Summertime, and the livin’ is easy, said the song. But it is not that easy when you are a bird in a place with little water. The summer is itself a challenge for birds. And we can help and, why not, take some photos.

As the hot summer days arrive and the temperatures are rising he birds are thirsty and you can help them with a simple dish in your balcony where you can provide some water. Of course, you can go beyond with more sophisticated drinking pools, or even setting a pond in the forest. The most important thing here is that you set it in some place where you are really sure that the cats cannot get the birds. We don’t want that our drinking pool becomes the cat self-service, right? Something that you have to think about is the depth of your pond. Imagine yourself having a pair of 5 cm legs and no hands and figure out how you could get the water. They will like to have a bath in your pond, so make them easy by setting a swallow drinking pool or at least, something with shores where the birds can get and drink from.  Watch out! If your drinking pool is built having a distance between the water and a vertical wall and having no slopes, it could became a deathtrap for your friends as they cannot get out and they will die drowned.

Think about the kind of birds you wish to help. Are they usually at ground level like a Sandgrouse or a Lark? Or are they usually moving around the trees like a Golden Oriole? This is important to know before you design your drinking pool. It has to be easy for them to find the water. And, be patient, a drinking pool is not a short time project. You should provide water regularly and avoid that it comes dry. With the time you will get more and more birds coming to drink.

How to photograph birds in a drinking pool? You can take advantage on these hot days for taking photos. You just have to set a hide at a proper distance to the water. Provide some nice perches, if required and go for it! Of course, your hide has to face the right light, are you planning to take photos in the morning or in the afternoon? Try to avoid the hide shadow on the area you expect to have the birds. A nice shooting angle for those birds coming to drink by walking is a ground level point of view, you can dig and set your hide in a hole or you can try to take advantage on the slopes on the ground.

So, is the water playing a role in your photo? Do you wish to catch this photo with the drinking bird and a drop falling from its bill? Are you thinking in reflections? Or, maybe the water is just the way to get them close enough, but you really wish to take your photos in a perch?

WHERE ARE THE PHOTO LOGISTICS DRINKING POOLS?

From the springtime to the end of summer we offer a number of drinking pool hides in different places all over Spain.

In Montgai, from the very beginning of the season in April until the end of August we have a hide with room for two people. It is a arable land area and so the birds there are: Tree Sparrow, Corn Bunting, Southern Grey Shrike, Jackdaw, Woodpigeon, and sometimes the Montagu’s Harrier like to come for a drink. Afternoon session hide. This is a water hole; the water is just the resource for attracting the birds, not a part of the photo.

Claret is the land of our drinking pools. There are three of them there. One for the morning session, in a wood close to grazing lands, Turtle Dove, Spanish Green Woodpecker, Dartford Warbler, Cirl Bunting, Bonelli’s Warbler, Serin, Rock Sparrow, etc. Here you can get some reflections. And two in the afternoon light in arable lands and scrub lands with birds like Turtle Dove, Nightingale, Jay, Subalpine Warbler and if it is hot enough some good odds for Golden Oriole. All those hides in Claret are for two photographers. Water hole.

Solsona is not too far to Claret and there, at 1.100 meters high in the mountain we have set a hide for Crossbills and Citril Finch (and a good number of forest species like Crested Tit, Blue Tit, Dunnock, Mistle Thrush, etc.) with reflections.  Both, morning and afternoon sessions are possible here.

València. Close to Alborache village in the essence of the Mediterranean atmosphere we have set a reflections drinking pool where birds like Spanish Green Woodpecker, Sardinian Warbler, Golden Finch, Linnet, Nightingale, Spotted Flycatcher , etc. come to drink. A nice option for spending an easy wildlife photo session if you are visiting  València.

Murcia, two different hides in two distant places for Crossbill, Rock Bunting, Cirl Bunting, Jay, etc. One is in Sierra Espuña, close to our Golden Eagle hide and the other one is in Cehegín area, close to our Black Weathear and Blue Rock Thrush facility. Both are morning hides. Also in Murcia is our Rufous tailed Scrub Robin hide where we have set a little water hole for getting some more birds there. Also in the same area we have our ground level (but seated) hide for Stone Curlew, where these amazing birds come to drink.

Near Barcelona, in Granollers area we have the most surprising hide for us. It is in a forest and in the last years we had not only Hawkfinch, Robin, Crested Tit and Red Squirrels but also Goshawk and Sparrowhawk.

And last but not least, our two summers highlights, the Sandgrouse hides in Belchite area. Pin-tailed Sandgrouse and Black-bellied Sandgrouse share the refection drinking pool with Calandra Lark, Skylark, Short-toed Lark, Lesser Short-toed Lark, Turtle Dove, Corn Bunting, Southern Grey Shrike and who knows what more. They are two different hides for three people each.

We have come here to do conservation through photography. We propose you to participate in a new project. Helping a Bonelli’s Eagle couple. How? Taking pictures on them. We explain it more.

The Arribes del Duero is one of the most rugged and unknown areas of Castilla y León. The terraced slopes go down to the river, creating a landscape that is difficult to describe. In some stretches the river runs in a rocky canyon and here is the perfect breeding habitat for the Bonelli’s Eagle. The relative short number of rabbits lead  the Junta de Castilla y León support the conservation of the species by providing supplementary feeding. These contributions should only ensure the reproduction of the Bonelli’s Eagle pairs without in any case making them dependent.

The Arribes del Duero is one of the wildest places in the Iberian Peninsula.

As of 2014, Carlos Sánchez, from Náyade, the company through which Photo Logistics operates in Castilla y León (this deserves a separate post, we will do it), made the proposal to take on the supplementary feeding of a pair of Bonelli’s Eagle and to build a photographic hide. The proposal was accepted, it was beneficial for the Administration that could put its efforts on other projects, for Photo Logistics, which would have a hide of an iconic species and for the Bonelli’s Eagles that would have guaranteed a supplementary feeding.

This couple had not an easy living, a year before Carlos Sánchez began to feed them the male died electrocuted. Like so many others. Soon a young male joined the female who was still established in the area. The young male, let’s call him Esla, did what he could but his inexperience made reproduction difficult despite his efforts and those of the female, which we will name Juana. In spite of everything they took out young Eagles ahead in 2015 and 2016, thanks in large part to the supplementary feeding .

Juana and Esla, one of the Bonelli’s Eagle pairs of the Arribes del Duero.

But, this was just begun.  A wild fire completely destroyed the breeding area of ​​the couple in the summer of 2017. They were moments of many nerves and downhearted for all of us who had been involved in the conservation of the Arribes del Duero. We did not know anything about the Bonelli’s Eagles. One of our hides was completely burned and the landscape was discouraging. But, in conservation, laments are pointless. We had to make a decision.

Moment of the fire by our camera-trap

General view a few days after the fire.

one of our hides was completely burned.

Commercially (we are a committed company, but at the same time we have to pay the salaries), we needed a new hide of Bonelli’s Eagle, and we did it. Well, Carlos did it, with an huge effort he found a different couple and he began to bait them. But, we did not stop thinking about Juana and Esla. At last they appeared in the burned area. We could not abandon them. We resume the supplementary feeding without waiting to take photographers to a burned area.

Esla and Juana continue to feed on the stone.

we have put new innkeepers not burned and the vegetation already springs up again in the area.

And here comes our deal to you for: help us to keep the supplementary feeding of Juana and Esla. The area is burned, but the stone where the Bonelli’s Eagles feed is still there, the couple is still there, the hide is still there and they feed on the dead rabbit that Carlos supplies them and we have put some new unburned perches. We propose a very low price from now until the month of June, when the chickens fly: € 100 per person, with the condition that you are two people. You take  photos at a much lower price and we can keep  feeding a pair of Bonelli’s Eagles. Deal?

You have already noticed that feeling, right? You see how the days get longer, the first arrivals of the migrating birds and the trees that bloom. There comes that moment of dreaming lights when you cannot think about anything else. And PHOTO LOGISTICS offers you the best hides so you can get the most out of spring.

We reveal where the hides are:

CASTILLA Y LEÓN (NW SPAIN):

Here we combine two zones: the steppes of Villafáfila for Great Bustard from the end of March to the beginning of May. Two hides of two seats each, with room enough for spending the necessary hours in a pleasant way. Also, in one of these hides we feed Red Kites, Black Kites, Buzzards and Marsh Harrier, so that the wait is more easy. And on the Zamora shore of the Arribes del Duero, we have already recovered our hides from the last summer wild fires and we can offer again the hides for Bonelli’s Eagle and Golden Eagle. Two hides that will give you the better opportunities for two great European raptors, and baited with dead rabbit.

EAST COAST:

The new thing in this house: we have joined some hides in València ares to the efforts of the companions of Murcia. The results is an vast area, from near Llíria (Valencia) to Alhama de Murcia where you can get the following species: Bonelli’s Eagle and Goshawk near Llíria. A hide for birds of the Mediterranean scrubland with reflections in Alborache, near Buñol. Golden Eagle and Crossbill drinking pool in Alhama, in the regional park of Sierra Espuña, Also in Alhama you can get Stone Curlew in a drinking pool in which we have high expectations. Without leaving Murcia, we have a hide of Black Wheatear where you can also take photos on Blue Rock Thrush. Sure Murcia will give more for this spring; we will inform you through the usual channels.

CATALONIA AND ARAGON:

At Montgai we are already heating engines. The season will begin at the beginning of April with the Little Bustard, Little Owl and Stone Curlew. Latter on more birds will reach the steppes: Montagu’s harrier, Roller, Green Woodpecker in the drinking pool, Hoopoe, Bee-eater, etc. You already know, there are seventeen hides to drive you crazy from the early morning to the late afternoon.

In the vicinity of Solsona, an hour from Montgai awaits you the best season of the hide of Cogulers for Lammergeier, and a series of drinking pools from the high mountains to the flat lands: Crossbills and Citril Finch, Black-eared Wheatear, Turtle Dove, Dartford Warbler and Subalpine Warbler. Specific hides for Rufous-tailed Rock Thrush and Blue Rock Thrush, Bee-eater or Hoopoe.

A little further north, near Tremp we offer you the possibility of photographing Genet in daylight. But, the highlights in Tremp are the raptors: What about Fígols hide for Egyptian vulture and Black and Red Kite in the morning and Black Vulture hide in the afternoon? And if you want to come with your family, do not hesitate: La Terreta.

Do you want to take pictures, but cannot get away from Barcelona? you have two hides in the Vallès area: the Kingfisher in Lliçà d’Amunt and the drinking pool  in the forest near Santa Agnès, where on hot days the Goshawk become regular it did all last summer.

In Bonansa (Huesca) the hide of Lammergeier that this winter has given us so good moments will continue to operate. And in Belchite (Zaragoza) we will start the season at the end of March with the Dupont Lark hides. And from June the Sandgrouse hides.

No doubt, the photos from photographic hide are another thing. The water birds can be photographed in many ways, but the approach, low point of view, background and orientation of the light that you have by using a hide in the Estany d’Ivars i Vila-sana or  the Delta del Ebro are unbeatable.

Also in these areas we are designing new hides and other services. Here we only inform you of those that already work. Be in touch with us through the information channels of Photo Logistics.

IN MANY HIDES THERE ARE OCCASIONS THAT ONLY APPEAR FOR A FEW DAYS. EVEN THERE ARE HIDES THAT DO NOT ARRIVE TO APPEAR ON THE WEB BECAUSE THEY HAVE A LIFE TOO MUCH EPHEMERAL. IF YOU SEND US A MESSAGE FROM WHATSAPP WITH YOUR NAME AND THE WORD “ALARM” AT 638887681 WE WILL INCLUDE YOU IN THE LIST OF DISSEMINATION (NOT GROUP) OF ALERTS IN HIDES.THE DIFFUSION LIST DOES NOT SERVE TO SEND OFFERS OR TO GIVE INFORMATION REPEATLY. WE ONLY INFORM OPPORTUNITIES WHICH, OTHERWISE, COULD BE MISSED.

PHOTO TERRA grows as a festival. This is the second edition and we want to make a strong commitment to the image as a tool for awareness of the environmental problems we face, from the village of Tremp to the entire world. And within this bet we have created a contest for those photographers who have in the audiovisual their way to send a message: VIDEOTERRA.

The contest is open to everyone, from any corner of the planet that wants to show the beauty of any event in Nature, a threatened species, an environmental denunciation or the intimate relationship between the rural world and nature.

VIDEOTERRA rewards the impact, the short and concise message of a video or audiovisual no longer than three minutes, because it is about getting an idea to the general population.

Do you like to participate?