Beech Marten

There's a beech marten living round here. I found it's sprait (droppings) in the garden. Beech martens (also known as stone marten, scientific name Martes foina) are a mustelid, relatives of otters, polecats and mink. They are quite widespread across central and eastern Europe. They live mostly in low-lying broadleaved woodlands but also in settlements. They are nocturnal and the best views I have had have always been when walking home late on, usually one bounding across the road and then diving under a parked car or leaping into someone's garden.
A few winters ago one used to sleep under the bonnet of my mother-in-laws car, we found scraps of food, including a nibbled bread roll and it had bitten through a cable, too.
Beech martens have a brown coat, a long bushy tail and a distinctive white bib. Its close relative, the pine marten Martes martes, is also fairly common but is more of an upland species inhabiting mature mixed forests. Both martens are good tree climbers and prey on squirrels, dormice, and birds. They use tree-holes, black woodpecker cavities and squirrel dreys as dens.
Anyway, back to those droppings. I gave them a poke with a stick and found they contained a few fruit stones and undigested house-hold scraps.A close sniff revealed them to be quite sweet smelling, which is typical for this mustelid.

Blackcap singing today

Went out to put some seed on the bird table and heard a Blackcap singing... the first warbler of the spring. The first White Storks have been noted in Hungary, too. Spring is here and very soon all kinds of birds will be flooding in from the south. It has been a very mild winter, just two sprinklings of snow and everything - birds, frogs, plants - are already getting started, a few week agead of usual.

No whine about the wine

We sampled a glass or two of cabernet sauvignon yesterday from the village of Noszvaj on the southern slopes of the Bukk hills. I say "sampled" but actually, we finished off the bottle... as they say "a bird never flew on one wing". The wine in question was a gift from Eva Thummerer... her father is one of Hungary's very best vinters. I often go in the Thummerer cellar after a hard day's birding in the Bukk hills, there's a Black Woodpecker nesthole not far away and Serins, Black Redstarts and Tree Sparrows right by the cellar. On one occasion I met a Green Toad on the way in... on the way out we usually see much more !!! I have taken Finns, Swedes, Americans and English in this cellar and all have enjoyed the wine, the snacks and the short tour we do. I had kept this wine safe at home for two years as Eva said it would be better after "a rest". She was right.

Buda Hills

I spent an hour in the woods above Budapest, the Buda Hills. This is my "local patch" and I've been birding it for years... decades actually. The area of woodland I walk in most is less than half an hour by bus from the city centre, 10 minutes from where I live. Fairly common birds in the woods up there include Nuthatch, Hawfinch and Tree Sparrow and there are 6 species of woodpecker resident. Middle Spotted tends to be in areas with oaks, Lesser Spotteds like broadleaved stands with plenty of dead wood and snags, Great Spotteds are all over the place. There are a couple of pairs of Green and Black Woodpeckers on the route I usually take and at least one pair of Grey-headed. Not bad at all for a capital city. There are no Syrian Woodpeckers in the woods proper but they are not far away in gardens and parks.

Walking Hungary's Hills

There are some fine hill ranges in Hungary, some blanketed in forests, others more open country with limestone karst features, all riddled with paths and trails. Over the years I have walked many of them, sometimes just for the walk with family or friends, often when guiding birding groups, and many, many times when looking for woodpeckers. Two of may favourite Hungarian ranges are the Bukk and Aggtelek. A few like-minded friends and I now run WALKING HUNGARY. We have come up with a variety of year-round walking holiday intineraries taking in scenic routes, folklore, wildlife, wine tours and, of course, just walking! We have tried to cater for all ages and abilities.

Woodpeckers of Europe

I have a website devoted to European woodpeckers. It took me a while to think of a name for it, one that would instantly express what the site was about. Finally, I came up with this, I think it does the trick: WOODPECKERS OF EUROPE. Friends and fellow woodpecker enthusiasts from all over Europe have sent photographs for the site. There are some real crackers. If you have any photos of woodpeckers that you'd like to see on the site, then just drop me a line.

Drumming

The Collared Doves where cooing outside on the balcony at 7am this morning. Spring is here, officially, today... and the doves know it. The woodpeckers know it, too. Actually, they've known it for some time. Last week I spent a day in the Bukk hills. I saw Black, Green, Grey-headed, Middle Spotted, Lesser Spotted, White-backed and Great Spotted Woodpeckers in the forests and a Syrian in a village near Eger. All in one day. It was a clear, warm day, just an odd shower, but more like spring than winter. Several of the woodies were drumming. Every spring I have to get my "ear-in" again and sort out who is doing what. It's possible to identify all of Europe's woodpeckers on the basis of their drumming. Some are easy to recognise as their drumming is diagnostic, unique and unmistakable. Some a bit tricky at times, there is overlap, at least to the human ear. And it's difficult to describe these drumming in words. The only way to learn them is to go out, listening, spending time in the woods. Woodpeckers can drum at almost anytime of year, it's their main way of communicating with each other, but spring, now, is the time when they really go at it... staking out their patch, bragging to rivals, showing off to potential mates.