ARRIVAL AT MUSCAT – VISITS TO: AL QURM NATURAL PARK AND BEACH AREA – AL
ANSAB LAGOONS – RAS AS SAWADI – KHATMAT MILAHAH.
After spending a very long day and night travelling from
London to Muscat via Istanbul and Bahrain I finally arrived at 3:30am. I
managed to get a bit of sleep before
Iordan, my good friend, from Bulgaria turned up to meet me. We got into our
rental car and set off birding for the day.
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| the tidal lagoon at Al Qurm |
We started at the Al Qurm Natural Park where some lovely
manicured gardens lead to some open scrubland, reed-beds and a tidal lagoon.
Our list began in earnest as many birds were flitting about. We had clear weather
with a nice temperature of about 15C at 7am.
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| Red-wattled Lapwing |
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| White-eared Bubul |
Many Common Mynahs dashed about and were as common at the
House Crow which we saw everywhere. White-cheeked and Spectacled Bubuls were
fairly common too and the Indian Roller captured our attention for quite a
while. Little Green Bee-eaters were a lovely sight in the morning light. As we
moved away from the gardens where a troupe of gardeners were creating a lot of
noise we found ourselves on the scrubland where small, shallow pools of water
prevailed. We added Little Green Bee-eater, White and Citrine Wagtail, Little Stint, Ringed Plover and
the superb Red-wattled Lapwing to our list. Noisy Grey Francolins were found near
a larger pool where we also listed Common Moorhen, Little Crake, Bluethroat,
Graceful Prinia, Daurian Shrike and Purple Sunbirds were very common.
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| view of Ras As Sawadi |
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| Laughing Dove |
On the main lagoon we found several species of duck, some dodgey
Geese and Great & Little Egrets, Grey Heron (one of which devoured a large
Brown Rat) and Indian Pond Heron. We had a couple of sightings of Common
Kingfisher, Common Sandpiper, Black-winged Stilts and Common Coot. Good views
of Clamorous Warbler was a highlight at the lagoon.
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| Little Green Bee-eater |
A Great Spotted Eagle showed well just before we left for
the beach area nearby. The tide was high but a nice selection of waders sat on
a sand-bar the best of which was a Lesser Sand Plover. Hundreds of
Slender-billed Gulls joined Great Cormorants, Lesser Crested and Swift Terns
over the sea.
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| Lesser-crested Tern (left) and Swift Tern |
After visiting several hotels in the beach area for future tours, we drove to
the Al Ansab lagoons where access was denied to us by a large fence. However we
did see Indian Roller, Greater Spotted Eagle and a Western Marsh Harrier.
Our visit to the beach area at Ras As Sawadi included a mini
pelagic trip around the numerous islands just offshore. We didn’t see many new
species but had fun trying to sort out the gulls, Sooty Gull, Caspian Gull and Heuglin’s Gull were seen, along with lots of terns including a Sandwich
Tern. Two or three Ospreys were fishing offshore and a Booted Eagle circled
over the main island. Hundreds of waders fed along the shore, we added Marsh
Sandpiper, Eurasian Oystercatcher and a few Greenshanks to the list.
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| Osprey
|
Well time was pressing we planned a short visit to some
local heath-land where we found Eurasian Hoopoe, Tawny Pipit, Crested Lark and
Isabelline Wheatear.
It was dark at 5:30pm and pitch black by 6pm, we drove into
darkness as we headed northward towards UAE, we stopped at our next planned
birding sight, Khatmat Milahah, but that would have to wait until tomorrow. We
pitched our tents near the beach and bedded down for night.
67 species were in the bag, with lots more coming tomorrow,
see you then.
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