Wall Lizards

Very common and seen daily. They even live amongst the lava rocks on the beaches.

Black-Winged-Stilt

This pretty individual was observed twice at Lagoa De Furnas, it has apparently been there a while. We first saw it in flight and it was very unconfiding. However we returned there and again saw it fly by, we then hid in vegetation for a few minutes and it waded toward us, enabling us to photograph it :)

Marsh Frogs

What an endearing bunch!!! They were very very vocal, anywhere near water, even up in the mountains etc, you could hear the frog chorus ringing out. Mostly when we approached - plop! plop! plop! they were gone! However we did find a large group inside a cattle trough and they posed nicely for us - great little creatures!!

Blackcap

Yet another azorean endemic - Blackcap(sylvia atricapilla gularis). These were prolific, their song greeted us every morning. One tree, with yellow flowers, in our hotel grounds seemed to draw them and sometimes there were 40+ of this species feeding there at any one time. As with our Blackcaps, the male has the black cap and the female, brown.

Little Egret

We saw around half a dozen of these whilst in the Azores

Azorean endemic Goldcrest

These birds were very common but not particularly confiding, heard more than seen. They are of the endemic subspecies regulus regulus azoricus

Grey Wagtail

These endemic subspecies (motacilla cinerea patriciae) Grey Wags were everwhere in the Azores, very common and seen as much in the towns and forests as well as near water.

Azores Sunset

Beautiful scenes from the coast.

Portuguese Man O' War

These beasties were everywhere so we didnt dare swim or snorkel as we would normally do! If you look carefully at some of the pics you can make out the reflections of the surrounding cliffs and clouds!

Azorean Long Eared Owl

Whilst in the Azores towards the end of our trip we heard these owls calling and saw brief glimpses of them in flight in the grounds of our hotel. On our last morning we had a couple of hours free so we scoured the gardens to find them roosting and were not disappointed! Absoluteley stunning owls!! Those eyes are amazing- a fitting end to our trip:)

Tawny Owlets and Azores update

Here are our latest pics of the local Tawny owlets, all seem hale and hearty- adorable!! With regards to the Azores we are nearly through with sorting the photographs so should get some pics on in next few days - phew! We did find the Azores Bullfinch and 7 cetacean species. :):). More details to follow...

Goodbye for 2 weeks

Blog will not be updated until early June as we are off away to the Azores in search of whales and dolphins and hopefully some good birds! We may even pin down the endangered endemic Azores Bullfinch. Watch this space............

Tawnies

We were thrilled this evening to see 3 newly fledged Tawnies on our local reserve. A fantastic sight despite torrential rain and thunder. We watched them stretching and flapping their wings and also saw them being fed by their parents. A priveledge indeed and big smiles all round!!

Shelducks

Large numbers of these on the patch now.

Little Egret

This is being seen quite regularly at the moment, on this occasion it was soon bullied by the local gulls.