El ROCIO – CORREDOR DE VERDE – DEHESA ABAJO – JOSE
VALVERDE CENTRE (NORTHERN MARSHES)
A rain free day with a cloudless morning and overcast
afternoon, warm out of the breeze.
We drove the 20km to Villamonrique and then turned
onto dirt tracks that ran along the Coredor de Verde. We noted White Stork, the
ubiquitous Black Kite, Common Buzzard, Bee-eater, Crested Lark, Common &
Azure-winged magpies and plenty of Woodchat Shrikes before we stopped the bus
for our first walk. In fact we never reached our destination because we found
our target species before we got there! A Black-winged Kite was seen from the
bus and we all jumped out to get superb views of this lovely little raptor, we
watched for 10 minutes before is drifted off in its’ delightful kit-like
manner.
We made another couple of stops along the coredor de
verde where we saw more Bee-eaters and White Storks, we also heard a Common
Cuckoo and noted both Booted and Short-0toed Eagles up in the blue sky.
A VIEW OF EL ROCIO FROM ACROSS THE LAGUNA MADRE DE LAS MARISMAS
The eucalyptus wood at Dehesa de Pilas had it usual
colony of Spanish Sparrows, there must be over 1000 pairs, the noise is
deafening. Most of the sparrows we flying off into the fields and returning
with a mouth full of grass, some struggled with a large amount, I wonder how
many kilos of grass it takes to build 500 nests?? Over 50 Bee-0eaters were
milling around and we saw a couple of Montagu’s harriers as well.
At Dehesa Abajo the lake was full of birds but as
usual they were a mile away on the far side, however we did get good views of
Little & Cattle Egrets, Night Herons, Purple Swamphens, Common Pochard,
Shoveler, Gadwall, Black-winged Stilts, Spoonbills, Greater Flamingos, Great
Cormorants (sinensis) and lots of
grebes, Great-crested and Little. In the distance we could see many Whiskered
Terns, Jackdaws, White Storks and Black Kites.
We stopped at aventa and had a tapas lunch before
setting off towards the Valverde Centre, we made a couple of stops to watch
Lesser Short-toed and Short-toed Larks, Calandra Lark, Yellow Wagtail, Corn
Bunting & Monatgu’s Harrier. As we approached the Valverde Centre we stopped
to view the large lake on our right which held hundreds of birds. There were
over 100 Ringed Plover, Redshank (50+), Greenshank (4), Spotted Redshank (15 –
some in pure black plumage!), Curlew Sandpiper, Common Sandpiper, Dunlin,
Kentish Plover, Avocet, Whimbrel, White Wagtail, Yellow Wagtail, Glossy Ibis,
Eurasian Spoonbill, Whiskered Tern and Greater Flamingo. We also saw Grey &
Purple Herons, Great Egret, Little Egret and Whiter Stork.
We then took the track that leads back to El Rocio and
found our first Collared Pratincoles of the trip, we also saw a bizarre sight
of over 300 Whiskered Terns quartering a field in one huge flock and diving to
the ground to collect insects as when they found them, extraordinary!!
Next we dropped into the visitors centre for a
caffeine top up and some ‘birding-behind-plate-glass’., We had good close views
of Great Reed Warbler, Purple Swamphen, Little Grebe and Common Pochard but not
much else.
Our drive back to El Rocio was interrupted only once
when we stopped to view a known Spanish Imperial Eagle’s nest site, this proved
successful as two birds were seen around the nest. During this homeward journey
we also saw Tawny Pipit, several Purple Herons, Great White Egrets and two
Marsh Harriers.
A last look at the marismas at El Rocio produced 2 new
birds for the trip in the shape of Gull-billed Tern (14) and Green Sandpiper
(1). We had logged 86 species today which is a fair reflection of the current
dry status of Donana.
No comments:
Post a Comment