A packed programme today provided lots of good birding opportunities, we had much better weather and lots more success than yesterday.
A pre-breakfast walk by some of the group produced one new bird for the trip, a Firecrest was seen well,along the lane next to the hotel. Other birds seen included Crested Tit, Song Thrush, garden Warbler and Blackcap.
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| Hoopoe - taken through my bins - digibining |
We spent the rest of day down the valley in the Pyrenean foothills, we had glorious sunshine all day and a nice breeze kept us from frying as the temperature went up to 32C at times. As we drove down the Hecho valley we saw Egyptian Vulture, Red Kite and a flock of some 15 Black kites on the wires.
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| a pair of juvenile Citril Finches |
A quick stop at the small oak woodland on the Alastuey road gave us our first Bonelli's Warbler but efforts to track down an Orphean Warbler failed. At the Monastery we had a great time, as soon as we arrived we saw a couple of Citril Finches in the car park. Our walk through the pine woos there gave us sightings of Coal Tit, Wood Nuthatch (a family party), Robin and we heard another couple of Bonelli's Warblers. At the mirador there fantastic views across the Aragon Plains to high peaks of the Pyrenees, a truly beautiful vista.
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| Mash Orchid |
From the Monastery we drove down the entire length of the Gallego valley following the river down to the 'emblase' near Riglos. We stopped several times and found an interesting selection of species and some nice orchids. We added Booted eagle to our trip list and had great views of a perched Short-toed Eagle, we saw Bee-eaters, Reed Warblers, Crag Martins lots of Common Swifts and we heard a Cuckoo.
After stopping to buy our picnic lunch we set off for the huge embalse at Sotonegro, this reservoir was full to capacity and had flooded a few fields on the western side. This wasn't good for us as we wanted to walk along the western shore looking for Penduline Tit, it also made this section too deep for ducks and waders.
We made several attempt to get good views of the water but were thwarted by the water level, we did see a flock of Cattle Egrets, several Purple Herons, Grey Heron,Mallard, Gadwall, Great Crested Grebe, a couple of Marsh Harriers and a Common Coot. Other stops in the woodland around the shore produced Orphean Warbler, lots of Crested larks and a couple of singing Woodlarks, Greenfinches, Goldfinches, Linnets and Serins. At one point we had very close views of a Hoopoe that remained stationary for quite a while allowing us to photograph it.
We left the area at 4pm after a nice coffee stop, we made one more stop at a small feeder river near the reservoir, we searched for Penduline Tit and came up with Reed Warbler, Cetti's Warbler (heard) and Zitting Cisticola.
Brief stops were made at both Riglos and Aguero to look at the fantastic scenery and to watch the vultures, this provided our new bird of the day in the shape of a pair of Peregrine Falcons. We also saw Red-billed Chough, Raven and Common Kestrel.
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| the group at Riglos |
Back at the hotel for 6pm we got ready for dinner and by 8:45pm we were back on the road again, this time we went searching for owls and nightjars. Not a really successful night but we did hear Common Nightjar and almost ran one over and we had a very brief sighting of a Scop's Owl which flew from a tree just after it called. No sight nor sound of the hoped for Eagle Owl!! In bed by 11:45pm - a long day over!
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| Aguero in the background |
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