Marc Illa's blog: Initiatives

This first 2013 days I knew two very interesting initiatives that I have to mention here. The first one is THE BIG YEAR SPAIN, with the purpose of make bird lists improving the conservation and some studies of Spain's birds. Everybody is invited to do his own bird lists in diferent modalities. I will participate in A2 (Eco Big Year; free of CO₂) and B (local patch) lists. You can find a lot of information in the previous link.

Another interesting idea is the Foot It. Birding by Foot is an interesting blog that invites everybody to not take the car for birdwatching and just walk close to your house. As I have a small wetland at ten minutes walking from my bedroom, I feel identify with this initiative, because I pass lots of hours birding by foot in my local patch: l'Aiguamoll de la Bòbila. It isn't a good place to expect rarities, no, and neither there weren't big birds concentrations. But have a local patch is a fantastic thing, and when you find there a special bird, you'll never forget. This is my blog about l'Aiguamoll de la Bòbila, written in Catalan.

Well, I started good this new year. I found a male Mandarin Duck (Aix galericulata) the 1st January in La Gavarresa stream, close to Oristà village. In Catalonia there are some Mandarins wintering every year in the same places, probably birds that come from northern countries. Also, some birds can come from farms or bord collections... I passed this days enjoying some Hawfinches (Coccothraustes coccothraustes), Eurasian Siskins (Carduelis spinus) and Redwings (Turdus iliacus), typical winter birds.

I found some moments to do some ringing sessions to. The most interesting birds were a Polish Reed Bunting (Emberiza schoeniclus) (first ringing recovery for my local patch!!), a Red-legged Partridge (Alectoris rufa) and some other birds...