Birdwatchers on Hvar between May and September will encounter beautiful colourful bee-eaters. The European Bee-Eater (Merops apiaster) is a gorgeous bird which migrates between tropical Africa and southern Europe. Occasional pairs have tried to breed in Southern England but only five pairs in the last fifty years. On Hvar they can most often be heard…
Hvar is not just the island of sun, wine, and nude beaches. Because of its lush vegetation and plentiful water, it is an important staging post for migrating birds, and many of them spend the summer here. The lack of pesticides on the island is also a big factor in keeping the bird and other…
Remember when the night skies were full of stars? Not just a few random bright dots on an otherwise dark backdrop – but whole drifts of fine-grained pinpoints where the more you look, the more you see? The structure of the Milky Way on clear view as it wheels above you? Shooting stars? Such is…
We wrote about swifts before and also about swallows and martins. But Hvar is the summer home of a whole set of other birds, many of them rare or non-existent in more northern climes. We just saw our first flock of Bee Eaters (Merops apiaster). This colourful bird winters in deepest Africa, but comes to warmer parts…
I love the music of Dalmatia. Here’s another song I often find myself humming – a lovely lyrical description of fishermen setting out in their boats before dawn, accompanied by bickering seagulls, while everyone else sleeps. This is the wonderful Ribari (Fishermen) by Vinko Coce, with some beautifully evocative scenes of the Adriatic in this…
Ok so Mara said she would not mention the swift (Common Swift or Apus Apus) in her nesting activities blog. Indeed it is not hard to understand why. The bird whistles through the air at up to 50mph emitting a non-musical screetch as it does so. It is very hard to photograph or film and…
Our local housemartins are busy. You can see them swooping up under eaves and into small corners to build their nests. It’s just amazing how they can get a grip on what looks like a sheer wall to me! Here’s a time-lapse video of the birds coming in to select their sites. This house overlooking…
Go Hvar 
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