birdwatcher55-blog

[birdwatcher55-blog]

March 29 & 31, 2017

This time, our group was now assigned at the Acad Oval and everything around it. We spent most of our time in the grassy fields near the UP Lagoon since the location around the Acad Oval was full of cars and may ward off birds to the middle part. Since the birds we saw during these days are almost the same, I compiled it into one blog entry.

During these days we found A LOT of mayas. They were very abundant since there are food fairs in the AS Parking and they are scavengers. On the first day, as we went to the insides of the Acad Oval, we heard some birds that has a very small chirp sound. We thought they were golden-bellied flyeaters but when I catched a glimpse of one of the birds, it had a white belly but I was not able to identify it because of lack of features seen. As we walk further, more mayas come together for a feast of food. We also saw a black-naped oriole in that area and  a collared kingfisher, which is very distinguishable by its color and call.As we were going back to the lagoon, we saw about 3 pied trillers. After seeing these, we heard the small chirp again and followed the sound. Then we saw a very small bird with an eye surrounded by the color white and its body was yellow-green.So we concluded that those small chirping birds are lowland white-eyes and the were many. This appearance ended the session.

On our second meeting, there were still a lot of mayas. There was nothing much to see but the highlight of this session is that we saw a Philippine fantail, with its tail flapping. It was beautiful! We also heard the lowland white-eyes this day.

As the time goes by, there are more birds that we can see in the campus. I hope we can see more so that we can appreciate their beauty.

[birdwatcher55-blog]

March 17, 2017

This time, our route was from the Math Building to CS Amphitheater and the Institute of Chemistry area. This time, we saw more birds that we didn’t see last time.

In the Math area, there were a lot of chirping birds but most of them were hidden in the trees. But the first bird we saw was the collared kingfisher, with its majestic blue plumage. Blue birds are somewhat rare or uncommon to people so we are amazed at its beauty. Then we saw another kingfisher at the top of the IESM Building, near NIGS. It was a bit far but we distinguished it from its blue plumage and long and pointed beak. As we are walking in the forest path near Math, we saw a long-tailed shrike, perched on a tree. Since it has a prominent black head, orange belly, and long tail (as the name suggests), we were able to identify it quickly. The next bird we saw were golden-bellied flyeaters. They pretty small but they were able to come closer to us. We found them beside the CS Library. What was hard about identifying these birds is its size, together with their fast movement. The last kind of bird we saw were white-breasted woodswallows, perched on an electric wire. When we saw them, they were in groups. They were plump and somewhat big, compared to the maya or Eurasian tree sparrow. We saw another long-tailed shrike and another collared kingfisher in the Chemistry area.

In our bird watching session as a group, we saw a total of 3 collared kingfishers, about 4 golden-bellied flyeaters, 4 white-breasted woodswallows, and 2 long-tailed shrikes.This time, more kind of birds showed up so we expect more kinds of birds in the upcoming bird watching sessions with the group. 

[birdwatcher55-blog]

March 10, 2017

This day was our first bird watching session as a group. We were assigned to the College of Science area for two weeks. During this session, we circled around the arboretum beside the Institute of Biology. We also allotted a small amount of our time at the MSI area.

As we circle around the arboretum, the first bird we saw was a small, plump bird. This bird, as we saw it, was finding for food. We never saw this bird, as far as we know. We even contemplated whether it is a brown shrike or not. We didn’t classify it as a brown shirke since it has a more orange breast compared to the brown shrike we have seen before. The next few birds we saw were yellow-vented bulbuls. We saw them in groups of 2 to 3 but sometimes, they are only one. The head count of the birds is approximately 15. These kinds of birds were abundant in the place went to. As we walk to the parking area of MSI, we saw the same bird, with the orange breast. This time it was perched on a shorter plant. As we walked through the MSI parking area, we heard and saw black-naped orioles. We saw quite a number of orioles, which we approximated to 4-5 orioles. Another bird we saw in this area was a Philippine pygmy woodpecker. This woodpecker was alone when we saw it.

What was a bit weird during our bird watching session is that we saw a few Eurasian tree sparrows. Maybe it is because we were focused on finding other birds that were different from the common bird, maya. Personally, I felt amazed, at the same time, open-minded. I was amazed at the number of birds we saw during our session, which was not a bad start for our group bird watching. I felt open-minded because there were sounds of birds that we never heard before, thus, we can’t identify them. This session was a good start. I hope we see more birds in the future and identify them properly. Also, I hope we see more uncommon birds like the collared kingfisher or the colasisi.