Early Spring Floods on Morava River - pt. 1

[Saturday, March 3, 2012]

There was very fine forecast for the weekend, so I decided to try get up early and catch my morning train. I wanted to visit on of my favourite sites near Morava river. Morava creates borderline between Slovakia and Austria. This interesting area of well preserved floodplains is part of IBA Morava. There is a bunch of images so I will split this photoreport into two parts.

 

 Five minutes before arrival of my train on Bratislava-Lamač train station.

 

Just 20 minutes later I got off the train in Devínske Jazero. Finally new train - day has fine start.

View on meadows called Hoferské lúky. That tree line in the background shows Morava river banks. I love these early mornings here. You know that you have full day ahead and you are already "in action".

Here is the real end of the city. Northernmost settlement of Bratislava ends with "Old Bicycle Buffet" - popular point of interest for cyclists. Later in afternoon I've met already few of them.

Great sighting of Yellowhammer (Emberiza citrinella) illuminated in the morning sun.

In this place river Malina pours into Morava.

Just compare it to conditions that were exactly 3 weeks earlier. River Malina was completely frozen and Morava was full of floating ice

Cormorants (Phalacrocorax carbo) are resident here.

But Wood Pigeons (Columba palumbus) are here just few days...

...and Starlings (Sturnus vulgaris) as well.

 I was counting with obstacles in form of high water so I put on my gum-boots. There were only 5cm of height of my boots left but my feet remained dry.

Meadows were flooded. Now you know why they are called floodplains.

Water was slowly creeping on. Here can river overflow onto the meadows more than 3km away from its usual river-basin.

Oxbow lakes are getting fresh water. I spotted few Mute Swans (Cygnus olor), male Wigeon (Anas penelope) and tens of Mallards (Anas platyrhynchos).

White-tailed Eagle (Haliaeetus albicilla) was perching on the tree. Carrion Crow (Corvus corone) was perching nearby but it flew away just a moment before this shot.

Hundreds of Greylag Geese (Anser anser) and White-fronted Geese (Anser albifrons) were landing nearby.

This was the end of my walk this way. The water level was too high beyond this line.

I turned back, wade 30 metres again and decided to continue my walk along Malina river. The rest of the day you can find in part 2.

Business Trip to Neusiedler See - Seewinkel National Park

[Thursday, March 1, 2012]

My colleagues from travel agency watching.sk have planned a business trip to Neusiedler See area. It included meeting with manager from Neusiedler See - Seewinkel National Park in the National Park Information Centre in Illmitz. We needed to discuss an excursion which will be part of Pannonian Bird Experience 2012. The other thing on our "to do list" was to check accomodation possibilities in Illmitz and nearby lying villages on the Hungarian part of Lake Neusiedl. I needed to dust off my ability to speak Hungarian but later I was satisfied with my performance. In the spare time we tried to make some birdwatching in this beautiful area. We visited several places but it's better to see it. And the late afternoon short stop on one watching tower brought a lifelist tick for two of us.

Modern building of information centre and headquarters of Neusiedler See - Seewinkel NP.

 We have about 20 minutes before the meeting with manager so we visited this hide.

This was the view from the hide - low grey clouds over Zicklacke periodic lake.

One of the Greylag Geese (Anser anser) that were feeding just few meters from the hide.

On the top of the watching tower next to the information centre.

Great Spotted Woodpecker (Dendrocopos major) seen from the watching tower.

Flatlands of Seewinkel.

After visiting of several guesthouses in Hungary we moved to the Hungarian part of the lake near Fertóujlak

Large flock of Geese was composed mostly of Greylag Geese (Anser anser) and White-fronted Geese (Anser albifrons). There were only few Bean Geese (Anser fabalis). Beside the Geese man could spot here 5 different duck species of Anas genus (Mallard, Gadwall, Teal, Pintail, Shoveler) and my favourite Shelducks.

Diving Pintails (Anas acuta).

Northern Shovelers (Anas clypeata) were showing their diving skills too.

My beloved Shelducks (Tadorna tadorna).

After the late lunch in Fertód we drove back to Bratislava,  but we decided to make two more stops near Illmitz. We stopped near Zicklacke (the same lake that could be seen from mentioned hide). I just asked if we have 10 spare minutes to go up on the watching tower and check some birds. In a while I spotted something that I have never seen before. Shelduck's rusty cousins. Two Ruddy Shelducks (Tadorna ferruginea) were feeding amidst Geese. What a great observation! It was lifelist tick for me and Katka. None of the photos is good enough but maybe this video:  With Ruddy Shelducks in our minds we moved to reeds that are all around the lake Neusiedl.

 Crisscross of channels, reeds and open water.

Sunset over vast reed belt.

List of observed bird species during the day:

Common Pheasant (Phasianus colchicus)
Bean Goose (Anser fabalis) 3000 (all Geese together)
Greylag Goose (Anser anser)
White-fronted Goose (Anser albifrons)
Mute Swan (Cygnus olor) 8
Shellduck (Tadorna tadorna) 15
Ruddy Shellduck (Tadorna ferruginea) 2; Lifer !!!
Gadwall (Anas strepera) 50
Wigeon (Anas penelope) 10
Mallard (Anas platyrhynchos)
Northern Shoveler (Anas clypeata) 3
Pintail (Anas acuta) 3
Teal (Anas crecca) 30
Pochard (Aythya ferina) 20
Common Goldeneye (Bucephala clangula) 1
Great Egret (Egretta alba) 4
Great Cormorant (Phalacrocorax carbo) 3
Hen Harrier (Circus cyaneus) 4
Common Buzzard (Buteo buteo) 15
Common Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus) 7
Coot (Fulica atra)
Lapwing (Vanellus vanellus)
Black-headed Gull (Chroicocephalus ridibundus)
large Gull (Larus cachinnans/michahellis)

Feral Pigeon (Columba livia f. domestica)
Wood Pigeon (Columba palumbus) 2
Collared Dove (Streptopelia decaocto)
Great Spotted Woodpecker (Dendrocopos major) 1
Common Magpie (Pica pica)
Jackdaw (Coloelus monedula) 2
Rook (Corvus frugilegus)
Hooded Crow (Corvus cornix)
Great Tit (Parus major)
Blue Tit (Cyanistes caeruleus)
Common Starling (Sturnus vulgaris)
Blackbird (Turdus merula)
House Sparrow (Passer domesticus)
Tree Sparrow (Passer montanus)
Greenfinch (Carduelis chloris) H
Goldfinch (Carduelis carduelis)
Reed Bunting (Emberiza schoeniclus) 3

number of individuals is mentioned only if we were able to count them or make an estimation; "H" means that we heard it