Tibetan Sand-PloverS!

So this is how it went: Saturday morning I get back from my weekly circuit of Hulda Reservoir with Piki et al. I take a look on eBird to see if anything interesting has come up. When I check a checklist from Hamaapil by Ilan Nissim Moriya, I am intrigued to see his report of two Greater Sand-Plovers. GSP is strictly coastal in Israel, so this is very unusual. I drop Ilan an email, asking for further details (I'm an eBird reviewer). Dan Sharon sends me via WhatsApp this photo, that knocks me off my chair:

Then Dan tells me it's Ilan's photo and I figured it out... According to them, this was one of three (not two) juveniles present, that all looked the same. That sounded totally unreal. Tibetan Sand-Plover is mega in Israel, with six or seven previous records, so three together?!? How can that even be real? I asked Ilan for further photos, and after lunch he sends me a bunch of convincing photos. I ask Ilan to release the news out as probable Tibetan Sand-Plover and a big twitch (in Israeli standards) develops. The first twitchers quickly arrive on site and confirm my tentative ID. I skip my traditional Saturday afternoon siesta and go with Piki to twitch them. 50 minutes drive, not too bad. I have seen two in Israel before, but not since 2013, and three together!!! When we get there several twitchers formed a bit of a queue. 

The fishpond is full of birds but we ignore them as we are very focused. The sand-plovers are on show immediately. Piki is smiling - it's a lifer for him. The birds are very close and tame but we are at the back of the queue, watching from inside the car into the sun. I drive around the pond and position us at the opposite corner. Light angle is slightly better but we are quite distant. I am not comfortable in the car with the angle and the heat, hence the mediocre documentation. There are much better photos available. We appreciate their small size and short, stout bill. I discuss on the phone their intricate ID features with other birders watching them out of other cars. A little bit of doubt is raised about their identification, because of their fairly long legs and slightly larger size of two of the three. However, I leave the site feeling confident they are Tibetan Sand-Plovers. 

Sweety

In different light conditions

With Little Stint

Three Tibetan Sand-Plovers together

The doubt is dissolved eventually, especially after two of the three birds were trapped and ringed today by a local ringing group doing a pre-planned shorebird ringing session. Their biometrics confirmed they are Tibetan. Bingo.

Diaries of an avid birder

August 6th, 04:45

I have a late morning meeting in Sde Boker. My original plan is to do MacQueen's Bustard point counts before the meeting (more on that later), but the site is an active military firing zone and I could not enter this morning. I revert my plans to do my morning eBirding at Be'er Sheva river park. En route, cruising at motorway speed, I hit some sharp object on the road. Rear tire explodes, I must pull over on the shoulders of the highway at a super risky spot. I change the spare tire at maximum speed, really fearing my life with heavy lorries zooming past inches from me. I arrive at the river park slightly later than I had planned but still early enough to enjoy birding. The man-made park has really nice habitat - I like it very much, and look forward to tzicking buntings here in November. In the meanwhile I enjoy many Savi's Warblers. Also Desert Finches and Rufous-tailed Scrub-Robin are nice. I make it to the meeting on time after repairing the tire in Beer Sheva.

August 7th, 05:56

I start my monthly monitoring session of our restoration project at Maagan Michael. I need to get as many point counts done before it heats up and then I need to rush to a meeting. Not too many birds around - still lovely at Maagan Michael. Heartening to see how our restoration work is already helping migrants rest and refuel. Migrant tern numbers are building up nicely. Only on the computer screen back home I notice that one of the White-winged Terns I had photographed was ringed. I send the image to Yosef Kiat - it's his bird from Atlit, ringed July 2021, resighted at Maagan Michael July 2022. The amount of detail in images produced by these modern cameras is amazing.

August 8th, 05:55

Morning eBirding with Piki. We check Revadim old fishponds - a bit more inspiring than a routine walk down my local patch, so worth the 15 minutes less sleep. The reservoir is full of herons and ibis, also quite a few shorebirds and terns. Among the terns we pick up a sweet Gull-billed Tern, bullying other birds. 07:10 I am back home to be a normal person, family stuff, work.

August 9th, 05:55

I start my first MacQueen's Bustard point count morning in a lovely area deep in the Negev, after a two hour drive in the dark. I do this work as part of BirdLife Israel's collaboration with Israel Nature and Parks Authority in a five-year study of these threatened bustards. I come with low expectations after a very dry spring in that part of the Negev. I am pleasantly surprised to find the desert plains full of life. In this study we use 15 minute point counts and move between them to manage four or five point counts in a morning before it heats up too much. At the first point count there are so many birds I can't pull myself away. I stay there for an additional 30 minutes taking in all the birds and mammals. There are dozens of Dorcas Gazelles and Asian Wild Asses striding solemnly across the desert plains:

On the bird front, the dry plains are whopping with them. The seeds remaining on the ground from previous wetter winters, added to the produce from the ungulate's behinds probably provide sufficient resources. Over 20 Cream-coloured Coursers, including several recently-fledged young, are fun to watch. 

There are tons of passerines busily foraging along a dry wadi bed - Bar-tailed Larks stand out among the larks, and the six species of wheatear are impressive too (Mourning, White-crowned, Desert, Hooded, Isabelline and Blackstart). Add to that Spotted and Crowned Sandgrouse, Spectacled Warbler, shrikes, babblers - I really enjoy this spot! 

Driving back home, past Sde Boker I see a huge bird of prey soaring over a distant ridge. I pull over, get my bins on it - Golden Eagle! 

I see it's a young bird by the pale tail base (juveniles of the population breeding in Israel show very limited, if any, white on primary bases). Knowing that a large proportion of fledglings are tagged every year by INPA, I check with my colleagues. Within minutes this map is sent to me - indeed it's a bird that hatched in the Negev this year. How cool is that.

August 10, 05:56

It's Saturday, so it's Hulda Reservoir with Piki. Today we have special guests joining us - Yuval Dax from my team and his 9 yo son Noam who's getting into birding. Hulda reservoir is at its best now, with low water levels and lots of exposed mud to feed shorebirds. Indeed, there are plenty of shorebirds, they attract most of our attention. A flock of 27 graceful Collared Pratincoles is a pleasure to watch - I love pratincoles. Among the large number of Little Stints we manage to pull out a Broad-billed Sandpiper - nice one, quite scarce inland.

Hamaapil fishponds pec

This morning before work I checked Hamaapil fishponds. I was tempted to go there by the Pectoral Sandpiper that had been found there yesterday by Uri Gati, a fine young birder. Also recent reports from there indicating that there are lots of migrants added to the attraction. I was there early and appreciated the beautiful fishponds, now being drained ahead of the incoming pelican migration. There's an adjacent pelican feeding station - later in autumn thousands of pelicans fly around there daily. The local fish farmers use this method to avoid conflict.

I quickly got on the Pec - such a nice bird, luv 'em. It showed very well through my Swarovski scope. It is a good rarity in Israel, just about annual. However, in recent years Hamaapil fishponds have hosted one almost every year - in autumn 2020, 2022, 2023 and now this. Some of these records could have referred to a returning bird. The current bird looks bright and fresh with prominent pale mantle braces so I think it's 1cy - probably a new bird. It was foraging on the mud with many other shorebirds, mainly Little Stints and Little Ringed Plovers.

While watching the pec a Marsh Harrier flew by and spooked many birds. It was hilarious (and unusual) to watch this small group of Little Grebes fleeing from the harrier run away on the mud in panic - they clearly aren't designed for this kind of activity. I laughed out loud while watching this scene. 

That one muddy pond held hundreds of maybe even thousands of birds. Really impressive. The shorebird aggregation included several Curlew Sandpipers and Temminck's Stints. The one in the video here is still pretty, sporting a near-complete rufous summer plumage. An early Citrine Wagtail was a nice surprise among the Western Yellow Wagtails, their numbers growing now by the day. 

I checked the other fishponds  and enjoyed lots of birds. There was a nice selection of terns - Common, Gull-billed, Whiskered and White-winged. These two young white-wings looked very sweet trying to balance on a wire - they made me smile as well.

Heading out I stopped for a minute to admire a flock of European Bee-eaters on wires. While counting them through my scope suddenly I noticed a starling on the wire - WTF? I instantly noticed it is pallid brown-grey, unstreaked, with darker wings and a pale bill - Rosy Starling! I had it in the scope for maybe two seconds then it dropped down into a vegetated area and I lost it. I spent a few minutes trying in vain to relocate it while notifying the other birders on site. I had to leave for work and was relieved when the others relocated it and managed to photograph it as well.

Nice pre-work session, check my eBird checklist here.