Late April has, for me, marked the beginning of probably the most exceptional and spectacular of chook spectacles you can anticipate finding wherever. For the final sixty seasons, I’ve waited for the arrival of Honey Buzzards (Pernis apivorus) from the tropical African forests as they head north for his or her breeding grounds throughout a lot of western Europe proper as much as the Scandinavian Peninsula, and doubtless even additional east into Russia.
The spectacle takes a number of kinds. On the one hand it’s the sheer numbers of birds concerned. Counting ten thousand Honey Buzzards in a single day is just not uncommon. Then, they fly in giant flocks which provides to the show. They fly very excessive through the center of the day however some early morning and nightfall flights, when the birds come down, are completely superior. Honey Buzzards are nice fliers and so they don’t anticipate the solar to generate thermals, in response to the basic raptor migration mannequin; as soon as they will see the place they’re going, they merely rise up and go.
Including to the surprise, Honey Buzzards are available a spread of plumage morphs. Most books describe a light-weight, a darkish and an intermediate morph however the actuality is that these are arbitrary separations of what’s a plumage continuum, from very darkish birds to very pale ones. This has led to confusion amongst visiting birders who will not be accustomed to these birds. I recall claims of flocks of Ospreys (Pandion haliaetus) in Might over Gibraltar, when most have already handed north and by no means in flocks anyway. They’re instances of mistaken identification with pale morph Honey Buzzards.
The Honey Buzzards‘ potential to fly in a variety of situations additionally signifies that they’re much less constrained by the ocean. At Gibraltar they’ll usually let themselves drift with the wind and journey over longer stretches of sea than the heavier raptors.
For me, this superb migration encapsulates all the pieces that has made me a life-long birder and ornithologist. There’s something about it that simply grips you, from the expectation as the date is right here and the winds are proper, to the sheer awe at seeing enormous flocks or raptors flying in tight formation because the transfer from rain forest, throughout the Sahara Desert after which the ocean, in direction of the boreal forests of Fennoscandia. Birding is not only about discovering rarities, a minimum of it shouldn’t be. For me, a minimum of, it’s about marveling on the wonders of the pure world.
