Hudsonian Whimbrel !!

I had this post to be published for a long time but due to the lack of  it, things got delayed more than expected. Anyway I will post a few record shots of one of my best bird discoveries ever, a Hudsonian Whimbrel that I found in Marismas de Santoña reservoir in Cantabria (North Spain).

The record has been the second homologated  for Spain and first ever for the Cantabria province!!

Here I show the bests pics of the wonderfull bird (thanks also to my friend David Arranz that stayed with me and helped me with the obtention of the pictures.)

The bird has remained in the area till the second week of april!!

Hudsonian whimbrel.

Hudsonian whimbrel.

Hudsonian whimbrel.

David took this picture with his mphone handholding it to the scope (Kowa 88).

This was the area. Intercoastal mudflats.

Was nice to see my picas the main one of the week in this important Spanish web.

The bird atracted a lot of birders to the corner.

Another twitch in a different day....

Again in the south.....

Here are some of the birds I saw the 14th of april in the south of my province, Navarra.

I repeated the place of the past blog entry and things didn't go bad at all, not many birds but some "first" of the year like the common sandpiper (3ind) and a wood sandpiper.

The reservoir was has still water but the muddy fields  are going to dry if it doesn't rain soon.....

The protective eyelid of the Common sandpiper.

The bird got still in the stone quite confidently.

My first wood sandpiper of the year. You know is going to appear but when and were.....

The omnipresent Little ringed plover ( I saw two pairs and I hope the have a succesfull breeding).

There were lingerin around also six black winged stilts.

have a nice day!

A few birds in the south of Navarra

The past week (060417) a made a quick trip to the south of my province. Its a normally dry region but there are a few water places interesting enough to atrackt birds in the migration period.

The visit lasted less than one hour due to the heavy wind that was blowing that afternoon.

I saw  three of them. If the season is wet enough it breeds there.

Nice to see the upper mandible working so precise as here.

A few times I have seen the snipe so confident than this one.

The Stilts are the other birds tha breed here if there are good conditions in spring.

One of the Little ringed plovers in the shore of the biggest mudland.

I saw four Lapwings resting in their migration journey.

A solitary Redshank was feeding inside the water.

1000 Lapwings and 1 Golden plover!!

Hello!

I had those pics from the past 08/03/17 when I enjoyed a great sunny afternoon with my friend Mikelgar and my son Ander at Zolina Reservoir.

While we were talking about the three Black tailed Lapwings that were roosting in the flooded island, far in the distance we saw a very big group of lapwings feeding in the east fields. For a reason that we could't figure out, all of them started flying and I discovered a Golden plover between them (usually they are associated in migration) and that was what I had in mind when I started watching their manouvers in the air.

After this interesting observation we set off to a better place to get a closer view and once there I heard the call of Ringed plovers inside the group, there were four of them and one Dunlin!!

I don't have pictures of them due to the distance and the hard light that was present at the moment.

Three Black tailed Lapwing

About a thousand Lapwings in the shore and  nearby fields.

The lonely Golden plover........

Perfect viewing conditions...it was really too hot that day (winter season ending)



Have  nice  day!!

(*) all the pictures had been taken with a mobile phone handholded and my Kowa 88.

Waders counting weekend....

 

Not too much but entertaining

Good morning.

I had an entretaining hour the other day (29/03/17) with the ornithological fauna that was on the reservoir and specially with two non stopping Litte ringed plovers in the west shore. I had very close views of this confident bird  (there was a pair of them) but always maintaining  its security distance and not alarming them

Littele ringed plover/Zolina/290317 

I also spent some time watching the elegant Black winged stilts. I hope that at least one couple breeds this season, there have past a few years since the last satisfactory reproduction in the reservoir.

Cigueñuelas/Zolina/290317 

Five dunlins in the shore

Hello.

The past week , the last one of march (27/03/17)  I made my weekly visit to the reservoir in a calm and nice day.
I telescoped all the shore but didn't see any wader in the north part till I moved my position to the west and discovered a nice group of ten Dunlins (I thought they were and I confirmed my suspiction when they arrived close to me in a direct flight).

I could also see a few Redshanks and one of them had rings in its legs. Sadly in the right leg didn't had any so I reckon that it had lost one of them somewhere.

Five Dunlins resting in the shore

Six redshanks patrolling the muds between the waves.

Dunlind/260317/Zolina 

Redshanks/260317/Zolina