20250503 Bird Photography Tour

This day Alexandra joined our guide Menno van Duijn on a photography tour. Targets were Bluethroat and White Stork for Alexandra which after some effort managed to photograph.

In the morning we meet in Amsterdam an head to the Nieuwkoopse Plassen. We arrive at sunrise with some mist over the fields. In the distance we hear a first Bluethroat whilst the sun comes up and we finish a quick coffee.

the Bluethroat remains out of sight but we can photograph some nice Sedge and Savi's Warblers. A male Bearded Tit is warming up in the first light and also the Reed Buntings start to sing in nice backlight.

There are quite some waders only the remain distant, we do see a Wood Sandpiper, many Ruff and a Temminck's Stint. Still we struggled with the Bluethroats, as their territorial behavior is less later in the spring but our perseverance paid off with a cooperative male next to the track.

We celebrated the nice photos with coffee, tea and biscuits before we headed off for the next target. We then drove around the countryside looking for farmer's working on the field. The fresh cut grass fields attract the opportunistic White Storks. We found a group foraging on the fields catching one after the other worm and tossing up and down their beaks.

The remaining time we spend scouting the fields for Purple Herons and other nice birds. We then got the info that 2 Red-breasted Geese we seen about 40 min away from us and decided to give it a try. After we arrived at the site the birds were far away and hidden behind the vegetation, we could see them in the telescope and entertained us with the other meadow birds. 

After that we headed back to Amsterdam with a visit of a nearby area for some more photos of Black-tailed Godwits, White Wagtails and other species and ended the day with 77 species of birds.