When travelling to a birding site in the
very early morning, when it was still completely dark I found an Egyptian
Nightjar sitting under a line of trees. The bird flew a short distance and
landed where I took a couple of photos of the bird using a flashgun before it
flew again a short distance and I left it in peace. Egyptian Nightjar is an
uncommon visitor to Saudi Arabia with most birds seen in the months of August
and September where they are often seen during the day. Winter birds are also
occasionally seen mostly in the Eastern Province but they are generally seen as
single birds like the one I saw rather than in small groups as occur in the
summer months.
Jem's Birding & Ringing Exploits in the Eastern Province and elsewhere in Saudi Arabia
29 February 2016
28 February 2016
Two winter plumaged Red-necked Phalaropes - Jubail
Phil Roberts and I found two winter plumaged Red-necked Phalaropes on
some flooded Sabkha in Jubail on 26 February. This is the first time I have
seen the species in winter plumage in the Kingdom and appears to be the
earliest ever record for the Eastern Province. These two birds were behaving in
typical Phalarope manner by spinning around at the same spot feeding. They kept
quite close to the muddy edge of the flooded sabkha allowing a few photographs
to be taken. Red-necked Phalarope is an uncommon bird in the Eastern Province
of Saudi Arabia, although Sabkhat Al Fasl is the best place in the Province to
see them. Bundy’s ‘Birds of the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia’ published in
October 1989 states that they are regular in varying numbers on marshy pools in
spring but very scarce and irregular in autumn. Records are regular in Kuwait
to the north but from the Eastern Province are limited with one record from
March, scare in April and regular in May with the peak inland count being 150
birds at Abqaiq in May 1976. As shown they were regular in years gone by but
have become increasingly scarce, although in the last four years birds have
been seen each year. Recent sightings have been in May, June, August and
September.
27 February 2016
Second Saudi Arabian record of Dead Sea Sparrow - Jubail
Phil Roberts and I were birding the Jubail
area on 26 February when I came across a small flock of sparrows along some
reed bed edges. They flew a short distance and kept in a tight flock so I
assumed they would be Spanish Sparrows that occur in winter in the area and do
a similar thing. I looked at one of the birds and was more than surprised to
see it was a male Dead Sea Sparrow as species neither Phil nor I had seen
before. I alerted Phil and we saw a couple of females and then saw more males
and females together and counted at least eleven birds in total and were of the
nominate
subspecies Passer moabiticus moabiticus as they showed grey instead of yellowish underparts. The flock was
very mobile and did not allow any reasonable views or photos to be taken but it
was clear they were Dead Sea Sparrows a species only recorded once before in
the country. We followed the flock up and down the reed edge and eventually
managed to get a few reasonable photos. The previous record of Dead Sea Sparrow
was also in the same area when a flock of 60 – 70 birds were seen at
Jubail Golf Course on 13 November 1991. These birds were assigned to the
nominate subspecies Passer moabiticus moabiticus which breeds in
southern Turkey, Cyprus, Israel, western Jordan, northern Syria and central Iraq
eastwards to south-west Iran. The second subspecies yatii occurs in the
Seistan region, on the borders of eastern Iran and south-western Afghanistan. The species is partially migratory, leaving its breeding areas in autumn.
They appear to move south in Israel with vagrants seen in the Eastern Province
of Saudi Arabia (two records), Bahrain (one record) and the United Arab
Emirates (two records) with no records from Qatar or Oman.
26 February 2016
Desert Mantis
The mantids in the Saudi Arabia include both praying
mantids and ground mantids, with a total of 46 species are known from Arabia
and many are likely to occur in Saudi Arabia. One of the best known is the beautiful
green and white Lappet Mantis Blepharopsis mendica nuda, found on vegetation
such as Euphorbia larica or, in the case of the male insects, attracted to
lights at night. Another common species is the cryptically coloured Ground
Mantis Eremiaphila baueri also known as the Desert Mantis. I would like to thank Mansur Al Fahad for identifying the insect for me.
25 February 2016
Western Marsh Harrier with prey – Sabkhat Al Fasl
Whilst birding at Sabkhat Al Fasl we saw a Western Marsh Harrier trying
to pick up what looked like a dead fish from the side of the flooded sabkha.
This spectacle was very interesting so we stopped and took a few photos of the
proceedings. As the bird was interested in the prey it was less wary of us than
is normal allowing us to take a few nice photographs of it as it flew around
and whilst it was trying to pick up and retrieve the item on the mud. As we
watched it became clear that the item of food was not a dead fish as first
suspected but a dead Little Grebe and the bird made several attempts to collect
and move the Little Grebe but the dead bird was a little too heavy for the
Western Marsh Harrier and after about ten minutes it left the bird and flew
off. As a result of the action and the closeness to the bird a good series of photographs
was taken and some are shown below.
24 February 2016
Wintering Purple Herons – Sabkhat Al Fasl
Whilst
birding at Sabkhat Al Fasl recently I have been seeing a number of Purple
Herons. This species is not common in winter at the site but has been common
this winter. In the Eastern Province the Purple Heron is a locally common passage
migrant and winter visitor seen from August through April with the majority in
the coastal zone and close to the littoral. Occurrences away from the coast
occur only regularly during August to October suggesting a southerly passage
over the desert. It is scarce away from the coastal zone after November and
there is no evidence of overland passage in spring. Birds of the Riyadh Region
(Stagg 1994) mentions the species is a passage migrant and winter visitor but
has been recorded in all months of the year. Some birds transit through the
region, others remain forming a winter population that peaks in late
November/early December and remains relatively static thereafter until the
spring movement commences in March. Elsewhere in Saudi Arabia it is a common
migrant and winter visitor to all coasts and coastal wetlands and occurs inland
in areas such as Riyadh and Tabuk.
23 February 2016
Well marked male Black-winged Stilt - Jubail
Whilst birdwatching a wetland area in Jubail I
found a very well-marked male Black-winged Stilt. The bird had extensive black
markings on the head making it look superficially like an American subspecies
Black-necked Stilt. The bird was significantly different to all other
Black-winged Stilts present but a drawing in Handbook of birds of the World
(HBW) shows and male variant Black-winged Stilt looking very similar to the
bird I saw. Black-winged Stilt is a common passage migrants and occasional
breeder in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia with passage birds increasing
the numbers in March as they combine with wintering birds. Elsewhere in the
Kingdom they are also common passage migrants with smaller numbers wintering
around all coasts.
22 February 2016
Black-headed Wagtail - Jubail
Whilst birdwatching the Jubail area I came
across a very smart looking male Black-headed Wagtail feeding along a dirt
track. It was not at all afraid of the car and allowed very close approach as
it busily feed on insects. Mid-February is the start of the spring passage for
this species and Black-headed Wagtail feldegg is often the first
subspecies to occur. The Black-headed Wagtail is part of the Yellow Wagtail
complex a group of birds that are common spring and autumn passage migrants,
sometimes in hundreds. Thy pass from mid-February to May and again from early
August to mid-November with many races identifiable in the field including feldegg,
melanogrisia, lutea, flava, thunbergi and bema. In spring the
black-headed yellow wagtail feldegg (considered by some as a separate
species) is often the first subspecies to occur with bema, flava and thunbergi
following. By April, flocks of more than a hundred birds are regularly recorded
in cultivated areas. During the autumn peak passage, in October, numbers are higher
with flocks occasionally exceeding 500 birds. Occasionally they are also recorded
during summer and winter.
21 February 2016
Painted Lady near Dammam – Record by Vinu Mathew
Vinu
found and photographed a couple of Painted Lady at a site near Dammam in January 2016.
This is a common butterfly at times but as Saudi Arabia has a mostly desert
environment it is often difficult to persuade people that wildlife can be
abundant at certain times in the region. The Painted Lady is a migrant species
and their survival strategy is based on mobility and the endless search for
conditions where they can breed. The Painted Lady is the world's most
cosmopolitan butterfly and when it has a successful breeding season; individual
butterflies can fly in any direction with some travelling thousands of
kilometres. Thus if some habitat in Arabia is suddenly blessed with an
abundance of rain, some Painted Lady will almost certainly find it, breed and
lay their eggs. Their progeny will then almost certainly leave the area, so if
the area is not suitable for breeding again for many years, it won't matter;
the progeny will have found still other places to breed. Obviously many
butterflies die in such a process as this nomadic life is harsh, but the
species will survive. The Painted Lady and other migrant butterflies are less
specialized in their choice of food plant and habitat than most of the sedentary
species. This is because they can't be as fussy to survive and as a result can
live in harsher environments. If winter rains have been good and flora has
flourished the number of Painted Lady recorded increases significantly. As a
result of our recent rains there is a strong probability that a good number of
these butterflies will be seen this year.
20 February 2016
Wintering Pied Kingfishers - Jubail
The weekend of 12 February Phil and
I saw four Pied Kingfishers perched together in the reed-beds. There were two
groups of two with three being females and a single male. These birds are
wintering at the site and have been present from 23 October 2015, when a single
bird was found with numbers increasing to twelve by 5 December 2015. These
birds were part of a significant influx of Pied Kingfishers into the eastern
part of Arabia in late October and early November 2015.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)