Early days

I tried doing a migration count at the coast on Friday but, apart from being very early in the season, it was extremely windy, resulting in a count of just 132 migrating individuals of 20 different species over the course of two hours.  The best were a single Spoonbill and two Marsh Harriers, with only a dozen or so each of Meadow Pipit and White Wagtail.  I thus gave up and did a tour of the polders, seeing my first Avocets, Black-tailed Godwits and Ringed Plovers of the year, as well as some lingering Wigeon and around 40 Barnacle Geese.  Today, I twitched this beautiful, male Pintail, a rare bird in Brussels, in Anderlecht, where I got an added bonus in the shape of my first Black Redstart of the spring.

March-ing on

There has been very little sign of our summer visitors in Brussels so far this month.   The bulk of the Chiffchaffs now seem to have arrived and, this morning, I heard and saw the first Blackcap singing in my local park.  Apart from that, though, the past few weeks have been very quiet, with just a couple of twitches to write about.  The first was a local one within Brussels to this subadult Caspian Gull along the canal.

The second, earlier this week was a quick trip to the coast for the Oriental Turtle Dove, which was discovered last weekend.  It was too distant for photo's but I got to see it well through the telescope.  This is only my second OTD, and my first in Belgium, the first one being a long-staying individual in The Netherlands I only saw very briefly some six years ago.  Having watched it preening for about ten minutes, it didn't look like it was going to be doing much else, so I explored the nearby nature reserve.  It too was quiet but, around 5pm, I witnessed a big exodus of around 1000 White-fronted Geese, with formation after formation passing over on what I presume was the first leg of their northward migration.

Master builders

A pair of Magpies have chosen a tree opposite my balcony in which to make their new nest and are making amazing progress.  This picture of a small jumble of twigs was taken last weekend, when I first noticed they kept returning to the same spot.  Just one week later, their new home now looks like this!

Interestingly, two of their old nests were visible from my apartment but, rather than re-using the same nest, they chose to recycle the sticks in order to make a new one.  One of the two has completely disappeared, partly thanks to the local Monk Parakeets, who also seem to have helped themselves to the easily accessible concentration of building material.  The first singing Chiffchaffs had arrived in Brussels by 28 February and, yesterday, during a long hike in the Hautes Fagnes, I finally added one last winter visitor, Great Grey Shrike, to my year list before the onslaught of all the other summer migrants begins.