Thursday 8 December 2016

Butchered!

While we were walking on Comber's Beach in Pacific Rim National Park, we saw a Northern Shrike, identifiable from the Loggerhead shrike by the patch of yellow on the bill. Shrikes found their common name as the Butcher bird, because of their habit of killing small birds, mammals and insects and impaling them on barbed wire and twigs.
Shrikes are showy birds and this one flew alongside us for our whole walk.

Funnily enough, after looking for a shrike for all this time and finally finding one (it has been a hard search!) the very next day, Bingo! another shrike at the Nanaimo River Estuary.
And five days later at the Riefel Bird Sanctuary in Delta, there was another one! I guess Northern Shrikes have decided to be my Christmas present this month.

Field sketch, Northern Shrike

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