Donana - Sept 9th - Afternoon

 

Afternoon session

Initially we visited a track with the vast Marshes viewable beyond, but with Farmland on one side and a large pool on the other. The usual culprits were present, and we searched a treeline and crops for birds, good numbers of Willow Warblers were around. A very green chunky Warbler aloft may have been Melodious but didn’t get good enough views to clinch it.

The vast Marsh we couldn’t access, you could see it was teeming with birds and a couple of largish distant Raptors.

We moved on and headed to the Salt Pans, a vast massive area next to a very wide river, I would presume this was the Guadalquivir.

These Salt Pans were alive with birds of all shapes and sizes, Greater Flamingo and White Stork dominated the big boys but the whole area of pans was teeming with waders of all sorts.

We spent quite a bit of time here, the heat was pretty impressive, as we had now sussed, you get a lot of shimmering which didn’t make for sharp photos but just seeing them was good enough.

Big flocks of Dunlin, smaller numbers of Curlew Sandpiper, occasional Little Stint, Redshank/Avocet everywhere, Little Ringed/Kentish Plover and fantastic to see good numbers of Slender Billed Gulls.

Sanderling was also seen along with a very big flock mainly made up of Bar Tailed but also a few Black Tailed Godwit mixed in, we also added Whimbrel and Ruff.

Raptors present were Booted Eagle, Common Buzzard, Marsh Harrier and the best of all, an Osprey sitting on a post.

We also saw Crested /Calandra Lark, Red Rumped Swallow, Bee Eater, Hoopoe and Griffon Vulture.

After time spent here, we moved on to another area favoured by Rufous Bush Robin, not a common bird now in Spain, they were known to favour this area. Despite a thorough good look around, we couldn’t locate one, but we did connect with our only Cirl Bunting of the trip.

Whilst also watching a pair of Red Rumped Swallows, I looked up and there was a dot, obviously a big Raptor, initial thought was Black Vulture and Pablo confirmed, another superb bird and one we didn’t expect in this neck of the woods. Grabbed a couple of distant photos of it, enough to confirm the ‘white feet’ and darker underwing.

                                                                 Slender Billed Gull

                                                                Red Rumped Swallow

                                                                       Black Vulture

It was time to call it a day, we were all pretty tuckered out with the heat, Pablo our guide had pulled out all the stops, shown us some stunning birds and he was worth every penny, it had been a fantastic day.

We finished the day on 104 species so going well.

Our next day was again with Pablo, this was La Janda and Barbate Marshes……., hopefully for one of my favourite raptors Black Winged Kite!

Coto Donana!

 

September 9th Day 2

Morning session



Chipiona

This was the first day of our guided tour and was one of the venues that personally, I had always wanted to visit and long been on the radar – Coto Donana.

Pablo our guide picked us up in darkness around 6.30a.m, the plan being to get on the road for the 2-hour drive to Donana, and more specifically arrive at the Little Swift colony around dawn.

The destination was the port of Chipiona and as we arrived, the Little Swifts were already active, a tick for most of us, we spent a good hour watching these little beauties.
Still breeding, as they approached the nest they trilled, fantastic little birds who put a smile on your face with their antics and vocals around the nest building.

A great start to the morning, we also added Pallid Swift, a couple of Turnstone, ever present Yellow Legged Gulls, House Martin and Red Rumped Swallow. Audouins Gull was also seen, however brekkie was calling so we headed off.

After breakfast it was down to Chipiona Beach, where we added a good number variety of waders to the list, this included the first Kentish Plover along with Little/Sandwich/Common and Caspian Tern and a single Mediterranean Gull.

Zitting Ciscola, Sardinian/Cetti’s Warbler also gave themselves up and I gained my 2nd tick here in the shape of a Waxbill.

A good start to the morning and thoroughly enjoyable for all of us, we were now up to 53 species seen so looking good. Our next destination was aptly named for obvious reasons -

Stinky Pools (Lagunas de Camino Colarado)



In fact, there were 3 of these nicknamed pools, not that big and they did pong, but boy did they hold some goodies, everywhere you looked, there were birds of note and we all enjoyed good views and got some decent photos.

Exiting the vehicle, we straight away encountered a couple of very approachable Pied Flycatchers, however there was so much going on the 1st pool, it was hard to know where to look and give your attention to.
At the water’s edge were a number Little Ringed Plover, Black Winged Stilt, Green Sandpiper, 2 Purple Swamphens, 4 Temmincks Stint, Glossy Ibis, Ringed Plover and Greater Flamingo as an appetiser, stunning.

We all had a good look round this Pool before moving up and across the road to the next pool, this was a little bigger.

Immediately on view were Spoonbill, Green Sandpiper, more Little Ringed Plover, a few Glossy Ibis,2 more Purple Swamphens, Common Teal,2 Greater Flamingo’s, Kingfisher, Marbled Duck, Little and a Cattle Egret. Looking up showed a pale phase Booted Eagle forever searching, pretty low so could see all the head movements. This was without doubt better views of a Raptor than El Algarroba – little did I know what was to come over the next few days!

Little Grebe were plentiful as was Mallard so after getting yet more photos, we headed round to the 3rd Pool.

We immediately got on a Red Knobbed Coot located by Pablo, and we then saw around 4 White Headed Duck, another Glossy Ibis, Shoveler but a goodie was a roosting Night Heron in trees. A bit distant but nonetheless a good bird to see.

As we were watching a Common Sandpiper, 6 waders arrived, circulating around before disappearing, on the limited views they looked good for Curlew Sandpiper.

Out of nowhere a Squacco Heron arrived, landed and gave pretty good viewing, it had a mouth full of Dragons and would suspect these were Lesser Emperors, they seemed to be just about everywhere. Along with the Night heron, 2 great birds that we rarely see.

Another bird new for me and the chaps was Black Headed Weaver, 2 of these flew across the Pools, although not sure of their status in Spain.

We then left the ‘stinky pools’, a very productive area, thoroughly enjoyable and it bought the trip list up to 78.



More from Day 2 from the afternoon of our guided tour on the next update……………….

Spain at last!

 

This has been a long time coming, it was organized prior to Covid 19 and was subsequently cancelled 3 times, before we finally got to Tarifa on September 8th, 2022.

Tarifa is Spain’s hotspot for Raptor migration to and from Africa, with several watchpoints which were localised to our hotel. We stayed at Hotel Meson De Sancho, I can recommend it, anywhere that has Iberian Chiffchaff, Short Toed Treecreeper and Firecrests in the Gardens has got to be good. It was a really nice hotel, superb accommodation with great food, we roomed in exterior log cabins.

We flew Gatwick to Gibraltar with EasyJet, with a journey time of around 2hours 20 minutes, the trip was planned from September 8th and then flying home on the 12th. The idea was 2 days of guided birding on the 9th and 10th with the remaining days bashing the watchpoints.

The party consisted of myself, Lee Brown, Russ Sherriff and Steve Bacon and we used Birding the Straits (highly recommended) for our 2 days of guided birding.

                                                          Just about to eat, great views

El Algarroba Watchpoint Sept 8th

I first visited this watchpoint in 2017, the approach road was awful then (rock through the bottom of the engine sump), little has changed and the track is still hazardous!

Having a few hours to spare in the afternoon after arrival, we covered it from 3.00 – 5.00pm, not expecting too much due to the lateness of the day.

There were already around 8 birders on station, and we subsequently learnt that this was one of the 2 recording watchpoints. It was very hot and the heat was pretty intense, little wind and what birds we did see were fairly high.

For a 2-hour afternoon period we didn’t do too bad, connecting with several of Spain’s specialities. These included Griffon Vulture – 6, Black Kite – 13, Booted Eagle – 6, Short Toed Eagle – 2, Sparrowhawk – 2 and a single Honey Buzzard on the Raptor front.

A single Red Rumped Swallow and 2 Alpine Swift were the pick of the hirundine powering through, however the stars of the show had to be 20+ Bee Eaters who dropped into feed.

These gave outstanding close views, exceptionally colourful and vocal, they were great to watch wheeling around hunting, just don’t see enough of these in the UK.

                                                                    The boys hard at it

                                                                     Black Kite

                                                                      Honey Buzzard

                                                                  Short Toed Eagle

We got a few photos and called it a day, a bit disappointed that the Raptors were so high, however over the next few days that definitely changed!

If you visit the site watch the road.