Birds in Brasil

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

John Mudd - Master Builder at work

I showed you John Mudd (João da Barro) in a previous post. Up to now I had never seen him actually building his fantastic nest even though we have several of them in our neighbourhood.

This post is a collection of photos of John Mudd and his wife Jane Mudd building their nest. It took three months to construct.

Note: These photos are from a pps by Miguel Durante of Poços de Caldas. He has kindly permitted me to publish them in this blog.

John Mudd is a pretty bird about the size of a Canadian Robin.

The construction begins!

The nest is finished and ready for the couple to live in. The curious thing is that after all that work they only use it once. They build a new nest each year.

Photos by Miguel

Monday, June 2, 2008

"I See You"

This "I See You" is in our Jabuticaba tree in our back yard.

He has a drink of water many times each day.

He is very much aware of me and the camera all the time.

Sometimes he just sits and watches me. He is puffed up because he eats the dog food on our verandah . But his favourite foods are the nuts in the Restaurant Tree and the Jabuticaba Berries.The "I See You" or "Great Kiskadee" (Bem-te-vi in Portuguese) is one of the most beautiful and attractive birds in South America. The popular name "Bem-te-vi" comes from the three notes in its singing that sound like "I've Seen You" .

To the "Tupi" (native Indian tribe) it sounded like "Nei-Nei"; to the "Guarani" (another Indian tribe) it sounded like "Pitangua".

Here is one in a tree in front of our house.

Here is another on the power lines.

We call this the Restaurant Tree because so many different birds feed there all day. They all love these nuts. The I See You come in early morning frm about 5:00 to 8:00, and again in late afternoon, from 5:00 p.m. to 6:30. There are many there and they make a loud racket. They seem to be having a great party every day.

This couple visit our Jabuticaba trees in the back yard. They are there every day

This is a small one, probably quite young.

They are very distinctive with their yellow breast and black mask.

Sometimes they are difficult to see even when out in the open like on this roof.

Every morning I am wakened by the I See You's singing. Our bedroom window looks out on the Jabuticaba trees and several I See You's greet the sunrise every morning. Their voices are quite loud so we do not need alarm clocks.

They truly are very beautiful.

Photos by Urso Branco

Sunday, December 30, 2007

Blue Herons

The first time I saw a Blue Heron in Águas da Prata was at night (around 10:30 p.m.) He was fishing. I was on the foot bridge and he was about three meters away. He watched me intently as I took his photograph using flash. Look at his long neck! They hang out near the foot bridge over the pond in Praça Basílio Ceschin.

The next time I saw a Blue Heron he was under the foot bridge fishing.

Notice how short his neck is. Is he the same bird? I don´t think so.

Then I saw this fellow with the White Heron. The white had just caught two fish at the same time. She dropped on behind that small bush and the Blue Heron stole it.

A few days later I saw the two together again.

He just stayed there and watched me take his photo near the foot bridge.

I had always wondered if there was more than one Blue. This fellow flew in on the other side of the foot bridge. So now I was certain there were at least two.

Then along came this fellow.

Like the others he watched me intently as I approached taking his photograph.

I was able to get as close as 2 meters (6 feet) to get this excellent. detailed photo.

So now we know there are three Blue Herons in Águas da Prata. They are, "No Neck", "Medium Neck" and "Long Neck" *SMILE*

Photos by Urso Branco