2023-06

30th June 2023

I spent a happy morning on Wednesday this week, stalking little egrets at the lake, while they themselves, were stalking fish. In the time I was there I achieved more than they did, in that they didn’t catch any fish while I managed to catch a few shots. The little egret is a medium-sized bird in the heron family, standing at about 60cm in height, and as you can see is primarily white. Many, if not most, fishing birds are predominantly white - gulls, terns, gannets and pelicans, to name but a few. This gives them an advantage over the fish, as it’s hard for the fish, looking up, to spot a white bird - it is camouflaged against the light sky above. That said, kingfishers seem to manage well, with their colourful plumage – further research required to understand why they’re not white.

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28th June 2023

While walking in the woods in Netanya earlier this week, I saw a crow sitting on the ground in the undergrowth with its wings spread. There are two theories as to why a crow would do this.

1) It is ‘sunning’ – allowing the sun to help spread its preen oils, which drives away parasites

2) It is ‘anting’ – enabling ants to crawl over its feathers, and formic acid from the ants drives away the parasites.

And yesterday in the woods in the Switzerland Forest, I watched a large salmon Arab butterfly. It’s really quite a small butterfly, but it’s called a large salmon Arab to distinguish it from the even smaller, small salmon Arab butterfly.

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26th June 2023

We’ve been in Leeds for the last few weeks. We had a wonderful time visiting Mum and all the family, but we are now back home. We missed the view of the lake and the mountains, and we missed our regular walks in the woods in Netanya and the Switzerland Forest. Last week I posted a photo of a magpie in England - today is the day of the jay – photographed in the woods in Netanya. The jay and the magpie are both corvids (no relation to the virus), that is members of the crow family. Even without getting a full view of jays we’ve learnt to recognise them. One of the giveaways is the location in which we see them – near oak trees. Jays love acorns (or should I say jaycorns?), almost as much as Pooh’s friend Piglet likes haycorns. Being part of the crow family, jays are intelligent, as we’ve discussed before. They know that there’s a plentiful supply of acorns/jaycorns in the autumn and that by the winter they’re no longer to be found. So, during the autumn they bury lots of acorns in the ground, for future consumption. They’ve got really good memories and in winter when food is hard to come by, they dig up the acorns that they had secreted. Good as their memory is, it’s not perfect and inevitably some get left behind. So planted by jays, mighty oaks from little acorns grow.  

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22nd June 2023

It’s really great to see exotic birds and animals in Israel. But of course, one man's exotic is another man's normal. So now I’m back in the UK for a visit, it seems quite exciting to see magpies, which despite the negative feeling about them, are really splendid looking birds. And being part of the crow family, they’re fairly intelligent birds. The grey squirrel is also much disliked, but again it was great for me to see them scuttling around gardens and parks. But no one at all, can have negative thoughts about the splendid thrush, which can be seen in Israel, though I’ve never seen one. However, we do see blue rock thrushes on Mount Arbel.

Yesterday, I saw a pine marten out for a walk. I really can’t say I approve of keeping wild animals as pets – they’d be much better off in the wild, where they’re meant to be.

This morning, there was a thud against the window. A little dunnock (like the one pictured here, with beak wide open) had flown into the window and was on the ground suffering from concussion. There it stayed for an hour and a half and then recovered sufficiently to fly off. Sadly, in all likelihood, it will die in the next few days from internal injuries suffered in the crash.

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20th June 2023

Rarely, if ever, are mute swans to be seen in Israel, ballet aside. But in Leeds and many other places in England, there are many on lakes and rivers.

I’ve written before about how birds cope during very hot weather, like we experience for prolonged periods in Israel. Birds can’t pant like dogs, to cool down. Nor can they sweat, like we do. So, some birds, cormorants for example, use a technique known as gular fluttering to stay cool. They flutter their throat muscles (gular) to allow air to circulate within them rapidly, and in doing so, it cools the birds down. Swans have a different way of cooling. I watched a swan swimming in Roundhay Park Lake in Leeds, with its foot resting on its back. I wondered whether it was injured, but then I saw other swans doing the same. It is thought that taking its foot out of the water is a way of it cooling, as water evaporates from the foot.

And why do you think they are called mute swans? Are they unable to speak/honk? It seems that a mute swan is called a mute swan because it is less vocal than other swan species – but that’s a moot point.

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18th June 2023

I spent a very enjoyable morning, one day last week, at the Bacall Bird Observatory and Gardens in Manchester. The head gardener told me that a bullfinch had been visiting every day for the last few days, but sadly it didn’t visit while I was there, probably because it was quite a warm day. However, a juvenile goldfinch popped in and perched on a tree before my camera (and the next day, I saw an adult male goldfinch in Leeds). I don’t see goldfinches so often in Israel, but in Britain there are more than a million and a half breeding pairs.

I learnt a new word this week – the word is nidicolous, which you will probably agree is verging on the ridiculous. Nidicolous birds, of which the goldfinch is a good example, remain in the nest for a long time after birth. On the other hand, nidifugous birds (gamebirds, for example) leave the nest soon after hatching.

In the gardens I photographed black roses (Aeonium arboreum 'zwartkop') and stars of Persia (Allium cristophii).

The highlight of the visit was lunch in the tea rooms with the head gardener and chef and other important guests.

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13th June 2023

Three of these photos are of Muscovy ducks and the other is a mandarin duck. I photographed the Muscovy ducks in Jerusalem recently, and the mandarin duck, last week, in Leeds (Britain).

Muscovy is an old name for the region surrounding Moscow, but Muscovy ducks aren’t from Russia at all, they’re from Northern and Southern America. It’s unclear why they’re known as Muscovy ducks, but it’s clear to many that these ducks are amongst the ugliest of all ducks, if not the ugliest.

Mandarin ducks, on the other hand, are considered by many as the most beautiful ducks of all. They are found in China and were imported into Britain in the 18^th Century. Some escaped and now breed/live in Britain.

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11th June 2023

One of the very rewarding benefits of writing this blog, is that people from all over the world give me feedback on the blog posts.

I’ve written before that the nearest relation in the animal world of the Syrian rock hyrax is the elephant. My cousin in the USA is a physician/researcher and haematologist looking to improve the diagnosis and treatment of blood-based diseases. He wrote to me about the Syrian rock hyrax:

I am finishing up a large research project that I have been doing for the past 45 years. I have measured the expression of a membrane water channel in some 400 species including the rock hyrax whose measurements are almost identical to elephants and quite unlike rodents that they were once thought to be.

I photographed this mother with her young, recently in the Switzerland Forest.

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My friend, Moshe in Tiberias, a licenced tour guide, wrote to me about water buffalo as follows:

During the Ottoman period water buffaloes were brought to Israel from Egypt. The Arab farmers used them and later on the Turkish army used them to a limited extent as well. The surviving animals escaped captivity and today live unattended.

Their milk has a higher fat content than cow milk and to this day in Egypt is used in pastries like Sabrina. Sabrina is a type of sponge cake covered in thick sweet cream and drenched with rum.

I photographed this water buffalo last month in the Hula Valley

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And Chantal from Belgium sent me this photo taken recently by her cousin who was visiting Namibia. I’ve posted photos and written about the common chameleon that we see in Israel. It can extend its tongue a huge distance (one and a half to two times its body length). However Israeli chameleons seem to very polite and don’t stick out their tongues, at least not while I’m watching. Chantal’s cousin photographed the Namaqua chameleon, which is found in Namibian deserts, clearly less polite, in that it put out its tongue to catch its lunch, while he was watching.

The photo of the common chameleon is mine and the photo of the Namaqua chameleon with it’s tongue out catching an insect is from Chantal’s cousin.

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8th June 2023

We’ve reached that time of year when the hills are browning, and the flowers have more or less ‘hibernated’ if you know what I mean (actually, there is a word for summer sleeping – aestivation). But there are a few nice flowers and plants still to be seen.

The caper bush, from which we get caper berries, has flowers with many long violet-coloured stamens – I photographed this flower on Mount Arbel.

And the plant with reddy/orange and green berries (photographed in woods in Netanya) is the Arum maculatum, more commonly known as cuckoopint, adder’s root and various other names. The berries are rather poisonous, unless you’re a bird, so stick to the caper berries which are somewhat better for you. Caper berries contain a natural antihistamine, so may even be good for hay fever sufferers.

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6th June 2023

Have you heard of water buffalo in Israel? There’s a herd of water buffalo at the Hula Reserve in the North of Israel and another herd at Tel Afek (near Haifa) - so, should you encounter a gruff-looking cow there, grazing in the water, it’s more likely than not, a gruff-looking water buffalo, which is not to be confused with a gruffalo. Bubalus bubalis, as the Pope would call it, commonly known as water buffalo hadn’t, been seen in Israel for a hundred years or so before they were reintroduced recently and now the biggest herd in Israel is to be found in the Hula Reserve.

They are similar in many ways to their more common farm-animal ‘cousins’, the cows and bulls we all know so well. But water buffalo tend to be bigger and heavier, and their milk is richer, which makes it suitable for making cheeses, such as mozzarella. They are also, as their name indicates, partial to sauntering in shallow water, for which their large hooves are particularly useful. And they enjoy wallowing in mud as much as do hippopotami and young children.

Kosher though they are, both chewing their cud and having cloven hooves, the water buffalo in Israel are well protected and will certainly not end up on your dinner plate. They’re thought of as a domestic animal, but their speed and bulk keep them out of harm's way from predators in the wild and they will even put up a good fight against lions and tigers. Female buffalo have small horns but the males’ can reach a meter and a half which makes for quite a weapon. So, when you’re next at the Hula Reserve or Tel Afek try not to get too close a view of these large bovines.

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4th June 2023

These birds are all shrikes. The black-headed bird is a masked shrike (photographed in Switzerland Forest, Tiberias). The grey-headed bird is the lesser grey shrike (photographed near Netanya) and the brown-headed bird is a woodchat shrike (photographed last week in the upper Galilee).

Shrike comes from the word shriek, and as you can guess they’re shriekers. They’re also known as butcherbirds, because, rather gruesomely, after killing their prey, some shrikes impale them on sharp points, until they’re ready to consume them.

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1st June 2023

Last week while walking in the Switzerland Forest near Tiberias I waspassing a wild carrot plant and I saw a hive of activity on the stem of the plant, just below the carrot flower itself. When I looked closely, I saw a group of paper wasps hard at work on their nest. They use various plant fibres together with their saliva to manufacture the paper-like substance with which they build the nest. They construct little chambers within which they lay their eggs. They then secrete an ant-repellent to deter ants from stealing the eggs they lay. It struck me as a little short-sighted of them, to position their nest on the flower stem, as the stem will wither soon, but I guess they know better than I, where is a good location for their nest. I watched them for some time and went quite close, which I have since discovered wasn’t a great idea as they can give a nasty sting if they feel their nest is threatened. After a while I let them be and went on my way.

Yesterday, I revisited and they’re still working industriously on their nest. I waspleased as could be that indeed it seems an OK place for a nest, at least for now.