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I have to thank cyberthrush for pointing out this blog post
http://tinyurl.com/bcydvk (and links) to me which shows that questions about the 1962 Eskimo Curlew photos have been asked before, and largely answered. It looks as though the color photo was assembled for aesthetic purposes.

(c) Don Bleitz - it says the photographs can be reproduced for educational purposes, so please learn something or I'm in the crap

and here

(c) Don Bleitz - it says the photographs can be reproduced for educational purposes, so please learn something or I'm in the crap - if a joke's funny the first time, it's funny every time, don'tcha think?

Again, above, one photo has been printed in reverse wrt to the other, but the bird is in what looks to be an identical pose in both shots. Just dirty rotten look for the photographer, I guess, but it just goes to show.

I've had this on the back burner for a while and like everyone else I came to the conclusion that these had to be real living birds photographed, as in fact the real living birds did exist and were seen by several top birders. Clearly others have gone to some trouble over it though. On my travels through the web I came across this photo of an Eskimo mount that was done as a prank - sorry I don't know who took this, so if you do, please let me know.

I think you'd tell by its unnatural bulgy eye and dishevelled coverts etc that this wasn't the real deal. I tried making it b+w and adding a bit of blur and noise in Photoshop, but it did only a little bit of good.


hey ho. Maybe 8 years on BOURC has poisoned my mind :-O :-O :-))

In Newtonhill today - weather, and lots of it.

The weather, the waves, the sea spray, the tattered Saltire. Welcome to Burns' Night! The only thing that could make this more Scottish would be a wee man pishing up against his own shed.

A few birds, but I think we both know that they were the usuals. The Elsick Burn was in full spate, and there was a White-bellied Dipper flying up and down making weird zippy noises, looking for somewhere to eat.

belated

Sunday 18th January

Bird levels critical. All the Reed Buntings in the stubble at the end of St Anne's have died of boredom, or gone away. 16 Rock Pipits in Cow Field might be the start of another mid winter flock. I think 50 was my record.

A few Long-tailed Titties hanging on persistently in the bushes down the track to the beach, but on the beach the waves were crashing in and there wasn't a lot around. Offshore, it was crawling with Northern Fulmars - about 50 bird going back and forth feeding. A single Common Scoter went south, a few auks back n forth. Not sure how I spotted 'em among the waves, but there was also a Harbour Porpoise sploshing about, and an Atlantic Grey Seal eating a whopper of a fish.

Many of you will have seen this before, but it's worth repeating here for lack of any extant birds. have you ever seen how this photo

(c) Don Bleitz - it says the photographs can be reproduced for educational purposes, so please learn something or I'm in the crap.

one of the Eskimo Curlews photographed by Don Bleitz in April 1962 in Texas , is obviously a reconstructed montage done by printing this image

(c) Don Bleitz - it says the photographs can be reproduced for educational purposes, so please learn something or I'm in the crap.

(sorry only have b+w for that one) as a mirror reverse and sticking it onto a prettier background. The highlight in the eye has been painted on too. What a bizarre thing to do. Do any of you US birders have any idea about the story of why or how this would have happened??

When the truth just gets in the way of the way things should be....

The weeks are flashing past, I'm not getting out as much as I would like, but there isn't anything in Newtonhill to see anyway. I was down at the beach scoping a Purple Sandpiper among the 20 or so Ruddy Turnstones among the seaweed. A new person there, and the perplexing 'Are you Martin?' was followed by the trepidation-inducing 'I've read your blog' - as I started to wonder who I've libelled recently. So this was Thane (Hi Thane) and brings the number of current N/hill birders to 5 (five! - I always assumed the population of Newtonhill was me and a few rather scabby-looking crabs. Turns out it's full of birders).

2 Common Stonechats and a few Rock Pipits on the beach too, 12 Black-headed Gulls and a Common Gull feeding among the ferocious breakers, and with birds out at sea so I went up to the cliffs for a seawatch, for about half an hour before I gave in. Lots of Northern Fulmars about (well, about 50), mostly going south, and about 50 Common Gulls, feeding and mostly going north. Say what you like about Common Gulls, and I do, they're hard as nails. Also one adult Northern Gannet (they fo hang around just about all winter), but apart from that and a few Razorbills and Guillemots, there's not a lot to be seen. Won't bore you any more.

Remember a couple of years ago I wrote about Richard Meinertzhagen as a Halloween Hero of the Birding Revolution (now there's a series I need to resurrect when I get chance). Well this week, I have mostly been reading The Meinertzhagen Mystery by Brian Garfield, and it rather brutally proves the lie about most of the extraordinary claimed events in Meinertzhagen's life. He never bounced on Darwin's knee; he rewrote his diaries to include his 'predictions' that war with Germany was inevitable; he never shot a German Duke then ate his Christmas dinner; he was never a real spy, and he hung around at the back of the battles he was meant to have participated in; he never crash-landed a plane after the pilot collapsed; he didn't drop the haversack behind Turkish lines (someone else did), and the Haversack Ruse didn't work anyway; he never rescued a Russian princess; he never fought for the Zionists against the Arabs in Haifa; he was never in a secret dual with a mystery spy; he never slaughtered a cell of Spanish Bolsheviks; he never met Hitler and/or had the opportunity to kill him. His wife did still die in strange circumstance, however (she apparently shot herself in the head while Dickie was standing behind her with a loaded revolver, shortly after she realised about his bird thefts). When you take away all the documentary evidence about the notable (non-birdy) events in Dickie's life that were not directly or indirectly derived from Meinertzhagen's own writing or influence, there is nothing left except an incompetent middle-level officer and troublesome low-level military intelligence worker who was gently pushed out of the army and into the harmless pursuit of collecting birds. The good work that he did (he was good at drawing maps in his military career, and was an outstanding traveller and collector in his ornithological career) was overshadowed and indeed blown away, in the end, by the unnecessary lies, thefts and deceit, and fantasy world he created around himself.

Wishing Chair, take me to a place where I can get a patch tick. But the mischievous Wishing Chair first took me round on a tour of the local Blue Tits, Common Chaffinches etc. Only 5 Eurasian Reed Buntings in the wet stubble - I needed a huge f***off Labradoodle to help me on that one. Several months after the trauma previously of trying to photograph a Bluethroat using Diane's camera, I finally dared to try once more, and got this cracking shot of one of the Reed Buntings. Clearly I haven't got the hang of the AF still.


Down at the beach, there were 8 yellow-billed male Common Eiders with their best girls, but still my focus was all over the place.


6 Common Scoters flew south in the distance, and this persuaded me to try a short seawatch, which was dull dull dull with only a few auks going north.

The Magical Wishing Chair took me up to Cran Hill, and as I flew alongside a formation of 5 (count 'em) Pink-footed Geese, I spotted a Common Raven circling in the air. Mmmmmm... for N Scotland you would assume that this one would be a fairly regular visitor, and difficult to overlook, but this is a Patch Tick. First of the year. First of several hopefully. Mind, Cran Hill does look suitable for foraging Ravens. I think it's the pile of dead Vikings that would attract them.

Monday 29th December.

Sooooo... cold. brrrrr.....Like the wrath of God has descended upon Gotham. I descended into the wrong comic. I'm not a bitter man, but if Santa doesn't hate me, why did he bring Meccano for Peter (grrr.....) and a keyboard for Lizzie? All I wanted for Christmas was a Marsh Tit. But Santa just left me a lump of Coal Tits. In the garden at East Cammachmore - all the other birds the owners had told me were there, were there. Great Spotted Woodpecker, Eurasian Sparrowhawk, plenty other tits, and an influx of Fieldfares. With the mildly amusing addition of a pair of Common Treecreepers on the peanuts. Nothing more interesting, but I resolved to give it one more try on Wednesday.


Wednesday 31st December.

Egad! It's even more boring than before! The same birds as before, minus any woodpeckers but plus a Goldcrest. hmmm... y'know, I think it's most likely there was aCommon Blackcap inthe garden at some point, and they have confused the features with a Coal Tit, in the way that non-birders do.

Between us, me and someone else's abomination of a labradoodle (ffs!) flushed 18 Eurasian Reed Buntings from the wet stubble by St Anne's.