MOROCCO 2013 - DAY 5 22ND MARCH

Day 5  -  March 22^ND    -  Café Yasmina  -  Merzouga Lake  -  Rossani Area

Another early start saw most of the group assembling on the terrace of the Kasbah Café Yasmina at 6am. The visiting ringing group was putting out their nets and whilst they were doing  that we looked out over the area scanning for birds. The best we could come up with was a male Marsh Harrier and not much else. Back on the terrace the ringing group let us watch them in action as several birds were being ‘processed’ and ringed before their release. We saw them ring:  Iberian Chiffchaff, Subalpine Warbler, Common Redstart, Willow Warbler and Western Olivaceous Warbler.

FULVOUS BABBLER - another exciting find

By 8am we were off in the minibus heading towards Merzouga, we stopped a few time to watch some desert species which included Brown-necked Raven and Bar-tailed Lark. We continued along the track to Merzouga and onto the main tarmac road before turning onto another track which took us to the lake. It always amazes me to see a wealth of wildlife in the midst of this desert region, the lake was brimming with birds. From the eastern shore we found Greater Flamingo, Ruddy Shelduck, Little Egret Avocet and a large number of Black-winged Stilts. As we moved to the northern end we could see the birds on the western shore, we picked out Common Coot, Shoveler, Great Crested grebe and a Booted Eagle circled above us.

The group on the shore of Merzouga Lake

Finally we drove around to the north-west corner of the lake and we were able to get closer views of a good number of ducks which turned out to be Marbled Duck (35+), Ferruginous Duck (4), Common Pochard (6) and Common Coot (100+). A few waders we also found which included: Little Stint, Sanderling, Kentish Plover and Green Sandpiper. The brightly coloured Yellow Wagtails looked truly beautiful in the morning sunshine we found a flock of some 20+ birds, with them we saw a couple of White Wagtails.

It was now approaching lunchtime so we drove up to Rissani to buy our picnic supplies but before we ate lunch we drove to an area near the town to look for the Long-billed crested Lark which turned up right on time, a few small groups of Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters also grabbed our attention.

Blue-cheeked bee-eaters

It was now quite windy, dust and sand was being lifted into the air making birding and eating sandwiches a bit tricky. We stopped at the river on the Alnif road and sat in the shelter of the new bridge. From there after eating lunch we walked along the river and found Moroccan Wagtail, Great Cormorant, Grey Heron, Willow Warbler, Common Bubul, Ruddy Shelduck but viewing wasn’t good in the windy conditions.

For the next couple of hours we searched the area for Lanner Falcon without much luck but we did find a flock of 14 Spotted Sandgrouse which were seen in a large ‘hidden’ valley which was fairly sheltered. As the afternoon wore on we the wind started to subside and we spent a while driving through the back lanes of Rossani. It was about 5:30pm when we finally found our target species, a small flock of some 5-6 Fulvous Babblers, one bird in particular sat out in the open for some 5 minutes and posed for the cameras, thank you very much!

Great Grey Shrike (elegans)

We also saw many Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters, in fact I have never seen so many here before, also Woodchat and Great Grey shrikes, Hoopoe, Long-billed Crested Lark, Barbary Partridge but smaller passerines we very few and far between.

Finally we set off for an area where I had seen Egyptian Nightjars in previous years, we stopped to look at a Little Owl along the way. The area where the nightjars were last seen has been drastically transformed with the building of the new Erfoud to Merzouga Road, so we were disappointed and left without a sighting. We drove back to Yasmina in the dark and ate a lovely tajine at 8:30pm.