Birding An Namas

Whilst birding the western mountains we visited An Namas an area where we had seen nests of both Arabian Woodpecker and Arabian Magpie previously. The area where we had seen these has been badly damaged by road building and neither nest was seen this visit. We did however see a single male Arabian Woodpeckeras wells a few other good birds including Bruce’s Green Pigeon, Arabian Wheatear and Gambaga Flycatcher. This entire area is very good for finding breeding Little Owl, which can often be seen on the roadside walls. The area is not marked as a breeding area for Little Owl in Mike Jennings Arabian Breeding Bird Atlas, but a good number of birds are present throughout the entire area to Billasmer at least.

Birding Alheefah Park - Tanoumah

Alheefah Park is normally very popular but as it was Ramadan when we were there, the number of people was much less than normal. The park is right on the escarpment edge and has breathtaking views, and is covered by large juniper trees and acacia scrub. The large trees are good places to see birds and Phil Roberts located a small group of Bruce’s Green Pigeons in good light where I managed to get a few good photos. There are plenty of rocks and hillsides and we heard Phlby’s Partridge calling soon after arriving and eventually located a single bird calling from the top of a rocky hill. As it was getting late and we want to look for owls we did not stay too long at the site with the only other bird photographed a male Palestine Sunbird.

Bruce's Green Pigeon

Bruce's Green Pigeon

Bruce's Green Pigeon

Palestine Sunbird

Philby's Partridge

Bottom of Raydah Escarpment in summer

I was at the bottom of the Raydah Escarpment in late June and the number of birds was significantly less than in May. There were a lot less African Grey Hornbill and Violet-backed Starlings but White-throated Bee-eaters had arrived that were not present in early May. The number of Bruce’s Green Pigeons remained high and a few Ruppell’s Weavers were building nests. A single Black-crowned Tchagra was seen at a location where I saw my only other sighting in the Kingdom. Grey-headed Kingfishers were seen and heard a number of times with one bird allowing some reasonable photos to be taken of it. 

Grey-headed Kingfisher

Grey-headed Kingfisher

Bruce's Green Pigeon

Bruce's Green Pigeon

Long-billed Pipit

White-throated Bee-eater

White-throated Bee-eater

African birds at the bottom of the Raydah Escarpment - Abha

Whilst birding the lower areas of the Raydah Escarpment in late March I saw a number of African species. Birds seen included African Grey Hornbill, Violet-backed Starling, Black-crowned Tchagra, Bruce’s Green Pigeon and White-browed Coucal. Bruce’s Green Pigeon is an interesting species as it only eats the fruit of a single type of fig tree. No White-throated Bee-eaters or Grey-headed Kingfishers were located so maybe we were too early for these birds to have arrived back from Africa. A few passerine migrants were also seen including a number of Common Blackcap. Resident species seen included Blackstart as well as Arabian Green Bee-eater and endemics recorded included the scarce Arabian Waxbill and the commoner Arabian Serin.

White-browed Coucal

Bruce Green Pigeon

Bruce Green Pigeon

Bruce Green Pigeon

Bruce Green Pigeon

Common Chiffchaff

Tristrams Starling 

Blackstart

Looking for Arabian Waxbill in Wadi Waj – Taif

Phil and I went to Wadi Waj, a site near the center of Taif. This site is a wastewater runoff stream that permanently flows and has good growth of reeds and sedges nearby. It is a place where Waxbill has been seen and where we saw two last summer. We went on the hope of seeing the species again as they are not easy to locate and managed to see the Waxbills soon after we arrive. They were in some sedges near the water but flew off and than we saw a flock of about fifteen birds fly in and join them. There were plenty of other birds about including Graceful Prinia’s and plenty of Green Bee-eaters. On our return we located a Bruce’s Green Pigeon and as it was getting dark we saw a Plain Nightjar fly over and saw it again a few times over a filed across the stream from us. This site appears to a good one for Plain Nightjar as well as we saw one here last summer. The nightjar rounded off a good selection of birds at this site in the centre of Taif.

Arabian Waxbill

Arabian Waxbill

Bruce's Green Pigeon

Green Bee-eater

Arabian Waxbill & Arabian Serin - Wadi Waj

Phil and I were taken to Wadi Waj, a site near the center of Taif, by a local birder Ali. He very kindly showed us the site and drove us around it in his four-wheel drive car, as our hire car could not make it. This site is a wastewater runoff stream that permanently flows and has good growth of reeds and sedges nearby. It is a place where Ali regularly sees Arabian Waxbill and Arabian Serin, two species that Phil and I were still trying to get decent photographs of. We saw the Waxbills almost as soon as we arrived but they were high in the tall trees and only average photos were obtained. We later saw them again when returned in the evening but again high in the trees. We did, however, get good views of Arabian Serin on several occasions. There were plenty of other birds about including Nile Valley Sunbirds, Graceful Prinias, Black Scrub Robins and plenty of Green Bee-eaters. An unusual bird seen almost immediately on arrival was a Scaly-breasted Munia, a species that Ali had not seen here before, but this may have been an escape from somewhere? A few wetland birds were seen as well including three Squacco Herons and a Green Sandpiper. On our return visit and as it was getting sark we located a Bruce’s Green Pigeon in a tall tree rounding off a good selection of birds at a good local site.

Arabian Serin

Arabian Serin

Arabian Waxbill

Bruce's Green Pigeon

Graceful Prinia

Nile Valley Sunbird

Scaly-breasted Munia

Squacco Heron

A low elevation record of Bruce’s Green Pigeon – Wadi Juwwah

Wadi Juwwah (16 56.75N, 43 01.80E) is alternatively written as Wadi Jawa or even Wadi Giwa and is a rare north-south wadi in south-west Saudi Arabia as most of the wadis are west-east. The wadi has one of the highest diversities of breeding species known in Arabia including Helmeted Guineafowl Numida meleagris although we did not see this species on this trip. It lies at an altitude of 100-300 metres in the foothills east of Abu Arish and south of al-Arida, inland from Jizan. It consists of a sandy and clay bed surrounded by often steep volcanic rocky slopes. Scattered Dobera and Ficus trees dominate the landscape and there are many remnant patches of Acacia and Salvadora scrub. The rocky outcrops and bordering slopes are only sparsely vegetated with Acacia and succulents but can have a surprising cover of grasses after heavy rain. The wadi is densely populated and most of it is cultivated with sorghum and millet. We bird-watched the area on 5 April and saw Abyssinian Rollers, Nile Valley Sunbirds, six Black Bush Robins, Ruppell’s Weavers, Arabian Babblers, Laughing Doves, Namaqua Doves, one Desert Lark and a Graceful Prinia. A pair of Gabar Goshawk was seen flying around for several minutes over the wadi and a few Green Bee-eaters, three Masked Shrikes and White-spectacled Bulbuls were also seen. The most interesting sighting was a Bruce’s Green Pigeon in a tree in the wadi which is below the general elevation levels recorded for the species of 500-2400 metres. I have previously regarded this species as a high elevation bird but this record clearly shows this assumption to be incorrect. They may move to lower elevations in the winter months like many other high elevation species.

Bruce's Green Pigeon

Abyssinian Roller

Bani Malik

Bani Malik (17 35.027N, 43 08.171E) is an area near to Jabal Gaha where after leaving the small village of Bani Malik at approximately 1800 metres, the road descends into a valley. This valley and the upper areas of it had previously been mentioned as a good area where some excellent birding had occurred in July 2001. We visited this area on 2 July but birded the lower regions (17 20.90N, 43 09.97E), before the main climb to Bani Malik, at about 810 metres. The road to the village was in very bad shape in July 2013 with large cliff falls and road slips. We found a deep wadi with a road off into it to the right just after a large town. We drove down the track until we found some nice vegetation and then birded the area on foot for a couple of hours. The temperature here was pleasantly cooler than down near the coast at Jizan making birding over the lunchtime period pleasant rather than a chore and as a result we saw a few good birds in the area. On entering the wadi we saw a large group of 50+ Alpine Swifts in the air together and five Red-rumped Swallows and two Little Swifts were also flying around. Although this was a back road with parts of the road missing it was still relatively busy with traffic.
 

Grey-headed Kingfisher

Bruce's Green Pigeon

Bruce's Green Pigeon

Blackstart

African Collared Dove

White-spectacled Bulbul

In the dry area of the wadi were two Blackstarts and an Arabian Warbler and five White-spectacled Bulbuls were in the roadside trees. Shining Sunbird and six Grey-headed Kingfishers was seen in a small side arm of the wadi with a pair of Grey-headed Kingfishers feeding young in a hole in the sand bank by the wadi roadside. Three Bruce’s Green Pigeons were flying about from tall tree to tall tree and an African Collared Dove was also seen along with 10+ Violet-backed Starlings.