Males are the prettiest!

For the first time since our stay we had a day without any wind yesterday. It is good for the nets, but it get hot very soon. A Scops Owl  in the first Heligoland trap round was a warm welcome for us.

Scops Owl (Otus scops)

The rest of the morning we had a lot of Chiffchaffs again but also some really nice male birds! A male Palestine Sunbird was really really beautiful and other than the sunbird we finally had a male Dead-sea Sparrow! 

 Palestine Sunbird (Nectarinia osea)

Male Dead-sea Sparrow (Passer moabiticus). Just beautiful!

Other nice birds ringed included 2 Hoopoes, 2 Black-eared Wheatears and 3 Quails. Here a picture of a Black-eared Wheatear:

Black-eared Wheatear, adult male

In the evening we made a gull ringing attempt at the Salt Pans, but probably we should have opened in the dark and not when it was still light. Most of the gulls departured as soon as it got dark. That was not according to plan.. Still, we managed to ring a single Black-headed Gull. This made Yotam really happy, because it was a ringing tick for him! *Three bored Northwestern-Europeans looking at Yotam*

Ringing tick #231 for Yotam!

In between the net checks we drove around the Eilat fields looking for some nightjars or owls. We saw one Long-eared Owl, a Scops Owl but the highlight of this short night tour was a Wolf! As we drove through some fields north of the Date palm plantations we saw it walking through a cropfield, on a pretty close distance. As for most of the Wolves here in Israel it was a tiny wolf, looking Jackal-alike. After a few minutes it decided to take off and run away. 

Ringing totals for the 11th of March:

Balkan Warbler 4 -

Barn Swallow 31 -

Black Redstart 1 -

Blackbird - 1

Bluethroat - 2

Chiffchaff 69 - 6

Collared Dove 2 -

Common Whitethroat - 1

Cretzchmar's Bunting 1 -

Dead-sea Sparrow 1 - 1

Eastern Black-eared Wheatear 2 -

Eastern Orphean Warbler - 3

Graceful Prinia - 1

Hoopoe 2 -

House Martin 1 -

House Sparrow 1 -

Lesser Whitethroat 11 - 5

Palestine Sunbird - 1

Quail 3 -

Red-rumped Swallow 4 -

Reed Warbler - 2

Rueppel's Warbler 1 - 1

Sand Martin 3 -

Sardinian Warbler 2 - 1

Scops Owl 1 -

Silverbill 2 -

Spanish Sparrow 1 -

White-spectacled Bulbul 3 - Total 143 - 27 = 170 28 species