds of this area (I'm also including the surrounding roofs). These obs's have a location radius of 1250 m.

The 'standard' birds on the tree are Finches, Blackbirds, Starlings, Magpies and Crows. A larger bird is often met by member(s) of a smaller species as if they wanted to state 'This is our territory as well!'. In rare cases only a larger bird like a Magpie drives away a smaller one. But Magpies often drive away Pigeons and Doves.
For me, one problem with this tree is that it is to the south-east of my windows and the birds especially like to pirch there in the morning. So, often the pics are backlighted by the sun (in addition to the open sky always being the background). This is especially true in the weeks around winter solstice when the sun is moving very low in that area of the sky.
Starting on December 16, 2016, I have begun to collect all sightings of a species during a day into one obs. Strictly speaking this is against the iNat principle of 'one place, one time.' But this is a special case: It concerns strictly one spot and most probably also the birds are the same again and again. So, mainly this is not about the presence of a spicies but about the birds' behaviour (e.g. interaction between them).
Of course, these observations are far from being systematic or complete: Often I'm not at home, often I don't notice the birds, and equally often they take off before I can take a shot at them. So it's very much a random choice.
A general obs in January 2017: Since the pair of Wood-Pigeons often occupies the tree for extended periods (often more than an hour), the Carrion Crows are quite rare there. Of course, the causal correlation is uncertain.

The tree has been felled on Nov. 12, 2021.

Attention: Since 2015, I don't set my camera to summer time. It remains at CET. So, the times of my observations also always are CET although iNat automatically sets the acronym to CEST. Actually this isn't true in sommer 2018 from April 27 on.

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