Common Crossbill

Today I made a long hike across the Strabrechtse Heide. Near the Starven, I heard some birds calling: singing common Crossbills! It did not take long to find them with the binoculars and a female was sitting on a branch and two males were singing in the background. Before I got the camera out of the bag, they flew and disappeared. But not for long! They were flying between a solitary tree near the Starven and the forest edge and frequently sitting on top of the trees. Now with the camera ready, I was able to get some shots and could slowly approach them. As on any Sunday, there are a lot of other hikers around and on Sunday typically with their dogs and small kids… A couple were approaching and spooked the birds and one of them flew from the ground to a tree about 5 meters from me! The female sat there for a few seconds and I was able to fire several shots on my camera. Beautiful! Then all the birds flew again as the playing kids approached. The birds slowly moved into the forest and out of view. But my morning walk had been perfect and produced some good photos of the Crossbills and also some short sound recordings. Analysing the sounds using a sonogram showed that the Crossbills were of type A.