Wednesday 18 May 2016

No Camera For A While

15th May
Two days after getting back from Lesbos I had a planned date with a Da Vinci robot at Canterbury that's kept me at home for two weeks. Felt fit enough to get out so my first outing was to Seasalter for an hour finding 2 hobbys and a family of stonechats, their youngsters in close attendance, my earliest record of fledging. Common terns were flying up and down the main drain on the plots plus a few hirundines and c.20 turnstones on the beach.

16th May
Another slightly longer visit finding a few more species new to the year inc. Sandwich tern, reed warbler and 5 swifts. Whitethroats, chiffchaffs, sedge warblers, several cetti's made their presence known and a peregrine was high overhead.  I managed to clock up 40 species before retiring home.

17th May
Over did a bit yesterday so told to just sit on the wall this morning but I managed to see half a dozen juvenile lapwings coming across from the fields behind the LNR plus a sparrowhawk and 2 sedge warblers. From the pumping station 'beach seat' 12 ringed plovers and 1 sanderling flew past plus a great crested grebe came in close to the shore.

Cut short and went home only to get out into the garden after a call from Chiddy about red kites he'd seen over his house. Sure enough 6 went past heading west, a couple very low, one even diving down into neighbours garden but swooping back up again. I stayed out  another 20 minutes seeing another 7, three of which went right overhead giving good views to my neighbour who had never seen them before locally.  For the last seven or eight years this has become a regular event from the garden, clearly a favourite flight path. Also a couple of buzzards. 

Monday 16 May 2016

Lesbos 16th-30th April

Even with all the media refugee scare stories I new Lesbos would still be a great place to bird and so I booked getting the lowest price ever!  After a few days it was clear there were no refugee problems and we didn't see one or any sign of them at all.  However, many small businesses across the island suffered because of the media scare stories and our flight  was only two thirds full, birders and  aid workers. We arrived a couple of hours after the Pope flew in for his visit and had a few delays with road closures as the Pope made his way to the camp at Moria which is a few miles from Mytilini.

It was quiet the first week and quite hot (28 degs) some days and later windy which on one day made birding difficult. The saltpans channel contained virtually nothing, just a few stilts, very disappointing although in the second week the odd greenshank, marsh sandpiper put in an appearance plus a regular 3 Temminck's stints and a few other waders but nothing like what I have seen in the past.  The Kalloni pool is still overgrown but several wood sandpipers and a regular flock of c.30 glossy ibis's were always good to see.



The East River or its real name 'Tsiknias River'  has always turned up the goods and so it did this year with the penduline tits nesting again and downstream to the ford, spotted, little and Baillon's crakes coming out onto a partially submerged tyre in the river. This shortly went missing after a couple of days, removed for some reason, no doubt  by a photographer who didn't want it in his picture as one or two photographers were camped out on the dry river bed rather than viewing from the river bank!

 Little Crake

 Spotted Crake

Baillon's Crake

Black storks were quite common, always a couple on the river or saltpans and often seen soaring in the sky. This one below was dancing around trying to catch small fish fry.



Red-throated pipits were easy to see this year with up to 22 on the damp field in front of the pans, it was quite dry this year, other times this field has been a sheet of water with loads of birds.

Just a small wet patch for the red-throated pipits this year.

Several yellow 'dombrowskii' Romanian wagtails around the saltpans.

Long-legged Buzzard

On Monday the 18th took the usual route to the pans seeing; little owl, marsh harrier, com. sandpiper, little bittern, grt reed warbler, 1 grt egret, 12 little egrets and wood sands etc.

Great Reed Warbler

 Then a drive north to the Kavaki cliffes to see the Ruppells warbler, perched on its usual bush as it has done for year upon year.  Also here were blue rock thrush, black-eared wheatears, linnets and raven. 



 After lunch in Petra we made our way back to Kalloni stopping at the mini soccer pitch to see Scop's owl then onto Achlerderi finding goshawk serin, cirling bunting and a middle spotted woodpecker.

Scops Owl

Goshawk

Another morning we saw kingfisher, 10 purple herons and a nice citrine wagtail with the red-throated pipits. A new bird for me was pheasant, seen along the coastal track too the Polichnitos saltpans after which we found tawny pipit a couple of woodchats and a masked shrike.




Driving to higher areas we found wren and a lovely all blue damselfly with the odd name, Odalisque, found near streams, which it was.

Odalisque damselfly

A trip to the western part of the island was very poor, just the odd collared flycatcher, no migration seen at all, a real job to find spotflys and wood warblers compared to other years. However, on the way crag martins, Cretzschmars bunting, rock nuthatches and buzzards. 

Towards the end of the first week we had seen, 5 red-footed falcons, lesser kestrels, 10 bee-eaters, whinchats, red-rumped swallows, LRPs, middle spotted woodpeckers and Kruipers nuthatch.

 Whinchats - common

Bee-eater on fence at the saltpans

 Feldegg wagtail


Kruipers Nuthatch found at a different site this year

 Another successful visit to see the Ruppells Warbler- at least 3 in one spot, raven also

 This was a surprise, I thought all the donkey users were gone but clearly one or two are still in use!


One of the Glossy Ibises opposite the hotel

Six Ferruginous ducks were found at the start of the Potamia Valley

 Black-headed buntings began to arrive in the second week

 Yellow-legged Gull

 Common Sandpiper along the coastal track

Two collared pratincoles were on the beach by the Alikoudi Pool

 Crested Lark

 Ruff - small numbers

 The usual Spur winged plover paid its annual visit but didn't bring any friends

Short-toad Eagle
 Black-winged stilt

 Lesser-grey shrike

 Lesser Grey Shrike

On the last day a roller- distant shot plus a great spotted cuckoo