Iberian Hare

Much of our bird photography in Portugal is done from a hide or, more often, from the car. We find a likely spot, make ourselves as comfortable as we can and then wait for something to come within range of the camera. Sometimes we wait for just a few minutes, often longer - much longer.

Of course, it helps if we can be waiting in the right place and we now have several favourite sites which can be very productive when conditions are favourable. In most cases, ’favourable’ has to do with water; unlike in the UK, we have had no success at all in attracting birds to an artificially provided food source. Why is it that birds in Portugal won’t come to seed, peanuts or, it seems, anything else?

One of our last sessions in the Algarve, before we returned for a short break here in the UK, was at a pond where we have seen and photographed a good variety of species in the last couple of years. Unfortunately, on this occasion birds were few but our eventual reward was an Iberian Hare that came to the water. We see plenty of Hares but haven’t before managed to photograph one. This one we were able to watch for several minutes as it came down to drink.


The Iberian Hare (Lepus granatensis), sometimes referred to as Granada Hare, is endemic to the Iberian peninsula and is the only Hare that occurs in Portugal. There has been debate in the past about the taxonomy and previously it was regarded as a subspecies of the Brown Hare (Lepus europaeus) that is familiar elsewhere in Europe. However, it is smaller than that species, has relatively long ears and ginger, brown, black and white fur.

We're always happy to see them and were particularly grateful to this one for brightening an otherwise uneventful morning!

Frank's back

The Franklin's Gull that was seen irregularly at Chasewater during the last couple of weeks was thought to have moved on. However, after an absence of four days it roosted there again on Thursday and then, yesterday afternoon, we received a call to say that it had been seen at Gailey Reservoirs, just 14 miles south of here.

When we got there the bird was easily located at the edge of a ploughed field to the north of the reservoir in a mixed flock of gulls that included an adult Yellow-legged. To start with, though, it wasn't very active and was partially obscured by vegetation; eventually, just as we were getting distracted by some Rooks (birds we don’t see in Portugal) and several Brown Hares, it began to walk around a bit and then finally flew over our heads and across the road. It landed on the Lower Pool, in the company of about two dozen Black-headed Gulls, and we watched it there for about 20 minutes. By then about ten other people had arrived - although only the second Franklin’s Gull for Staffordshire, after two weeks in the area its crowd-pulling days are clearly over!

Our chances of photographing it would have been increased significantly if we had taken the 50D + 100-400mm combination. Instead we had only a Lumix FZ-50 with inevitable consequences!

Next time take the Canon!

Or even a Nikon - this one was digiscoped with a Coolpix 4500 - but in Chile in 2005

According to the BOU, the scientific name of Franklin's Gull is still Larus pipixcan but in 2008, on the basis of genetic data, the American Ornithologists' Union switched the species to the genus Leucophaeus and so in the Americas it is now referred to a Leucophaeus pipixcan. This was part of the shake-up of the genus Larus that also resulted in Slender-billed, Bonaparte's and Black-headed Gulls (amongst others) being assigned to the genus Chroicocephalus. There was a time, not so long ago, when we became mildly irritated by occasional attempts to change the English names of birds but at least we could rely then on their scientific names being constant. That was before we knew anything about mitochondrial DNA. Now it's hard to keep up!

Incidentally, in case you were wondering, regarding pipixcan, A Dictionary of Scientific Bird Names (Jobling 1991) states:

According to Hernandez (1615), Historia avium Novae Hispaniae, pipizcan was the name given by Mexican Indians to a sort of gull (cf. Spanish apipizca, a gull).

So now you know!

Staffordshire Rarities

We're currently taking a break from the heat of the Algarve, spending some time in the cool and damp UK! Forecast high temperatures today are 31° in Tavira and 16° in Stafford, so already we're wondering whether we've made the right decision.

Remarkably, our visit to Stafford has coincided with the occurrence of two rare birds locally: an adult Franklin's Gull at Chasewater and a juvenile Cattle Egret at Doxey Marshes Nature Reserve. To have any sort of rare bird in Staffordshire is in itself something of a rarity, so having two here at the same time, and in July, really is unusual.

The Franklin's Gull was seen regularly at Chasewater for more than a week, mostly in the evenings, flying in to roost. Where it was spending its days was anyone's guess. Anyway, it hasn't been seen since Saturday, so has presumably moved on. The only previous record of this species in Staffordshire was at Blithfield Reservoir in August 2006. The Cattle Egret on the other hand, only the third for Staffordshire, seems to have settled in at Doxey.

Doxey Marshes

Of course, Cattle Egrets are very common birds in many parts of the world that we visit regularly. Quite often, in Costa Rica for instance, we have seen them in flocks of hundreds and in Portugal we have only to look out of the window most evenings to see scores of them flying to roost. So why, you may well ask, were we there on Doxey Marshes yesterday evening waiting for a very brief view of just a single bird flying across the reserve? It doesn't make much sense, does it? Really it doesn't! There wasn't even a chance to photograph it. The only excuse we can offer is that the reserve is less than a mile away and it was a welcome opportunity to get some exercise.

Sunday at Castro Marim

Without doubt, Castro Marim is one of our favourite sites in the Algarve and it's one we visit pretty regularly. However, the Reserva Natural do Sapal de Castro Marim e Vila Real de Santo António (to give it its full title) covers a huge area and at this time of year, when the temperature can be approaching 30 degrees by 10.00am, we're not inclined to cover all of it in one day. This morning we gave it about two and a half hours before retreating into some shade.

Although much of that time was spent taking photographs (how many flight shots of Spoonbills do we really need?) and trying to read colour-rings, we managed to dig out about 50 species with minimum effort.



The only real surprise was a Black-crowned Night Heron, a species that seems to be occurring more frequently in the Algarve and will surely be breeding here soon if it isn't already.


Amonst the gulls, we found about a dozen each of Slender-billed and Audouin's. (For some reason, the largest concentration of Audouin's in the area currently is at Santa Luzia where 268 were reported this morning.)

As well as the resident Kentish Plovers, Avocets and Black-winged Stilts, a few returning waders were in evidence including Dunlins and Black-tailed Godwits, a couple of Little Ringed Plovers, a Common Sandpiper and (our favourites) two Green Sandpipers.



Not many raptors were seen but we had several sightings of what was presumably the same male Montagu's Harrier, plus Common Buzzard and Common Kestrel.

One species that we particularly looked for was Common Magpie and eventually we found two rather bedraggled-looking birds. As we had hoped, these Magpies were feeding two well-grown Great Spotted Cuckoos. The Cuckoos looked as though they should have been well capable of fending for themselves, but why would they when their foster parents were so attentive. No wonder the Magpies looked worn out!

Other notables were Woodchat and Southern Grey Shrikes, three Common Ravens, Little Terns, hundreds of Greater Flamingos, Azure-winged Magpies, Common Shelducks and Red-rumped Swallows.

All in all, some pretty decent birding. We are no longer surprised that we didn't see another birder the whole time we were there.

Quinta do Lago

Yesterday's visit to Quinta do Lago was for no other reason than we hadn't been there for quite a while. As it was, the morning's bird list contained few surprises but the chance to photograph Little Bitterns made the trip worthwhile even if the results weren't great in the very harsh sunlight.



It was difficult to resist also pointing the camera at the Black-headed Weavers, a species that surprises and often puzzles first-time visitors here. An African species introduced to Portugal and now a well-established breeding bird, Ploceus melanocephalus is also referred to by some authors (e.g. Stevenson & Fanshawe, Field Guide to the Birds of East Africa) as Yellow-backed Weaver. The fact that the name Black-headed Weaver is also sometimes given to Ploceus cucullatus, better known as Village Weaver, adds to the confusion!


Some time ago we had a long debate in the hide at Quinta do Lago with a visiting 'expert' who knew for certain these birds couldn't be weavers of any sort because they were definitely Black-headed Buntings which he 'was very familiar with' after seeing them on his trip to Lesvos! Nothing we could say would persuade him...

The lagoon held the usual species: Purple Swamp-hens, Common & Red-crested Pochards, Little Grebes, Great Reed Warblers, etc. On the the tidal mud there were a few returning (or perhaps never departed) waders: Grey Plover, Whimbrel, Curlew, Redshank, Avocet; also good numbers of Black-headed & Yellow-legged Gulls with just a few Lesser Black-backs and Mediterranean Gulls and a single Audouin's. (On Saturday, we counted 85 Audouin's Gulls at Santa Luzia saltpans.)

If there was any sort of surprise for us yesterday it was the flock of 26 Glossy Ibises that flew over, following the coast. Perhaps they'll end up at Lagoa dos Salgados or maybe some inland ricefields.

At 10.00am, with the temperature approaching 30 degrees, we figured it was time to head for some shade!

Castro Verde again!

We were in the Castro Verde / Mértola area again yesterday and enjoyed another reasonably successful day in spite of a much later start than we would have liked. Great Bustards, always one of the main targets, now have well-grown young but they can be hard to find and, even after a lot of searching in the usual places, the total number seen was in single figures. Little Bustards are currently even more difficult to see well.

Raptors, on the other hand, were show-offs! Montagu's Harriers, Marsh Harriers, Black Kites, Short-toed Eagles, Booted Eagles, Common Buzzards and Lesser Kestrels would have been hard to miss.

Booted Eagle

Short-toed Eagle

Golden Orioles, Tawny Pipits, Rufous-tailed Scrub-Robins, Collared Pratincoles, Rollers, a single Purple Heron and even Kingfishers and Little Owls were amongst the day's most popular species but, with the temperature around 36 degrees, finding and showing any birds at all had became a bit of a challenge by mid-morning!

Swifts by name, swift by nature

At the beginning of June last year, we posted some photographs of Pallid Swifts that we had taken here in the centre of Tavira. This morning we went into the town for another session with these remarkable birds.

If any family of birds is appropriately named, it's the Apodidae, the swifts. Having upgraded to a Canon EOS 50D since last year we felt better equipped to try and get some flight shots but still found it incredibly difficult; the speed of these birds is simply amazing and their line of flight often completely unpredictable.


Pallid Swifts usually nest under the eaves of buildings or in a hole in a wall; sometimes they will use a cave or a cliff crevice. Birds of the Western Paleacrtic lists only two instances of them nesting in holes in palm trees: in Algeria and in Portugal. The Portuguese reference is to 'our birds' in Tavira.



We were a month later than last year and this morning there was a frenzy of activity as uncountable numbers of birds were feeding young in the nests.