In June / July 2019 I made a trip to the Indigirka delta (Siberia, Russia) to photograph Ross’s Gulls...

In June/July 2019 I made a trip to the Indigirka Delta, the north part of Siberia, Russia. The purpose of the trip is to photograph arctic birds. The main goal is Ross’s Gulls in breeding plumage...

Sunday February 10th, Monday February 11th
After a flight from Amsterdam via Moscow I arrived at the airport in Irkutsk. There I was picked up by my guide Sasha (Alexandr Povarintsev) and our driver Nicolay, arranged by Rubythroat Birdingtours of Michiel Valkenburg. This first day (-34^oC) we visited some locations for orientation. Photographing Baikal Bullfinch (Grey Bullfinch or Pyrrhula cineracea) would be difficult, there were not many birds of this species observed last winter. I took some pictures of a Waxwing with backlight. After a traditional Russian meal, we went to bed early...

Redpolls from Greenland and from Iceland are called one (sub)species by some people, namely rostrata. I think this is not correct, because both redpolls are quite different.

A fascinating place to watch redpolls is Barrow, in the north part of Alaska. Are the redpolls in this remote arctic place Mealy Redpolls (flammea) or Coues’s Coues’s Arctic Redpolls (exilipes)? Good question!

Together with Edwin Winkel, we travelled to Barrow, Alaska in October 2018. And all this to photograph Ross's Gulls!

In this article I’ll try to write about a ‘redpoll issue’, namely a wrongly claimed moult limit in the wing of a redpoll.

Wood Warbler, Katwijk, the Neterlands

Nutcracker, Triberg, Germany

In March, 2018 I visited northern Sweden for a week. My main target was to photograph Bullfinches...

The Parrot Crossbill is a scare visitor in the Netherlands…

A Bufflehead is staying in Barendrecht, the Netherlands for many years…

A Coues’s Arctic Redpoll is staying in Arnhem, the Netherlands for a few weeks (February 2018). The bird joints a group of approximately 30 Mealy Redpolls…

As a child, looking in my bird guide, I really liked the paintings of the Ross’ gull. I was believing that I would never see this beautiful Arctic bird in real life...

When you regularly stay in the far north, it is a nice change to book a trip to Florida. So at the end of November 2017, I traveled together with my wife to this beautiful and sunny State. I promised my partner not to spend too much time on bird photography, it should be a romantic holiday. I’m not sure if that worked out well...

What does the Hornemann’s Arctic Redpolls look like after moulting their plumage? To answer this question, I took the plane to Greenland at the end of October 2017...

Long, long time ago, as a 15-year-old-boy, I saw the Wallcreeper in The Netherlands, at the VU-building in Amsterdam (1989). From that moment on I fell in love with this bird.

Most men have a hobby. Some are encouraging their favourite soccer club, some become a wonderful cook, other go running, start saving stamps or maybe even start saving tattoos...

In January, 2017, I visited St. John's, Canada for a week. My main target was to photograph Kumlien's Gull at the Quidi Vidi Lake...

Here you'll find an overview of all redpoll-articles of my website. Enjoy reading...

I like urban birding, especially in Autumn because the colours are so beautiful!

Red-breasted Flycatcher, adult, Oostende, Belgium

In two weeks’ time (September 2016) we went from Bologna via Florence, Sienna and the picturesque village of Pienza to Rome. The reason: holiday!

Since September 2016 I’m the proud owner of a Canon EOS 5D mark iv…

Almost everyone has a weakness for owls. Of course we knew that long before Harry Potter. I have yet to meet a person who doesn't love these birds.

The Sand Martin is not only our smallest swallow, it’s also the swallow that, compared to other swallows, arrives the earliest in Springtime. You would already see these amusing birds in March...

In June 2016, Gerard Visser and myself visited Bulgaria to shoot Wallcreepers.

This is my third article about ‘less is more’ it surely won’t be the last! (see link to second and first article). ‘Less is more’ has become really my favorite thing. I'm even considering selling my 500-mm-telephoto lens as  it’s lying around in my basement uselessly (that being said, I keep using it regularly).

Act I: I grew up in the city of Rotterdam together with my parents and my older brother (Henk). But as a four year old, I suddenly got a new brother: what a nice surprise! My brand-new brother, named Jaap, was already around thirteen years old when he was introduced to our family...