James Smith's daily sightings reports

19th November 2001 - Southern Arava

The White-breasted Kingfisher was the first bird I saw this morning, perched briefly in a Kibbutz fig tree at 06:30 hrs. The views were superb in the early morning sunlight and I moved on quickly to check on the Hume’s Warbler, which was still present in the same place as the previous two days. This time the bird seemed less attached to the tamarisk and I had very good, close views of it in a low mesquite. Walking down to the soccer field and then the organic garden, I actually found little in the way of new birds and noted that Chiffchaff numbers in particular had dropped dramatically. Overnight had actually been extremely cold with very clear skies allowing many birds to depart and continue their southward migration. Around the dairy barn I had magnificent views of a Barbary Falcon hunting doves at close range and there was also a Desert Wheatear close to the border. On the whole it seemed quiet and I opted for a change of scenery and headed for Eilat.

My first stop in Eilat was the northern sewage farm, which was full of small birds – Red-throated and Water Pipits, White Wagtails, and even a couple a Reed Buntings, scarce birds in southern Israel. A few lingering summer visitors included several Barn Swallows, a Sand Martin and a Yellow Wagtail. However, my mind was really on the Red-wattled Lapwing, last reported from this site on 2nd November. Needless to say, I didn’t have much luck and the closest that I came was finding three Northern Lapwing. Little Stints and Ringed Plovers were plentiful here, and there was even a late Wood Sandpiper. As I began to the leave site my eyes were drawn to a shrike sitting on top of an acacia and even at range through binoculars I thought the bird was most likely from one of the ‘Isabelline group’. Close inspection through a scope revealed it be a really fine example of an Isabelline Shrike of the nominate form ‘isabellinus’. I sat and enjoyed it for a while, and made some field sketches. The bird was very cooperative and not at all shy. We tend to see Isabelline Shrikes every year in late autumn, but this one struck me as being especially attractive being very cleanly marked with a thin dark mask behind the eye and bright rufous rump and upper-tail coverts.

Next stop was the huge saltpans at Km. 20. The place was so full of birds that I couldn’t list them all but impressive numbers of Greater Flamingo were all of the pans and I counted about 450 in all. There were also about 120 Black-winged Stilt, 50 Shelduck, 90 Dunlin, 12 Avocet and 1-3 each of Marsh Sandpiper, Spotted Redshank and Greenshank. A party of 5 Common Cranes dropped into rest and I later saw a flock of c.55 migrating south over the Arava highway near Beer Ora.

Finishing off a fine day at Yotvata, I was thrilled to find an adult Whiskered Tern hawking over the sewage pools but still arrived back at Lotan with enough light in the day to enjoy great looks at a flock of 15 Stone Curlew at their traditional winter roost. What a great month we’re having in southern Israel.

Good birding to all,

James Smith.

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Daphna Abell
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lotan-programs@lotan.ardom.co.il
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