Bird Diary entry Mon 21st winter solstice northern hemisphere West London
7.20 am
Sun rising – prussian blue lightening to cobalt, and light blue in east. Very cold – minus 2′, patches of snow now re-frozen and all water solid ice. Few birds – cold and silent. Then two small sounds – ‘chck’ing and a 2 or 3 note whistle. Blue tits? Yes. Blackbird? High air, clear, cloudless, sharp as a knife. Planes fly over irregularly (Heathrow flight path).
Must re-familiarise myself with the birds here. Crows (Carrion crow), pigeons and seagulls common as usual.
Blue tit (Cyanistes caeruleus)
Carrion crow (Corvus corone)
Pigeon (Columba livia)
Herring/Atlantic gull (Larus argentatus)
Bird diary entry Wed 16th Dec 09
Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon en route to UK
Low cloud cover, mild, 20’c, rain showers, tops of sky scrapers in cloud. Pigeons swoop from roof of hotel – fast and high. Birds of prey hover over Kowloon Park.
Bird Diary entry
Sunday 13th Dec 6.50am Coburg nr the Merri Creek
Doves – constant regular surprisingly penetrating call; fairly close though not in this garden; no other birds close. Blackbird trill in distance. A crow calls 1,2,3,4,5. (Crows vocal at Annalea’s yesterday). Pretty quiet; mild, low cloud cover. One myna calls 1,2,3. Couple of lorikeets fly over. Doves continuous. Then one wattlebird in distance.
Car passes.
Clock ticks.
Wattlebird, myna – small chucks and squeaks. Doves – ‘uh-orrr-or uh-orrr-or uh-orrr-or’ a rougher sound than pigeons.
Then
An upset smaller bird, later realised it was a honeyeater; repeated agitated ‘cheep’ing, nesting?
Then the larger whistlers sing – pied butcherbird and magpies carol further in distance. An echoey spatial quality to their songs – lovely tone, choral.
All the songs start then stop. There is no general build up or chorus amongst the birds, unlike early Spring. Dispersed, individual phases of song. Small individualised, incidental it seems, no crescendo. All except doves which remain a constant, although even they pause after about half an hour.
Singers:
Spotted Turtle-Dove (Streptopelia chinensis)
Common Blackbird (Turdus merula)
Little Raven (Corvus mellori)
Common Myna (Acridotheres tristis)
Rainbow Lorikeet (Trichoglossus haematodus)
Red Wattlebird (Anthochaera carunculata)
White-plumed Honeyeater (Lichenostomus pencilatus)
Pied Butcherbird (Cracticus nigrogularis)
Australian Magpie (Gymnorhina tibicen)
Andrew Bryant’s comments on how useful blogs can be in ‘Why professional artists need a blog’ is spot on. in particular ‘But thinking, talking and writing about what is essentially a visual process, is one of the most difficult things for an artist to do. It can make you feel awkward, pretentious, ignorant, and vulnerable.’ and ‘For myself, thinking about my visual output is a crucial part of my practice’. I completely agree with both comments.
At the moment I am finding it easier to upload images and add small amounts of commentary rather than writing much. Mostly the articulation comes later in the process – it’s important to be in the chaos of making and the not-knowing, not trying to make sense of everything too early. There is a lot of pressure on artists to validate their output and this can really undermine the creative process.
