New Mexico Winter Birding Special...!

We have just posted a brand new tour to New Mexico in December next year searching for resident and winter specialities such as Hooded Merganser, Barrow's Goldeneye, Williamson's & Red-naped Sapsuckers, Gray Jay, Bridled Titmouse, Mountain Bluebird, Crissal Thrasher, Phainopepla, and both Evening & Pine Grosbeaks. A special visit to Sandia Crest will be made for Gray-crowned, Black and Brown-capped Rosy-Finches. And let's not forget the spectacle of 1000's of Snow and Ross's Geese and Sandhill Cranes at Bosque Del Apache NWR. Should be great photo opportunities, great food, great scenery and a great experience.  Can't wait...!   

Click the link to view the tour itinerary: http://www.zootherabirding.com/page_3175147.html

Just to give you a little flavour of the geese and crane spectacle, take a look at these videos...

India 2

Our Classic Himalayas tour (15th - 27th March 2015) is a guaranteed departure. Visiting Corbett, Pangot, Sat Tal and finishing up at Okhla Barrage we have 10 days to find Cheer Pheasant, Ibisbill, Wallcreeper, Tawny Fish Owl, Scaly-breasted & Himalayan Woodpeckers, Long-billed Thrush, Rufous-chinned Laughingthrush, Nepal Wren-babbler, Black-headed Jay and Pink-browed Rosefinch amongst others - phew..!!

As Corbett is a Tiger Reserve you have to go birding in jeeps

Corbett

A view across the grasslands at Corbett

Looking for bush-warblers at Corbett..!!

The weather is usually very good at this time of year

Oh yes, there are Tigers here....

This is the view from the lodge at Dhikala

More Corbett scenery

Up at Pangot the scenery gets even better

The Himalayan foothills - some great birds here...

One of the specialities of the area - Black-headed Jay

Lammergeier and Himalayan Griffon

We'll also do a dawn Elephant ride at Corbett....

India 1

Still places left on our India 1 tour 6th - 17th March visiting the Chambal River, Bharatpur, Taj Mahal, Ranthambhore & Sultanpur. Key birds include Indian Skimmer, Painted Sandgrouse, Painted Spurfowl, Marshall's Iora, Smoky and Sulphur-bellied Warblers and Sind Sparrow amongst others. Oh and always a chance of Bengal Tiger and a bunch of other great mammals as well.

Here's a small selection of photos form our last tours, but you can see more on my Flickr page at https://www.flickr.com/photos/94771517@N07/sets/72157636143209035/

Bay-backed Shrike

Black-bellied Tern

Brahminy Starling

Bronze-winged Jacana

Bund Baretha - great habitat

The Chambal River

Dalmatian Pelican

One of the major birds is Indian Skimmer

Looking for skimmers

White-throated Kingfisher

There's even a bit of culture on this tour

Tickell's Thrush

We'll look for Tiger at Ranthambhore

More Sulawesi & Halmahera Pics....

Ok well back to my last tour and we had a great time with nightbirds, getting great views of several Sulawesi Scops-owls, some day roosting Great-eared Nightjars and this incredibly co-operative Moluccan Scops-owl...

Moluccan Scops-owl

Sulawesi ~scops-owl

Great-Eared Nightjar

Another great evening excursion was for this Moluccan Scrubfowl that had flown down onto a secluded beach to lay its eggs in northern Halmahera. Worth the 5 hour drive (i think)....!

Moluccan Scrubfowl

And finally,  we connected with this Maleo at Tambun in northern Sulawesi on our second visit to its breeding site. 

Maleo

Colombia 14th Feb - 1st March 2015

Still places left on our exciting adventure in Colombia next year with Diego Calderon. For the full itinerary please go to: http://www.zootherabirding.com/page_2534521.html

We've already made several visits to this bird rich country and by having exclusive use of Diego (Colombia's No 1 bird guide) , we really are in safe hands and guaranteed a great tour. 

Here's just a few of the great birds on offer - all photos taken by Steve Bird: 

Chestnut-naped Antpitta

Antioquia Wren

Black-chested Jay

Chestnut Piculet

Dwarf Cuckoo

Glowing Puffleg

Red-bellied Grackle

Sulawesi & Halmahera Highlights

Have recently returned from an exciting tour to Sulawesi & Halmahera and unfortunately during our 3 weeks there things such as wifi were hard to find! So instead of a full blown diary I will post some of the best photos from the trip. The following pics are of some of the group's favourite birds and probably most people's No 1 (including me) would have been the stunning Ivory-breasted Pitta from Halmahera.

Ivory-breasted Pitta

Lompobattang Flycatcher isn't bad either and as far as I know, my group were the only ones to go for it this year. It is one of the rarest Sulawesi endemics and only known from the Lompobattang Hills....

Lompobattang Flycatcher

Following the recent splitting of Red-bellied Pitta into 16 species, the bird below is now called Sulawesi Pitta. We had stunning views of this individual at Tangkoko in northern Sulawesi...

Sulawesi Pitta

And you can't get much better than this Wallace's Standardwing at a lek on Halmahera. Instead of the monster 3 hour pre-dawn hike i've had to do twice in the past few years, to get to this lek involved only a 10 minute walk from where our vehicles were parked. Lovely!

Wallace's Standardwing

Wallace's Standardwing