What difference a day makes! Yesterday's weather was absolutely fabulous and today was pants! We awoke to wet and windy conditions and low cloud we couldn't see the end of the street. Fortunately it cleared a little as we drove down the mountains towards the coast at Algeciras.
Our first stop was at a secluded track near San Pablo where we spent a 'dry' hour or so looking for a couple of target species. One of the first birds we noticed was a Little Owl, this was our third of the day as we had seen two as we approached the track. Then we saw a couple of Sardinian Warblers a few Serins, Greenfinches, a Common Buzzard and lots of Goldfinches.
A sparrow caught the eye of Martin because it looked odd and sure enough on closer inspection we could see that it had the characteristics of both the House Sparrow and the Spanish Sparrow. This was indeed a hybrid and often called an Italian Sparrow, whether or not it is a distinct species is the subject of an going scientific debate.
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| The Italian Sparrow showing a brown head with some grey, white cheeks, white supercilious and other features of both Spanish and House Sparrow. |
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| RUFOUS BUSH ROBIN - three pictures of this rare breeding bird of Spain |
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| in full song just five meters from us |
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| The rival looking on |
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| The only picture I got of the Tawny Pipit |
We took a coffee break hoping for the rain to relent but it never did so we set off for LA JANDA and to our great surprise the weather cleared up by the time we got there.
Our visit lasted a couple of hours, it was still a little too windy so we stayed In the car a lot, from there we watched hundreds of Cattle and Little Egrets, Glossy Ibis, White Storks, Grey Herons and not a lot else. We did see a few distant Collared Pratincoles, a Marsh Harrier, Common Kestrel, but generally it was very quiet.
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| hiding from a rain shower at La JANDA - the Marx Borthers |
A drive along an avenue of white poplar trees took us close to a huge nesting colony of egrets and ibis, the noise was deafening and the smell off-putting but the sight was tremendous. We ate our lunch close by and notched up a few Turtle Doves as we ate, also a distant Black Kite, lots of Common Pheasants and we heard both a Cetti's and a Reed Warbler.
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| Turtle Dove at lunch time |
After lunch we drove out of LA JANDA and headed towards Benalup, we saw our fourth Little Owl of the day at the 'smelly farm' and also another six Black Kites. We then found another superb species for the area in the shape of a Spanish Imperial Eagle, not one but two drifted high over us with some Griffon Vultures, what a great discovery.
Next we drove to Vejer to the site of the breeding colony of BALD IBIS, these introduced birds are doing well and now have two colonies on the cliffs below Vejer, the one we visited had 9 almost full grown chicks on view and several of their ugly parents, if I were a Bald Ibis chick and I saw what I was going to turn out like I may have a tendency to jump out of the nest and onto the main road in front of a truck!
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| tap the picture to enlarge it and you might see a few BALD IBIS chicks |
Our last venue was the new natural park at BARBATE, this huge area of shallow lagoons and large islands is getting better and better. It now supports a large number of Collared Pratincoles, a few pairs of Stone Curlew, Short-toed Larks, Yellow Wagtail, Kentish Plover and provides a haven for roosting gulls and passing waders. There are also Greater Flamingos, Eurasian Spoonbills and both Skylark and Calandra Lark in the surrounding meadows. We saw all of the above with special close views of the Pratincoles.
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| These birds were on the track and allowed close approach |
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