Pallid beauty

This morning I went with Jonathan to bird in the Eilat area. Our first mission was to see the Grey Hypocolius found by Barak Granit a few days ago near the IBRCE. We searched for it for a long time but at first with no success. We worked the nearby date plantation, in which we had an Olive-backed Pipit. I heard a very interesting Phylloscopus calling several times. It first sounded to me like an odd humei call, but after consulting with my iPod I found it closely matching proregulus! The bird was very mobile and stayed high in the canopies. I kept losing it, even with the help of Itai and Jonathan. I had a glimpse of it flying from treetop to treetop - it was tiny but I could get no plumage details. Eventually we gave up on it, but if a pallas's gets found tomorrow then it's mine!

We returned to the IBRCE, and soon after we had a few brief encounters with this beautiful bird. Unfortunately it was very shy and jumpy, and kept disappearing in the thick vegetation of the IBRCE. lucky I managed a couple of shots. I was very happy to see it - haven't seen one for many years.

Grey Hypocolius - male

While searching for the hypo I had quite a few Indian Silverbills:

We continued to Yotvata fields. In the southern field I had two Richard's Pipits, male Hooded Wheatear and a few Crag Martins. No sign of the recent rarities (Blyth's pipit and Little Bunting), but it was nice to see the couple of Hoopoe Larks that have been hanging around in the field for a week or so. Bizarre to see them feeding like Crested Larks in the dry field. I am used to find them in the remotest corners of our desert. Part of the time they were feeding with a small group of Ringed Plovers - interesting combo.

Hoopoe Lark

In the northern fields we enjoyed (too?) good views of two first-winter White-fronted Geese. The white forehead is quite developed for a youngster, but the lack of barring on the underparts and dark tip to bill indicate these are young birds.

White-fronted Goose

There was considerable size difference between both birds, but the small one was not small enough...

This seems to be a good season for white-fronts in Israel, with small groups recorded in several sites all over the country.

Other nice birds in the field were 1 Oriental Skylark and a couple of Caucasian Stonechats.

Caucasian Stonechat

Casucasian Stonechats

This morning I had a good ringing session at my local alfalfa field near Bet Kama, with Eyal and Re'a. We had a good catch that consisted mainly pipits (red-throats, coutelii water and meadow). In addition we caught two Caucasian Stonechats, that are good birds for this region. In the NE Valleys (Hula and Bet She'an) and at Eilat one can see on a good day this time of year 15-20 individuals or even more. The male was a classic variegatus, with more than half of each tail feather is white.

Caucasian Stonechat Saxicola maurus variegatus - male

Females are much more tricky. In the field, the tail of this individual would look completely dark, and would be identified as maurus. However, when the uppertail coverts are moved aside, the white bases to the rectrices (about 10 mm) become visible. This of course is impossible to see in the field. This female seems to fit variegatus too; I'd expect armenicus to have less or no white at the bases of the rectrices.

For this reason I believe that many of the European records of 'maurus' females in fact involve variegatus. It would be interesting to compare the ratio of variegatus VS. maurus records in W Europe for males and females.

Caucasian Stonechat Saxicola maurus variegatus - female

"Field" views - all dark tail:

White bases to rectrices revealed:

Water Pipit Anthus spinoletta coutelii

Eurasian Skylark

Other good birds seen in the field were 1 Oriental Skylark, 1 Merlin and 1 Peregrine.

Many thanks to Eyal and Re'a.

Huuuuuuuulaaaaaaaa!

I had some work up in the north yesterday and today, so I managed to squeeze a few hours of birding at the Hula Lake (Agamon). This is such a great place and I miss it so much after working there for several years. It was good to meet good old friends too.
The lake itself held this flock of 16 Ruddy Shelducks among the hundreds of other ducks:

Several Coypus were feeding near the waters' edge:

Driving around the lake we bumped into this Bittern that was sure it was invisible:

Many Lapwings were in the fields and flying around:

I had several eastern Stonechats. This is a male variegatus:

And this was an obliging maurus-type:

The weather was very good and there were many eagles up in the air. Found this adult Greater Spotted Eagle perched on a low tree just before it lifted off:

This adult male Red-backed Shrike is two monthes late! It should have been in Africa already. Its' deformed bill must have disrupted its' migration plans. It was feeding quite actively though, so it might just make it.

There are over 30000 cranes at the Agamon nowadays. This is a small part of them, feeding in last seasons' peanut field.

On the way out this Snipe try to become invisible too:

Fieldfares and other bits and pieces

Drove around a bit over the last couple of days and collected some nice stuff along the way. Yesterday at Ashdod not too many gulls or shorebirds, and nothing exciting among them. Single Greater Spotted Eagle and Short-toed Eagle (late!) were nice. These two female Mountain Gazelles showed me their butts as they sped away from my car. Are they being poached in that area? They were very very shy.


Later drove to Segula to look for the Fieldfare trio found by Re'a the previous day. The first look produced nothing, but after a short lunch break found them feeding quite relaxed on the lawn. They really let me approach - I never had such good views in Israel. These guys must have come from a village or town somewhere (in Russia?) - their tame behaviour suggested that. Great to see these Israeli rarities - hopefully we will have a good winter for them (and for their black-throated cousin tooo...)

This morning I was ringing at my local site in Ashdod. It was pretty good with many chiffies, Blackcaps, Bluethroats and Robins. A couple of Spanish Sparrows were nice, and this Moustached Warbler was my first for the season. Other birds about were a Reed Bunting flying around and dodging my nets, and several Water Rails heard calling.

Moustached Warbler

Spanish Sparrow

A short afternoon visit to Tsor'a didn't produce much. This female Stonechat posed nicely against the light:

And this late Isabelline Wheatear was pretty in the warm afternoon light:

Pre-rain Tsora

This morning woke up early and went with Uri to Tsora fields. We were expecting our first serious weather system of the coming winter, and I was happy to be outside before a few days of rain. It seems that most winter birds are already here, and we're recieving the late migrants now.
However it was pretty windy and not too many birds were about. The alfalfa fields held a large mixed flock of pipits and skylarks, with one Richard's among the many red-throats, meadow and water. Near the reservoir one male Caucasian Stonechat (veriegata) showed well. Almost got bogged with the car while trying to cross the wild Sorek stream but managed to get through.