Seawatching at Eilat - 25th April 2003

About once every two weeks the Southern Arava is usually pounded by a really good sandstorm, most frequently when the wind swings round to the southern quarter. Such conditions make birding impossible, except in one place - Eilat's north beach. Since the late 'seventies' vagrant seabirds have been found at Eilat with enough regularity to make the gathering of birders a well known tradition at the north beach. Hot on the heels of the recent Swinhoe's Storm Petrel find, another big southern 'blow' found Barak Granit, Nir Sapir, Arnon Tsairi and myself glued to the north beach on the morning of 25th April.

From here, we could watch Cory's and Sooty Shearwaters careening above the Red Sea and flights of migrant skuas overhead. Although on this day we found no national rarity, simply being there for the potential of something 'big' was enough. We worked hard for our birds and for Eilat at least, our totals after an eight hour seawatch were impressive:

11 Sooty Shearwaters, 4 Cory's Shearwaters, 11 Arctic Skuas, 6 Pomarine Skuas, 1 Long-tailed Skua, 8 Gull-billed Terns and 1 White-cheeked Tern were amongst the pick.

The images included here were all taken during the above seawatch on 25th April 2003.

No doubt the next southern 'blow' will see us all gathering on the north beach.

Good birding,

James Smith & The Birdingisrael Team

Click on a thumbnail to enlarge (+)
Arctic Skua	Cory's Shearwater	Cory's Shearwater
Cory's Shearwater	Gull-billed Tern	Gull-billed Tern
Sooty Shearwater	Sooty Shearwater	Sooty Shearwater

Contact info

Daphna Abell
Program Coordinator
lotan-programs@lotan.ardom.co.il
Tel: +972 8 6356935;
Toll Free: 1800 2000 75 (when in Israel)