January - Brambling (Brussels); in a good winter for them, I first saw one amongst Chaffinches on my Brussels patch, then well over 100 of them in the Sonian Forest.
February - Alpine Accentor (Luxembourg Province); a bizarre, medieval twitch to the individual overwintering within the walls of Bouillon castle.
March - Western Bonelli's Warbler (Forêt de Fontainebleau, France); a single, early individual located by its occasional bursts of song.
April - Booted Eagle (Mechels Broek, Antwerpen); my first in Belgium spotted circling with Buzzards during a guided tour.
May - Black-winged Stilt (West Flanders); a huge invasion this spring resulted in several breeding pairs, with 31 seen in a small, flooded field near Bruges.
June - ROCK PARTRIDGE (Savoie, France); the first of two butterflying to the trips to Modane in the French Alps finally got me this elusive species thanks to local guide Olivier Trompette.
July - Honey Buzzard (Brussels, Antwerp and Luxembourg); in what must have been a good year for them, I saw three different birds this month, starting with one over the Sonian Forest.
August - Short-toed Eagle (Liège Province); another guiding trip, another eagle, this time an immature migrating along the valley near Trois-Points and only my second in Belgium.
September - Common Crane (Otmoor, UK); a trip to England included a visit to RSPB Otmoor, where I saw an immature Crane, part of the recently re-established breeding population.
October - YELLOW-BROWED BUNTING (Vlieland, NL); a mammoth journey was required to see this 1st-year bird on the last day of its stay!
November - ANDEAN COCK-OF-THE-ROCK (Ecuador); just one of the many highlights of a ten-day birding tour of the Andes.
December - Redwing (Brussels) - present almost daily in the park neighbouring my apartment and even heard singing, which is rare away from their breeding grounds.
During the year, I saw or heard 179 species in Belgium (just 1 more than last year!), with trips to the UK, The Netherlands, France and Berlin taking my European year-list to 229. Three of these were lifers, namely Rock Partridge, Radde's Warbler and Yellow-browed Bunting, and I added three new species to my Belgian list; Alpine Accentor, Booted Eagle and Radde's Warbler.
I flew to Ecuador the long way round, adding a stopover in Atlanta, where Brown-headed Nuthatch was the only new addition to my life-list, before the flood of new species in Ecuador. Of the 349 encountered there, 223 (almost two-thirds) were new for me, pushing my life-list to 2789 species, which means I have now seen more than 1/4 of all the birds in the world!
2023 thus ended on 618 species seen/heard in the world, the best of which was of course my most-wanted one, the Cock-of-the-Rock.
May I wish you all a happy and birdy 2024.
May I wish you all a happy and birdy 2024.
