Any Excuse....

....is a good excuse for a little 'gap filler' and a couple of brilliant photographs until I  can  get the

time to blog about today's birding experiences hopefully on Wednesday.

I've  been asked not to make  any further  comments  regarding  the Autumn Watch programme

mentioned  in my last post  and I intend  to respect the request.  However, I draw attention to the 

fact that someone somewhere  asked for the  news to be  put out to advertise the event, only for 

a supporter of Birds2blog in the comments section  to be told by the  RSPB that this was 'out of 

order'.  

These 'shrikes' are much more interesting than the garbage above, and so are the photographs 

which I recommend you 'clik the pik'. 

Red-backed Shrike John Richardson

The Red-backed Shrike (RBS) bred successfully on Dartmoor in Devon this year, the only pair of 'butcher birds' to do so in the UK having returned here for the fourth time. The RBS was driven to extinction in the UK at the end of the last century, and egg collecting remains a threat, but these birds successfully bred, got two young to fledging, and is excellent conservation news. I was going to do a piece on the RBS but after a search through the archives found I have already done one HERE 

Southern Grey Shrike Ana Minguez

Sometimes called the Steppe Shrike the first record of the species in Britain was only 57 years ago, it was found on Fair Isle, Shetland in 1956, the bird was seen as a 'pale shrike' by two observers, it avoided the mist-nets already in place in the area, but was eventually forced into a Heligoland trap by the mobbing Starlings where positive ID was achieved.

Thanks to John and Ana for the excellent photographs of these two birds.