Foggy dust, dusty fog

March 20th,

It was already noticable in the morning: this is going to be a day full of dust! While opening the nets the dust sprung of the nets, like dew drops in the early morning. We were totally alone yesterday as we couldn't see Jordan nor Eilat nor Eilat Mountains, just the IBCRE park!

Birds were grounded by the dust which meant quite a few retraps but still new arrival of birds. In the first round Yotam came back with this lovely adult male Siberian Stonechat ssp. variegatus:

One hell of a bird!~

Other nice birds included some Swifts and a Wryneck. The days total was 177 new and about 40 recaptures. 

Swift (Apus apus)

Balkan Warbler 1 -

Barn Swallow 8 – 1

Blackcap 15 -

Bluethroat 2 -

Chiffchaff 11 – 5

Collared Dove 2 -

Common Whitethroat 5 – 1

Cretzchsmar’s Bunting 2 – 1

Eastern Olivaceous Warbler 1 -

Eastern Orphean Warbler 5 – 3

House Martin 50 – 1

House Sparrow 1 -

Laughing Dove 1 -

Lesser Whitethroat 56 – 8

Red-rumped Swallow 4 -

Redstart 1 -

Reed Warbler 4 -

Sardinian Warbler – 1

Savi’s Warbler 1 -

Siberian Stonechat 1 -

Spanish Sparrow 1 -

Swift 4 -

Tree Pipit 1 -

White-spectacled Bulbul – 1

Wryneck 1 – TOTAL 177 - 22

We finished the wader traps in the afternoon and had to go to the city to pick up an exhausted Swift, found by someone. We also needed some plastic bottles to finish our heron trap. 

 Homeless guy searching for plastic bottles

 The salt pans of Eilat, barely visible

 Dust in Eilat Mountains aswell.

The Moustached Cat

In the evening we made a round in the dark seeing Scops Owl, Stone Curlews, some Isabelline Wheatears.

Stone Curlew

A belated birthday gift

I woke up as a fresh 19-year old dude this morning, thinking with a headache (no not from the beer) about what there was to come.  It was pretty cold and windy but the birds did well this morning. Lower numbers, good diversity. Again a Scops Owl in the first round, as well as our 3^rd Tawny Pipit of the season in the Heligolands.

As the morning proceeded we soon got a first for the season: a precious adult male Masked Shrike. While ringing some birds, checking raptor migration two Finnish dudes (one of them was Roni ofcourse) saw an exciting wheatear adjacent to the ringing hut! It was a superb tame adult male Pied Wheatear! We had good views on the bird and eventually managed to catch it in one of our Heligoland traps!

 Pied Wheatear (Oenanthe pleschanka), adult male

Tail of Pied, clearly very few black on the terminal tailband, unlike Cyprus.

Look at the length of P10, just the same lenght as the PC's, unlike Cyprus where the P10 is clearly longer than the PC's.

What an amaaazing bird to catch!! The best bird we’ve got so far I bet… One could call this a belated birthday gift for me, but also an early birthday present for Mr. Yotam since it’s his birthday tomorrow!

In the afternoon we were busy with finishing our wader traps, we’ve now made 3, which means one more to go. Hopefully tomorrow we can start catching waders! Furthermore we checked the Northern Date palm plantations where we saw the Cyprus Wheatear and the Crested Honey Buzzard. The Cyprus Wheatear is also still at K20, where we saw it today.

Before the swallow ringing Roni, Christian and I went to the traditional site for the Lichtenstein’s Sandgrouse.  We weren´t alone there, there were Dutch birders only, 11 to be precise (and one Finnish guy)!  At 18:15 excatly, a pair, came down to drink and we had wonderful views of both birds! Simply stunning!  Lichtenstein’s Sandgrouse, probably one of the coolest birds I´ve ever seen in Israel!

Ringing totals: 

Balkan Wagtail 1 -

Balkan Warbler 2 -

Barn Swallow 11 - 2

Blackcap 26 - 2

Bluethroat 2 -

Chiffchaff 20 - 2

Collared Dove 1 - 1

Common Whitethroat 10 - 1

Cretzchmar's Bunting 7 - 2

Eastern Orphean Warbler 2 - 3

Eatern Olivaceous Warbler 2 -

Graceful Prinia 2 -

House Martin 42 -

House Sparrow 1 -

Laughing Dove 1 - 1

Lesser Whitethroat 59 - 10

Masked Shrike 1 -

Pied Wheatear 1 -

Quail - 1

Red-rumped Swallow 7 - 1

Redstart 7 - 2

Sand Martin 1 -

Savi's Warbler 2 - 1

Scops Owl 1 -

Sedge Warbler - 1

Spanish Sparrow 2 - 1

Swift 1 -

Tawny Pipit 1 -

White Wagtail 1 -

White-spectacled Bulbul 2 - 1

Total 215 – 31 = 246

 Weird white-throated Cretzchsmar's Bunting (Emberiza caesia), adult male

 Bluethroat ssp. cyanecula on the left and ssp. svecica on the right.

Masked Shrike (Lanius nubicus), adult male; first for the season!

It's my birdday

Yes this young bird ringer has become 19 years old! This is probably the first time I celebrate my birthday abroad, it feels a bit weird not celebrating it at home, but something different is always welcome:) I don't really have the 'birthday' feeling, but that doesn't matter since bird ringing on your birthday is something every ringer can only dream of!

For this day we discussed certain species we wanted to catch for my birthday, but none of these wishes were fullfilled, maybe I will get an after-birthday species! No new species for me were ringed but we had another amazing day with many birds around. We had Scops Owl, two Cyprus Warblers, 14 Cretzchsmar's Buntings, Little Crake and Blackcaps were the main bulk species of today with 93 ringed. The day's total was 254 new and 53 recaps. Steppe Buzzard migration picked up with a few thousands passing by over Eilat mountains today and over a thousand over the IBRCE.

In the afternoon the Northern Date Palm plantations were visited with Cyprus Wheatear and loads of other cool birds around being observed. We weren't able to relocate the reported Olive-backed Pipit but we did find several Tree Pipits with one having a call really similar to Olive-backed, but this bird turned out to be just a Tree Pipit. I might post pictures of this bird later. At the North Beach we saw the two Brown Boobies and the usual (nothing) stuff there.

In the evening we went to Eilat and ate some nice shoarma, and afterwards, Yotam, Christian, Roni and I went to Pinilek/ Pickilecks, Pinicilli's or whatever you want to call it to have some of the best icecreams here in Eilat. Too bad that the hot girl was not behind the bar...

 Whoooooo are you???

Don't think the bird posed like this all the time, I managed to get one shot before the bird continued enjoying pinching my fingers!

This first summer Cyprus Wheatear was a really 'posy' individual and allowed me to come really close.

Flight shot of the Wheatear.

It's good to know we're being protected all the time, even while bird watching at the North Beach!

Cold Northern Winds

Last night I did a trap round around 8, this resulted in two reaaaally cute Desert Hedgehogs and 1 Orphean Warbler in a trap.

Awhh cute hedgies!

What a difference in temperature suddenly.. I'm sitting outside now with my sweater on, unlike the previous days. It is also snowing and raining again in the north!

The temperatures today very much reminded me of Holland in summer. Maybe I should be happy that it isn't that warm yet here, since warm temperatures are on their way for sure. Still, I would appreciate a few degrees higher. So from 18 degrees to 23 degrees orso.

Also now, we had a very clear view on everything. I decided to take some photos of the surroundings, since I haven't posted that many pictures yet of what Eilat and it surroundings look like. So here they come!

 The lake of the IBRCE with the Hasakee in front!

A view from the IBRCE park on the saltpans and the hotels along the beach of Eilat.

This is one of the large Heligoland traps we catch birds with. This is trap number 8.

This morning we had many swallows in the pond nets, 80 House Martins and some Red-rumped and Barn Swallows!

The trend of many birds continued, only slightly fewer birds than the past few days. The quality was, as always, good again, with Little Bittern, recapture Little Crake, Subalpine Warbler, Rock Martin, Eastern Black-eared Wheatears, Tawny Pipit and Cretzchsmar's Buntings.

Migration improved today with more Steppe Buzzards passing by, most of them going really low over the park. We had 8 Black Storks (one group of 7) and some Steppe Eagles.

 Little Bittern (Ixobrychus minutus), adult male

  Little Bittern (Ixobrychus minutus), adult male

Sardinian Warbler (Sylvia melanocephala), adult male; these common but beautiful species may not be absent in photos ofcourse.

In the afternoon I slept for a very long time and had dreams, about catching Collared Doves in large Heligoland traps (including a nice song along) and in my dream I was also on the beach, with the IBRCE team... haha. 

At 16.00 we went to do a bit of birdwatching. Roni, Christian, Yael and I first went to Shahamon Park in the SW-part of Eilat and then left for the North Beach. At the park we did not see many birds, just a Woodchat Shrike. At the North Beach we did not only see one Brown Booby, but also found the second individual! One of the birds had fish wire around his leg, we noticed this while it was flying around above the Gulf of Aquaba. Furthermore some of the usual birds; Sandwich Terns and some White-eyed Gulls.

Gulf of Aquaba, with the hotels of Eilat on the left, and Aquaba on the right. As you can see: a clear view!

And last but not least today's ringing totals:

Balkan Warbler 4 - 2

Barn Swallow 26 - 1

Blackcap 41 -

Bluethroat - 1

Chiffchaff 2 - 6

Common Whitethroat 10 - 2

Cretchsmar's Bunting 7 - 1

Eastern Black-eared Wheatear 2 -

Eastern Olivaceous Warbler 4 -

Eastern Orphean Warbler 21 - 6

House Martin 80 -

House Sparrow 2 - 1

Laughing Dove 1 - 1

Lesser Whitethroat 78 - 26

Little Bittern 1 -

Little Crake - 1

Penduline Tit 1 -

Red-rumped Swallow 26 - 4

Redstart 5 - 2

Reed Warbler 1 -

Rock Martin 1 -

Rueppel's Warbler 2 -

Sand Martin 3 -

Sardinian Warbler 1 - 4

Savi's Warbler 2 -

Sedge Warbler 2 - 1

Spanish Sparrow 3 -

Subalpine Warbler 1 -

Tawny Pipit 1 -

White Wagtail 1 -

White-spectacled Bulbul 1 - 4 TOTAL 331- 60

Guests from France and Denmark

The Lesser Whitethroat bonanza kept on going and with this many curruca's a foreign retrap is almost inevitable. And thus, this was proved! Yotam kept telling us: check both legs, check both legs! And as we were ringing all the curruca's I pulled a curruca out of the bag, with a worn ring on the left leg: Paris! Not much later Roni came back with more news: he just got a Lesser Whitethroat out of the net carrying a Danish ring! Having foreign retraps in Israel is already pretty rare, let alone two on one day! The recovery of the Lesser Whitethroat with the French ring was a first for Israel, pretty cool.

This is where we sleep, the iglo!

The morning hours were really busy with birds, after that it slowed down a bit but we still had good birds. 450 birds were caught today! 

In the afternoon we did some trap fixing, since Heligoland trap 5 was severly broken by the strong winds in February. We started with re-making the cage again, hopefully we can repair the Heligoland trap soon, so we can catch birds with it again! 

Below a couple of pictures from today, be prepared!

 Cyprus Warbler (Sylvia melanothorax), 2cy male, just beautiful!

Balkan Wagtail (Motacilla flava feldgegg), probable adult male

 Crag Martin (Ptynonoprogne rupestris), a species seldomly ringed here at the IBRCE! It was both a ringing tick for Yotam and Yael. 

 Balkan Warbler (Phylloscopus orientalis)

Eastern Black-eared Wheater (Oenanthe melanoleuca), female

Daily total:

Balkan Wagtail 1 -

Balkan Warbler 4 - 1

Barn Swallow 28 -

Blackcap 27 -

Bluethroat - 1

Chiffchaff 8 - 7

Common Whitethroat 26 - 1

Crag Martin 1 -

Cretzchsmar's Bunting 1 -

Cyprus Warbler 1 -

Eastern Black-eared Wheatear 2 -

Eastern Oliveceous Warbler 3 -

Eastern Orphean Warbler 21 - 2

House Martin 51 -

House Sparrow 4 - 2

Lesser Whitethroat 185 - 19

Menetries's Warbler - 1

Quail 1 - 1

Red-rumped Swallow 25 - 2

Redstart 5 -

Reed Warbler 2 -

Sardinian Warbler - 1

Savi's Warbler 1 -

Sedge Warbler 1 - 1

Silverbill 1 -

Spanish Sparrow 2 - 1

White-spectacled Bulbul 1 - 1

Woodchat Shrike 1 - Total 410 - 42 (including foreign recaptures) = 452!

Big Bang!

Curruca, Curruca, Curruca, Lesser Whitethroat, Lesser Whitethroat, Lesser Whitethroat…. 222 Lesser Whitethroats were ringed this morning! With this amount of birds the Heligoland traps worked really well, with some traps having 10 Lesser Whitethroats at one single time.

The ringing hut (picture from a few days ago of course, because today the sun was shining!)

The entire morning we were catching loads of birds, mainly Lesser Whitethroats, but there were some other highlights ofcourse! Orphean Warblers were represented well, with 14 birds caught! We got a stunning male Little Crake out of a crake trap late in the morning, our 3^rd Subalpine Warbler of the season, an adult female, was ringed. Among these cool birds we also had the more common but still scarce birds in the hand, like Hoopoe and Quails.

 Cretzchsmar's Bunting (Emberiza caesia), adult male

 Subalpine Warbler (Sylvia cantillans albistrata), adult female

 Little Crake (Porza parva), first-year male

Quail (Coturnix coturnix).

It's miiiiiiine!

For the first time since about a week we had a clear view again. The Jordanian and Eilat mountains were clearly visible and instead of a vague wash of clouds we had clear skies. Highlights from the migrating birds were 2 Crag Martins, 1 Little Swift, 2 Ospreys, 1 Lesser Kestrel and 1 Black Stork.

In the evening we did swallow catching of course, catching about 60 swallows, mainly Red-rumpeds. We were just 6 new birds short of 400 ringed today...

 Christian: urgh, dirty swallow. Yotam: dirty indeed. Roni: retained vernicular toe feathers pointing towards retarded moult of 4th calenderyear.

Ringing from the 15th of March: 

Balkan Warbler  23 – 4

Barn Swallow 20 – 1

Blackcap 11 -

Chiffchaff 19 – 7

Collared Dove 1 -

Common Whitethroat 5 – 2

Cretzchsmar’s Bunting 2 – 1

Eastern Black-eared Wheatear 1 -

Eastern Olivaceous Warbler 1 -

Eastern Orphean Warbler 12 – 2

Hoopoe 1 -

House Martin 8 -

House Sparrow – 1

Laughing Dove 6 -

Lesser Whitethroat 222 -3

Little Crake 1 -

Little Green Bee-eater 1 -

Palestine Sunbird 1 -

Quail 1 – 1

Red-rumped Swallow 38 -

Reed Warbler 4 – 2

Rueppel’s Warbler 3 – 1

Sardinian Warbler 4 - 1

Savi’s Warbler 3 -

Sedge Warbler 2 -

Spanish Sparrow – 2

Subalpine Warbler 1 -

White-spectacled Bulbul 1 -

Woodchat Shrike 1 -

TOTAL 393 – 29 = 422
29 species

Sylvia bonanza

Ringing has been good the last days with a clear change in bulk species: Lesser Whitethroats seem to have overruled the Chiffchaffs  in numbers. Sylvia's are doing well already, with for example 68 Lesser Whitethroats ringed today. The ringing is making us all pretty tired so this will be just a short blog post. Today was our best day so far for the season with 272 birds being caught today, including the swallow catches from tonight. The totals will be added later.

 Tawny Pipit

Northern Wheatear, female

 Subalpine Warbler, 2cy male (bird nr. 1)

Subalpine Warbler, 2cy male (bird nr. 2)

 Eastern Orphean Warbler, adult male

Quiz bird!

One of the three Little Green Bee-eaters we caught today.

13th of March:

Balkan Warbler 4 -

Barn Swallow 18 -

Blackcap 7 -

Bluethroat 1 -1

Chiffchaff 47 - 4

Common Whitethroat 4 -

Eastern Olivaceous Warbler 2

Eastern Orphean Warbler 1 -

House Sparrow 2 -

Laughing Dove 1 -

Lesser Whitethroat 23 - 2

Menetries's Warbler 1 -

Northern Wheatear 1 -

Palestine Sunbird 2 -

Penduline Tit 1 -

Red-rumped Swallow 13 -

Sand Martin 2 -

Sardinian Warbler 2 - 1

Savi's Warbler - 2

Segde Warbler 2 -

Silverbill 2 -

Spanish Sparrow 1 -3

Tawny Pipit 1 -

White-spectacled Bulbul 1 - 1

TOTAL 139 - 16 = 155

24 species

14th of March

Balkan Warbler 15 - 1

Barn Swallow 65 - 1

Blackcap 8 - 1

Bluethroat 1 - 1

Chiffchaff 17 - 5

Common Whitethroat 8 - 1

Dead-sea Sparrow 1 - 1

Eastern Olivaceous Warbler 1 -

Eastern Orphean Warbler 2 - 2

Graceful Prinia 1 - 2

House Martin 1 -

House Sparrow 1 -

Laughing Dove 1 -

Lesser Whitethroat 68 - 4

Little Green Bee-eater 2 - 1

Quail 1 -

Red-rumped Swallow 29 -

Redstart 1 -

Reed Warbler 6 -

Rueppel's Warbler 1 -

Sand Martin 7 -

Sardinian Warbler 2 -

Savi's Warbler 1 -1

Segde Warbler 2 - 1

Spanish Sparrow 2 -

Subalpine Warbler 2 -

White-spectacled Bulbul - 3

TOTAL 251 - 21 = 272 27 species