That was the week...

We’ve just spent a week with two friends from the UK who are keen and widely travelled birders but making their visit to Portugal.  It was a shame that their arrival coincided with a spell of unsettled weather, including a couple of days of rain, but we did our best to show them why it was that we decided to make our base here in lovely Tavira.

Sunday, 20th
Just a half day around the Tavira and Santa Luzia saltpans where the usual selection of waders included one or two Ruff but the highlight for us was seeing Common Redshank H19 for the first time this autumn.  We have written before here about this Dutch-ringed bird, which was back in its usual spot where it has been seen regularly through the last three winters.
There are lots of Audouin’s Gulls here still and we couldn’t resist jotting down a few ring numbers.

 

Monday, 21st
A full day in the Castro Verde area saw the best of the week’s weather - warm and sunny with just a gentle breeze.  With persistence and a little luck we were able to find most of the target species, including both Great Bustard and Little Bustard, Spanish Imperial Eagle, Black-bellied Sandgrouse, Griffon Vulture, Black Vulture, Stone-curlew and Calandra Lark.  A Hen Harrier was our first of the season, Red Kite numbers had increased from a week ago but the day’s only Black-winged Kite disappointed by quickly disappearing from view.

Tuesday, 22nd
A dark and dismal morning with persistent rain found us at Castro Marim birding just from the car.  We saw barely 30 species in the hour or so before we saw sense and headed back home!

Wednesday, 23rd
Most of the day was spent around Ludo and Quinta do Lago where early morning raptors included four Booted Eagles, an Osprey, a Marsh Harrier and a Black-winged Kite.  We saw what were probably three different Little Bitterns and as well as the usual Purple Swamp-hens it’s nice that a Water Rail has recently taken to appearing from time to time in front of the hide.  Several Red-crested Pochards, Glossy Ibises and Black-headed Weaver completed the area’s ‘must see’ species.  Two Cetti’s Warblers put on a memorable and uncharacteristic show for us, displaying and chasing about in open view, lots of White Storks were back on their nests, the wooded areas provided Crested Tits, Iberian Green Woodpecker and Great Spotted Woodpecker but for some reason not Short-toed Treecreeper.  Two Common Scoters off Praia de Faro at lunchtime were a bonus.
We rounded off the day back in Tavira where three Bluethroats in view simultaneously could hardly have been bettered.

Thursday, 24th
When the forecast shows wet and windy weather approaching from the west, it’s best to head east!  We went to Doñana for the day and although we didn’t see much sun we did stay dry.
At La Dehesa de Abajo there were fewer birds than we saw on our last visit there two weeks ago mainly because Glossy Ibises and White Storks were mostly absent.  There were still 1,000 or so Greater Flamingos and probably twice that number of Northern Shovelers.  Among the hundreds of Black-winged Stilts, one with a colour-ring obligingly walked past the hide two or three times.  Two Black Terns, two Pallid Swifts and several Red-knobbed Coots were also notable and there were large numbers of hirundines feeding over the water.  After all that we enjoyed an excellent lunch in the visitor centre.
In the afternoon, we headed off to explore other parts of Doñana where the numbers of Marsh Harriers, Great Egrets, Grey Herons and Common Kestrels were particularly impressive.  We saw Griffon Vultures and Calandra Larks, on several occasions we had good views of Black-winged Kites but the highlight was probably seeing four Black Storks at close range, birds that we don‘t often see on the ground in the Algarve.

Friday, 25th
Heavy overnight rain continued into the morning and we decided not to venture out birding until after lunch.  The afternoon was no better; we managed half an hour or so around Tavira, birding from the car but it was no fun and we did the only sensible thing, we packed up and went home.

Saturday, 26th
During a week’s birdwatching tour in the Algarve it would be unprofessional not to go to Sagres, particularly at this time of the year when there is a chance to see some raptors and other migrants.  The weather had improved and we enjoyed a mostly sunny day with very little wind.  Unfortunately, it wasn’t a great birding day - the birds just didn‘t turn up! 
We saw a few Cory’s Shearwaters, a tired-looking Garden Warbler and a Pied Flycatcher, Shags, Rock Doves and Crag Martins and a flock of what must have been 100 or more Red-billed Choughs but the only raptors were a Booted Eagle and a Common Buzzard.

On the way back to Tavira, we called in at Lagoa dos Salgados but it wasn’t a pretty sight.  Work is currently being carried out by Águas do Algarve, which it is said should provide enhanced nesting and feeding areas for birds, enable the water levels to be controlled and generally increase the lagoon's appeal to migrating birds to stop over, rest and feed.  If it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is!  We should remember that the head of  Águas do Algarve is that same person who was previously mayor of Silves council and was instrumental in granting permission to Finalgarve for the tourist development adjacent to the lagoon that has been the subject of an online petition and a complaint to the European Environment Commissioner.

So, that was the week - some very good days, one that was not so good and two that were washed out by the weather.

La Dehesa de Abajo

We’ve been across the border to Spain a couple of times recently, to the Marismas del Odiel, to Doñana and in particular to La Dehesa de Abajo.

Usually our trips to Doñana are one-day affairs involving early starts from Tavira and returning late.  Our most recent trip was like that.  However, a few weeks back we had a leisurely journey, stopping off on the way for some birding at the Marismas del Odiel and then staying overnight in Aznalcázar at the very nice Hacienda Olontigi.

Our main reason for the overnight stay was to give ourselves several chances to photograph Iberian lynx.  We went with three friends from Tavira and in Aznalcázar we met up with Beltran Ceballos Vazquez and Sergio Asian González, both of whom are involved in the lynx re-introduction project and whom we know from previous trips to Andalucía.  This trip was the result of a conversation that we had with the two of them at the Birdfair at Rutland Water in August.

Sadly things didn’t work out quite as we and they had hoped.  Partly this was the result of the weather - there was persistent rain that really didn’t encourage us or any lynx to be out and about; also there was some bad luck in that we visited several potential sites and were simply at the right place at the wrong time.  While we were at Site A, what looked from the photos captured by a camera trap to be three different lynxes were at Site B!

In spite of some miserable weather and missing out on our main target, we had an enjoyable couple of days.  The birding at La Dehesa de Abajo was very good - thousands of roosting White Storks were quite a sight and there was a good selection of waders and ducks.  We also took the ferry across the Rio Guadalquivir at Coria del Rio and spent an afternoon in the Paraje Natural del Brazo del Este where Glossy Ibises were particularly numerous.  There were no rarities, just plenty of birds, amongst them Black Stork, Osprey, Great Egret, lots of Marsh Harriers and various common passerine migrants.

La Dehesa de Abajo

Last week, we didn’t take much persuading to go back to La Dehesa de Abajo just on a day trip.  On this occasion the weather was superb but we were there for the birds and there was no chance to look for any lynx.  If anything there were even more birds than earlier - just by counting five species (White Stork, Greater Flamingo, Glossy Ibis, Northern Shoveler and Black-tailed Godwit) we estimated more than 12,000 birds.  The departure from the lagoon of several thousand White Storks was followed by the arrival of wave after wave of Glossy Ibises, a spectacle that on its own made the journey worthwhile.  We also saw there a Red-knobbed Coot, a late Bee-eater and lots of waders that included several hundred Avocets; not too far away, we watched a Spanish Imperial Eagle.

Red-knobbed Coot - from a hide that faces into the light

It’s great to see the visitor centre at La Dehesa de Abajo open and being able to buy some lunch there made a change from the sandwiches that we’ve been having day after day.  The new regime has plans for more hides to be provided at some stage and it would be nice if there could also be some modifications to the two existing ones which like most hides in this part of the world are poorly designed and badly sited.

We will be planning an early return to La Dehesa de Abajo and to other parts of Doñana.  It won’t be long before Common Cranes arrive!  And, of course, there’s also the lynx to be photographed.

Algarve Update

With scarcely a day off from birding in one form or another and lots of long days out to the Alentejo, to Sagres and to Doñana, regular updates to our blog have been impossible these last few weeks.

September and October are two of the best months for birding here.  It’s migration time of course and that means birds arriving, birds leaving and birds just passing through - raptors, passerines, waders, seabirds, everything.  We've been busy!

Among all these birds can usually be found a few rarities but we have to be careful when we refer to rarities.  In the last month or so there have been records here of American Golden Plover, Lesser Flamingo, Lesser Redpoll, Rüppell’s Griffon, White-winged Tern, Herring Gull, Brent Goose, Roseate Tern, Glaucous Gull, Chimney Swift, Long-tailed Skua, Yelkouan Shearwater and Long-legged Buzzard, all of which are subject to scrutiny by the Portuguese Rarities Committee but this list no doubt includes a few that you may not think of as rare if you live in the UK, for instance.  It will be interesting to see how many of them are eventually accepted. 

Other scarce (but not officially rare) species of local interest have included Western Olivaceous Warbler, Great Egret, Grey Phalarope and Ferruginous Duck, plus Eleanora’s Falcon, Spanish Imperial Eagle and several other raptors. 

Grey Phalarope

Here in Tavira, we did hear a couple of reports of a Western Reef Egret but they almost certainly referred to the presumed hybrid garzetta x gularis egret that has been mainly around the Forte do Rato area for several weeks.

Hybrid garzetta x gularis egret

In recent autumns at least some of the rarity records in the Algarve have resulted from ringing activity but as far as we are aware that hasn’t happened this year.  The group from the UK led by Colin McShane who in previous years have ringed Common Yellowthroat, Aquatic Warbler and Common Rosefinch among others, unfortunately chose to spend a week at Vilamoura that included the only few days in the last several months that proved to be unsuitable for ringing.  This was their seventh visit here and the total number of birds ringed, while they endured wind and rain, was their lowest so far.

The 4th Sagres Birdwatching Festival during the first weekend of October seems to have been a success both for the number of people attending and for the number and variety of birds that were recorded.  Some days at Sagres / Cape St Vincent birding can be hard work so it was good that those who travelled there just for the festival had plenty to keep them entertained.

This autumn we have managed only one ‘pelagic’ trip and really it wasn’t one of the best.  We went about 5 miles out from Fuseta but saw only Cory’s and Sooty Shearwaters, a Black Tern and Northern Gannets.  Probably we should have gone a week or two earlier but that wasn’t possible.

 Northern Gannet

Black Tern

Much of our birding has been in the Eastern Algarve, at Castro Marim and in the Ria Formosa.  The numbers of birds have been impressive - e.g. 1,700 Greater Flamingos, 1,350 Audouin’s Gulls and 900 Avocets at Castro Marim - and species such as Bluethroat, Glossy Ibis, Purple Swamp-hen, Little Bittern, Slender-billed Gull, Caspian Tern and Black-necked Grebe have been popular with visiting birders and mostly easy to see.

 Black-necked Grebe

 Glossy Ibis

 Caspian Terns

Little Bittern

As usual, we've been reading and reporting colour-rings.  Three Lesser Black-backed Gulls from the Netherlands and two from Belgium were all seen at Olhão.  We are still awaiting replies concerning a Black-winged Stilt, a Spoonbill and several Greater Flamingos and Audouin's Gulls.

In other news, television personality Bill Oddie has been birding in the Algarve and has expressed support for the campaign to ‘Save Salgados’.  You can read about that here and, if you haven’t signed the petition, it’s still available here.

Travels Up North - 2

Our third day up north saw us travelling from the Aquafalls Hotel to Quinta Nova de Nossa Senhora do Carmo in the Douro Valley.  The journey took us through Vila Real where we stopped for a coffee.  The mountains that overlook the city are the Alvão and Marão mountains, rising to 1,400m.

We passed by the Palácio de Mateus, an image of which appears on the labels of a range of wines that includes Mateus Rosé, possibly the best-known and certainly the best-marketed of all Portuguese wines.  The distinctively shaped bottle certainly stands out from the crowd of other standard taller bottles and this no doubt helped to raise its profile in the UK back in the 1970s when people made table lamps out of them.

The Douro Valley has been described as one of the most beautiful wine regions in the world and it certainly has its attractions.  It seems that almost everything that happens there is connected in some way to the production of wine.  The names of well-known producers can be seen everywhere.

Our time spent at Quinta Nova de Nossa Senhora do Carmo was most enjoyable and a lot of fun.  The vineyards and cellar date back to 1764 but the ‘rural hotel’, formerly an 18th Century manor house, was established only in 2005.  We took a tour of the cellars and saw some of the wine-making process but the highlight came when we were given the opportunity to create our own individual blends of wine.  We were given three bottles, each of them already containing a blend of two or more wines, and then, using flasks, measuring cylinders and pipettes and guided by the Quinta’s Susana Pinho, we each set about making a new unique blend which we then bottled and brought away with us.  We took it seriously but the fact that we regularly tasted the mixture as we refined it ensured that there were plenty of laughs during the process.  We’ll be keeping ours for a special occasion, such as West Bromwich Albion and Birmingham City both winning a match on the same day!
 

June, the wine maker

Showing off the new wine blends

Quinta Nova

Quinta Nova

After lunch we visited the railway station at nearby Pinhão, another one that like the São Bento Railway Station in Porto is decorated with azulejos.  The station is a major tourist destination in the Alto Douro Wine Region.  The azulejos date from 1937 and depict landscapes, and customs of the Douro Region, including the harvest.  Travelling to the Douro Valley by rail looks like it could be a nice option.

Pinhão railway station

Azulejos

Also in Pinhão, we came across the MV Spirit of Chartwell, a hotel barge owned and operated by Portuguese holiday company Douro Azul for luxury cruises along the river.  This is the barge that formerly operated on the River Thames and carried the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh on the Thames Diamond Jubilee Pageant on 3rd June 2012.

MV Spirit of Chartwell

Our last stop of the day was at Quinta da Pacheca, one of the best known wine producers in the Douro Valley and apparently the first to bottle wine under its own brand.  Unfortunately, we were a few days too early for the start of the harvest so although we had a tour of the place we missed out on the chance to actually tread the grapes.  We were told by our charming host, José Serpa Pimentel, that one million bottles of wine were produced here last year and it was good to hear also that every one of them had a traditional cork stopper.

Quinta da Pacheca

As well as wine production, Quinta da Pacheca has a very nice hotel where we spent the night and an excellent restaurant where we had dinner and breakfast.  It also has a shop that, as well as wines, sells jams and other regional products.  June came away with a bottle of rosé and a jar of tomato and orange jam.

Dining room at Quinta da Pacheca

Most of the last day of our trip was devoted to visiting Arouca Geopark, part of the European Geoparks Network that was created in 2000, now has 54 member sites and about which we were previously completely ignorant.

Arouca Geopark is primarily of geological interest but it covers more than 300 sq. km. and is being developed for tourism based on archaeological, ecological, historical, sporting and cultural activities and there is a network of walking trails.  We visited the Frecha da Mizarela waterfall, Portugal’s highest but not at its best at this dry time of year.  We had been told that there was the chance here for us to go canoeing, which seemed a bit unlikely, but in the event we were offered canyoning, which may sound similar but is something entirely different!  We declined and instead spent a couple of hours birding.

Also in Arouca we were shown trilobites, fossils of extinct marine arthropods very similar to the Dudley Bug that we both know from the Wren’s Nest National Nature Reserve.  Some of these Portuguese ones were of a particularly impressive size.

Probably the best known attractions of the Arouca Geopark are the Pedras Parideiras, the “rocks that give birth to new stones”, which are thought to be unique in the world.  Disc-shaped biotite nodules (stones) occur in the granite (rocks) and are released as a result of erosion.  Not only did we see these, but in the interpretative centre at Castanheira village we watched a 3D film about them!

Ready for the 3D film

 

Hearing about the Pedras Parideiras

We spent our last night back at the coast in the very nice Hotel Solverde Spa & Wellness Centre at Espinho.  For dinner at the nearby PraiaGolfe Hotel we were joined by Helena Gonçalves, Executive Director of the Porto Convention Bureau to whom we are most grateful for having had the opportunity to at last visit to some new and very different parts of Portugal.  At times, it was easy to imagine that we might be in a different country from the Algarve.

Travels Up North - 1

When we came to Portugal it was our plan to spend most of our time here in the Algarve but also to use Tavira as a base from which to explore the rest of the country and also some of the nearer parts of Spain.  For a variety of reasons this hasn’t really happened.  We have got to know parts of the Baixo Alentejo very well but trips further north have been few and far between.  We have been birding around the Tejo Estuary and we have been to Lisbon but that’s been about it - until last weekend!

We have just returned from a very enjoyable four day visit to Porto and Northern Portugal where we were hosted by the local Tourism Board and the Porto Convention Bureau.  We were accompanied throughout by José Aragão from Turismo de Portugal, local guide Monica and driver, Ricardo.

Our lunchtime flight from Faro to Porto with Ryanair was very convenient and a perfectly satisfactory experience.  We arrived in the country’s second-largest city with time for just a short tour around the old and narrow streets.  Porto (sometimes seen referred to as Oporto) is a city with tremendous historical interest; it was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996.  We will have to go back to fully appreciate it and do it justice.

Porto and the Douro River

One feature that we did get to see was the historic São Bento Railway Station, well known for its tile (azulejo) panels depicting scenes of the history of Portugal.  The tiles are said to number 20,000 and date from 1905–1916.

São Bento Railway Station

After the city tour we went to the Cálem port wine cellars where we saw and heard about the production of tawny and ruby ports, LBVs, Colheitas, etc.  We also got to sample a couple of them, something that became a recurring theme of the trip!

Cálem port wine cellar

Dinner was enjoyed at the D. Tonho Restaurant where our outside table overlooked the Douro River and the famous Dom Luis Bridge.
 

Dom Luis Bridge

We very soon heard about the nickname given to the people of Porto: tripeiros, people who eat tripe!  This refers to a period in history when higher-quality cuts of meat were shipped from Porto with their sailors, while off-cuts and by-products, such as tripe, were left behind for the local citizens.  Although tripe is still a popular dish, neither of us was tempted to try it, probably having been put off by what we have seen on sale in butchers’ shops in the UK.

We stayed overnight at the Vila Galé Porto which is located within easy walking distance of the city’s main shopping area.

The following morning we travelled north by minibus to the Peneda-Gerês National Park, which is the only national park in Portugal and actually straddles the border with Spain.  We met with Paulo and Isobel, guides from Portugal Green Walks, in the town of Ponte de Lima and after stopping off to look at the historic espigueiros in the village of Soajo and a very pleasant lunch, we walked part of the Glacier and Alto Vez trail.  There were 24 espigueiros looking almost like a small cemetery; they are grain stores, constructed from local granite, some dating back to the 18th Century and still in use today for storing and drying maize.  An interesting feature of the walking trail was the grooves that had been worn in the rocks by years of use by heavy ox-carts.

Espigueiros

 Peneda-Gerês National Park...

 

Did we see any birds?  Well, yes we did see quite a number but of the species that we hoped to find in the north of the country, i.e. those that don’t normally occur in the Algarve, we caught just a glimpse of a Coal Tit!

We spent the night at the beautifully located Aquafalls Hotel in S. Miguel da Caniçada, about 30km from Braga.  As so often on these trips, there wasn’t time to sample its many facilities and we even went out to dinner, to the Pousada Santa Maria do Bouro, a 12th Century Cistercian monastery, which was well worth the drive not just for the food but for the ambience and the whole experience.

More to follow...

Dotterels

Dotterels are scarce birds here in the Algarve.  They seem to occur most years in September or October but only in very small numbers, sometimes just single birds, but they’re not guaranteed to stay around for more than a few days.  The regular site for them is the Vale Santo, near Cabo de São Vicente at the extreme south-west of the country and that’s where we were yesterday.

We had seen reports that four or even five Dotterels had been seen earlier in the week and realising that we hadn’t managed to see one here since 2007, we decided to give them a try.  We set off early from Tavira, along with Ray Tipper, hoping that the birds would still be there - it would be a long way to go and not see them!

It turned out to be a bright, sunny day (no surprise there!) but it was also quite windy and although we did eventually find three Dotterels it took us some time as they were hunkered down, getting what shelter they could in the sparse vegetation.  Even from just a few metres away they remained almost invisible and we might easily have given up.  But that’s the nice thing about Dotterels, as well as being really lovely birds, they’re also very confiding and with patience they can be approached quite closely.

But we weren’t just there for the Dotterels.  The Sagres peninsula is particularly well known for raptor migration at this time of the year and so we also spent some time at the popular watch point, Cabranosa.  It wasn’t a vintage day by any means but we did see a Short-toed Eagle, two Ospreys, a Goshawk, one or two Montagu’s Harriers and Peregrine Falcons and several Honey Buzzards - a nice variety even if the numbers were small and even if we did miss seeing an Eleanora's Falcon.

Among the passerine migrants in the area were Tawny Pipits, Whinchats, Spotted & Pied Flycatchers, Northern Wheatears, Yellow Wagtails, Short-toed Larks, Woodchat Shrikes, Willow Warblers and Chiffchaffs, all contributing to a most enjoyable day that was well worth the long drive. 

Lesser Flamingo!

Our first day back in the Algarve and already a rarity!  Not for the first time our reward for helping out with the monthly wetland bird count at Castro Marim was seeing something unusual.

A few weeks ago we received news that a pair of Lesser Flamingos was breeding among the many thousands of Greater Flamingos at Laguna Fuente de Piedra in the Málaga province of Spain.  We know from colour-ringing that many of the Greater Flamingos we see in the Algarve originate from there so maybe then it shouldn’t have been such a surprise this afternoon to see a Lesser Flamingo among the many Greaters at Castro Marim.

Of course, today’s bird could be from somewhere else completely but it’s nice to think that it might have come from Laguna Fuente de Piedra and that it might stay in our area into the winter.  Even among the many hundreds of Greaters it should be easy enough to locate from its smaller size, all dark bill and generally pinker appearance.

We have only once before seen a Lesser Flamingo at Castro Marim; that was on 1st July 2007.  All records of this species are, of course, subject to scrutiny by the Portuguese Rarities Committee and even when accepted they are usually accompanied by a comment about the possibility of escape from captivity.  The breeding birds in Spain may well be from a wildfowl collection somewhere - who knows?

Lesser Flamingos are birds that we are more used to seeing in Africa mainly in the Rift Valley lakes of Ethiopia and Tanzania.