A few weeks ago I was able to observe a great natural phenomenon. In a very small valley somewhere in “Siegen-Wittgenstein”, there were bramblings - these beautiful birds live mainly in Scandinavian birch forests throughout the year and during the winter season they form large flocks in Germany from time to time. This year I was quite lucky because a large number of these birds lived near my hometown.
Every evening, just before sunset, troops of these finches arrived, gradually condensing into a huge flock, almost like "clouds" in the sky. According to estimates of local ornithologists, the size of the flock peaked at more than one, at most two million finches.
Again and again small flocks of many thousands flew also very low for a short moment, only a few meters above the nature enthusiasts and photographers. The caused breeze could be heard clearly - a crazy experience! Since they were attacked again and again by birds of prey, they often sat down only for a short moment in the free-standing trees of the valley. Only far after sunset they finally flew into the dense and dark fir woods to be protected from the predators in the total darkness.
I was able to watch this spectacle for three evenings and it was one of the most impressive experiences I have had in wildlife photography.
Finally, a technical note: in this series I would like to point out for once that the photos do not work at all on small displays (smartphones, small tablets), because the reproduction scale is extremely small and the image effect lives on the details - so, get to the computer 😅🖐
With best regards
Thomas
