Some bird records from the Jubail area – Bird records by Mohammed Al-Ruqaya

I recently received an e-mail from Mohammed Al-Ruqaya a birdwatcher and photographer from the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia who sent me a few of his photos he has taken in the Jubail area in the last two years. He has very kindly allowed me to use the photos on my website some of which some are shown below. One of the photos is of a White-breasted Kingfisher from last winter at Sabkhat Al Fasl and another a Common Kingfisher from the same site. The White-throated Kingfisher is a scarce winter visitor to the region, but more and more records are being seen in recent winters so, hopefully, some birds may stay and breed. The other birds photographed are regular migrants or winter visitors to the area although some are not so easy to get good photographs of.

Common Kingfisher

White-throated Kingfisher

Collared Pratincole

European Bee-eater 

Red-backed Shrike

Red-spotted Bluethroat

Spotted Flycatcher

A few re-traps – Alba Marsh (Bahrain)

An early morning visit to Alba Marsh saw us arrive well before first light to set up the nets. It was a very cold but windless day, with almost perfect conditions for catching birds. We never catch very many birds in Bahrain and I am very envious of the numbers caught and ringed in a day in Israel and Turkey for  example but we still continue to see what we can catch and learn. Last weekend saw us re-trap a number of birds including three Clamorous Reed Warblers (20/4/2012, 25/10/2013 & 03/01/2014), Common Kingfisher (25/10/2013), Graceful Prinia (20/01/2012) and Water Pipit (09/08/2012). A couple of these were interesting for us and although all birds had been ringed by us at the same site we had not had a re-trap of a Water Pipit from a previous year before. This shows that Water Pipit, along with Bluethroat are site faithful over the years to this small marsh where they return in the winter. The Graceful Prinia is also the oldest re-trap we have on record for this site and was re-trapped almost two years to the day it was first ringed.

Common Kingfisher

Common Kingfisher

Common Kingfisher

Clamorous Reed Warbler

Clamorous Reed Warbler

Clamorous Reed Warbler

Graceful Prinia

Other birds caught included an adult Common Moorhen, a common bird at the site but one we do not often catch as we keep the nets well above the water level so birds can not get caught in the bottom shelves and fall into the water. As a result crakes & rails can walk under the nets without getting caught. We also caught an Isabelline Shrike, which looks like a Daurian Shrike, which was a surprise as we had not seen the bird prior to capture and we do not often catch them in the middle of winter. Other birds caught included two male Little Bitterns and a male House Sparrow.

Pied Kingfisher & Common Kingfisher – Alba Marsh (Bahrain)

Whilst ringing at Alba Marsh over the weekend I saw a Pied Kingfisher at the marsh. The bird flew over and perched on top of one of the net poles but did not go into the net. Pied Kingfisher is a scarce winter visitor to Bahrain with the last record I know of being a bird at the same site in winter 2011/12. I have only seen a single bird in Saudi Arabia at Sabkhat Al Fasl in winter the same winter as the Bahrain bird above. Along with the Pied Kingfisher were at least three Common Kingfishers and although I did not photograph the Pied Kingfisher I did get some pictures of the Common Kingfishers. Other good birds seen included a Marsh Sandpiper, one Common Redshank, 10 Black-winged Stilts, four Little Bitterns and a Marsh Harrier.

Common Kingfisher

Common Kingfisher

Little Bittern - adult male

Little Bittern, Common Kingfisher & more – Ringing at Alba Marsh (Bahrain)

Nicole and I went to Alba Marsh for our first ringing trip of the year. Mid-winter is not a peak time at the marsh but we have caught a few good birds in the past in January. We set up our nets in the normal areas although the reeds had been cut back since our last visit making the nets quite open and the wind was stronger than we had hoped. Very few birds were noticeable whilst setting up the nets even though we were there before first light and after two hours we had not caught a bird and thought it may be a waste of time. We stuck at it and caught 11 birds of seven species including re-trapped Common Kingfisher, Water Pipit and Graceful Prinia all ringed at the same site in late winter 2013. The best bird we caught was an adult female Little Bittern that was only the fourth caught at the site. Other birds caught included Bluethroat, Clamorous Reed Warbler and House Sparrow.

Little Bittern - adult female

Common Kingfisher - female

Bluethroat

Clamorous Reed Warbler

Graceful Prinia

House Sparrow - male (left) & female (right)

Water Pipit

Re-trapped Red-spotted Bluethroat - Alba Marsh (Bahrain)

An early morning trip to Bahrain to go ringing proved quite successful for us with 22 birds caught of eight species. Quite a few re-traps were processes all of which had been ringed at the same site by us. The most interesting one was an adult male Red-spotted Bluethroat that was originally caught in November 2012 and again in January 2013 showing the bird was using Alba Marsh as a wintering site. The fact we then re-caught the bird in November 2013 shows it is probably going to use the same site to winter again after having moved off north to breed. Bluethroats are difficult to assign to race unless an adult male is seen or caught, but this one looks like a svecica that breed in Scandinavia and north Asia as well as north-west North America and Canada and winter in southern Europe, North and North tropical Africa, Arabia and south and east Asia.

Red-spotted Bluethroat - adult male

Red-spotted Bluethroat - adult male

Red-spotted Bluethroat - first year male

We also re-caught a Common Kingfisher that we had caught originally at the same site a few weeks earlier suggesting this bird is also going to use the site as a wintering location. Other re-traps were Clamorous Reed Warblers that are resident at the site. A few Graceful Prinias were also caught, a species we have not caught for almost a year. They are really beautiful as well as small birds weighing only 6-7 grams and are resident at the marsh.

Common Kingfisher

Common Kingfisher

Common Chiffchaff

European Reed Warbler

Graceful Prinia 

Water Pipit

Some good birds ringing at Alba Marsh – Alba Marsh (Bahrain)

An early morning ringing trip to Alba Marsh in Bahrain produced a few good birds for us. We caught slowly but steadily and ended up with 15 species of bird which is quite good for us. I know this is a laughably small amount for most ringers but we have limited places with permission to ring so beggers cannot be choosers as they say. We do catch good number of species, however, and out of the 15 birds we caught ten different species. Birds included Common Kingfisher, which was a new ringing species for Bahrain last autumn but which we have caught ten birds now. We re-caught a Clamorous Reed Warbler from two years ago (25/11/2011), ringed at the same site, and the Eurasian Wryneck ringed on 28 September. The Wryneck was caught in exactly the same net and had increased in weight from 36.2 grams to 45.1 grams an encouraging sign for the bird.

Common Kingfisher

Eurasian Wryneck

Clamorous Reed Warbler

Clamorous Reed Warbler

Great Reed Warbler

Great Reed Warbler

Other birds caught included several more Clamorous Reed Warblers, Eurasian Reed Warbler, two Bluethroats including one Red-spotted male and a first year female, Great Reed Warbler, Sedge Warbler, Savi’s Warbler and two Turkestan Shrikes the first shrikes we have caught this autumn. The shrikes were side by side in the same net so I suspect they had been chasing each other and both ended up in the net at the same time.

European Reed Warbler

Red-spotted Bluethroat

Sedge Warbler

Ringing at Alba Marsh (Bahrain)

Nicole and I went ringing again at Alba Marsh very early in the morning. This was our first ringing trip for a month as I was away for Christmas and we were interested to see what had changed. We got to the site before sunrise and set up all five of our nets. One in a new area across some water with tamarisk scrub nearby. This net caught three birds including Water Pipit, Clamorous Reed Warbler and Bluethroat and looks like a reasonable place to set the net. Although there was not too much bid activity we caught 13 birds of five species with the addition to the above of Common Chiffchaff and Common Kingfisher. Nine birds were re-traps including six Clamorous Reed Warblers (see tomorrow post for more details), two Bluethroats and one Common Kingfisher. The Common Kingfisher is obviously wintering in the area as it was originally caught 5th October 2012, as are the Bluethroats, one of which was caught almost a year to the day ago showing they use the same sites to winter year after year. The only other birds caught were a single Common Chiffchaff and two Water Pipits of the race coutelli

Common kingfisher - female

Common kingfisher - female

Common kingfisher - female

Red-spotted Bluethroat - male

Red-spotted Bluethroat - male

Red-spotted Bluethroat - male

Red-spotted Bluethroat - male

Bluethroat - female

Bluethroat - female

Water Pipit - A. s. coutelli

Water Pipit - A. s. coutelli