Early June in coastal Salalah

Yesterday, I had time to visit Jarziz farm early in the morning and Khawr Rori in late afternoon. Both are coastal locations and at sea level. 

The visit to Jarziz farm was very short lasting no more than 20 minutes. I went there solely to look for falcons. From April 28th until May 30th there were always Amur falcon every time I went. On May 31st there were finally none.

Yesterday, June 3rd there was one again. This was the 32nd one I have seen there this spring. Its about as guaranteed location as it can get.

I have also been looking for sooty falcon on passage but have seen none.

Amur falcon 1

This bird was a female. It was very tame and allowed me closer than any of the previous 31 birds.

Amur falcon 2

I have seen a lot of variation in the individual birds. This one for example has a longer moustache than most others.

Amur falcon 3

Otherwise, the most eventful sighting while there was a fly-over of about 60 chestnut-bellied sandgrouse heading north out of the farm. I wonder if they were off for their morning drink.

In the afternoon, I headed to Khawr Rori with friends and work colleagues, Michael Immel and Paul Leslie.

mixed terns and gulls

Near the ornamental dhows is always a good place to start. This time there were tens of gulls and terns. The highest number were great crested tern and slender-billed gull. However there were several Caspian tern, Sooty gull and sandwich tern along with smaller numbers of Saunders's tern, white-cheeked tern and whiskered tern. There was also one western reef heron.

Sandwich tern (l), Caspian tern (back), great crested tern (front)

Keeping a wary distance over the water were several grey heron.

We walked north along the eastern bank where there is a marshy area.

female garganey

Here were several black-winged stilt, more western reef heron, moorhen and a female garganey. Four pheasant-tailed jacana weren't seen until flushed and they flew the length of the khawr to the southern part of the west side where there are low lying reeds.

Michael and I elected to go look over that side. This involved driving the car to the sandbar at the southern end of the khawr and walking the rest. 

Crossing the sandbar I saw three black-tailed godwit. When I finally reached the place the pheasant-tailed jacana had gone to there was plenty of other bird activity. Ten flamingo were out wading in the deeper water. Eight little grebe were swimming together including several young birds.

little grebe

An over-summering male pintail was swimming around.

male pintail

The pheasant-tailed jacana were very flighty. They flew off as soon as I arrived near-by despite my stealth. Luckily this time they flew only a short distance.

two pheasant-tailed jacana

The female is the brighter coloured bird and can be polyandrous although it looked to me as if there were only pairs at Khawr Rori.

female pheasant-tailed jacana (left)

Khawr Rori closes at 6pm so we started to make our way back to the car in good time. On the way, we were following a whimbrel that flushed towards the sand bar.

whimbrel

As we got close to it, it flushed again on to the beach. It was there that I got lucky.

record shot of brown noddy

A dark brown bird flew around the beach and on to the near-by sea.  Both Michael and I got pictures but the sun was waning and behind a late afternoon cloud giving poor light.

record shot of brown noddy by Michael Immel

Nevertheless, I have consulted and found that it was a brown noddy albeit a well-worn and faded one. I particularly thank Andrew Bailey in UAE for his help in identification. 

Brown noddy has been reported in this bay before but it's not common for a brown noddy to come to a mainland.

It became bird 285 on my country list and was totally unexpected.

Outer Farasan islands boat trip

On Saturday morning, Bernard Bracken and I took a four hour boat trip out of the small harbour next to our hotel. Indeed it was organised through the hotel and cost 250 riyals per hour (125 riyals per person per hour). However in my view it was worth every penny.

The boatman not only spoke English well and piloted the boat well but knew where to take us for many of our requested birds. These included close ups (but not too close to force evacuation) for example of brown noddy which we had only glimpsed through the ferry window the day before.  

brown noddy

The first place of interest the boatman took us was a platform some way off an island. Here we had good views of greater crested tern which Bernard photographed well.

greater crested tern (swift tern) by Bernard Bracken

The first island which the boatman took us close to had mini cliffs two or three metres tall. On ledges all along the north facing mini-cliffs were brown booby.

brown booby

We soon realised there were a couple of sooty falcon menacing the area.

sooty falcon

One perched for a moment but the swell on the boat made photography almost impossible. However I finally got a distant shot when we landed on a very small beach.

After this, we asked to go to a low-lying island with potential for terns, knowing, by the way, that surveys show that breeding doesn't start quite yet but that extreme care was needed.

However as we headed to a likely island where we could see terns on the beach, the boatman deviated toward a very small rocky outcrop of an island. As we got closer we realised the outcrop was covered in birds. 

white eyed gull courtesy of Bernard Bracken

Most were brown noddy. There were over 45. However there were also a few white eyed gull and brown booby. 

plenty of brown noddy

We were conscious of the need not to force them off and asked that the boat be pulled away. 

We had similar issues, trying to minimise disturbance, when we finally headed to the large low-lying sandy island. 

white cheeked tern

We landed on a beach with little activity except 3 or 4 white cheeked tern preening.

bridled tern landing

On another beach further round the island there was much more activity and we decided not to approach it. From a distance we could see many of the birds were bridled tern. However, one came in from the sea and obliged by posing on a bush inland.

Bridled tern was not only a lifer but also proved to last addition to my Saudi list on the trip.

bridled tern

We headed back to the boat after about 10 minutes. We started the homeward journey. However we had plenty of time to visit one last island.

greater flamingo and crab plover

We stopped off at an island with a sand bar in front of a shallow lagoon. This beautiful setting had four crab plover hard at work seeking out food.

At the back of the lagoon were two shy over-summering whimbrel.

greater flamingo in flight

A single young greater flamingo was also present. On the mounds near-by were yet more osprey.

dolphins

Before making the stretch of the journey which would take us back to the main island, Farasan Kabir, we sailed further round the island with the lagoon.

We came across a pod of dolphins. 

common tern (left)

On some rocks near-by we saw another type of tern: common tern.  It was then time to sail directly to Farasan Kabir.

Black crowned night heron

We hit Farasan Kabir about two kilometres west of the harbour and so had a chance to look out for birds as we moved along the shoreline. It was here that we added one final species to the trip list as two black crowned night heron were seen resting on some rocks. 

List of 33 species seen on the Farasan islands.

L = lifer. S = addition to Saudi list

Brown booby	Sooty gull
Greater flamingo	Baltic gull
Black crowned night heron	Lesser crested tern
Striated heron	Swift tern
Goliath heron  L,S	Bridled tern  L,S
Western reef heron	White-cheeked tern
Pink backed pelican	Common tern
Osprey	Brown noddy   S
Egyptian vulture	Laughing dove
Sooty falcon  L,S	African collared dove
Crab plover	House crow
Grey plover	White spectacled bulbul
Kentish plover	Black crowned sparrow lark
Whimbrel	Hoopoe lark
Common redshank	Crested lark
Ruddy turnstone	Mangrove reed warbler
White eyed gull

In addition, three species were seen at Jizan ferry terminal which weren't seen on the Farasans. These were feral pigeon, house sparrow and African palm swift.

Some notes on the logistics of the trip

Ferries

The ferry has a very large capacity for passengers and I imagine rarely gets full. However car space looks more limited.

Jizan to Farasan ferry: Ferry terminal gate opens at 5.30 am. Boarding starts at 6.30 am. Ferry officially departs at 7.00 am and arrives at 8.00 am

Farasan to Jizan ferry: Ferry terminal gate officially opens at 3 pm but was open when we arrived at 2.45pm. Boarding starts at 4.00 pm. Ferry departs at 4.30 pm and arrives in Jizan at 5.30 pm.

Tickets are free and can be bought at an office next to the ferry terminal gate in Jizan from 6.00 am onward. I didn't see where the booking office was on the Farasan side.

However we bought our passenger only tickets on-line via https://www.mot.gov.sa/ar/Pages/home.aspx  Be warned the site is in Arabic. Furthermore, to buy a ticket you need to register and the only people who can register are Saudis. Once you have a Saudi willing to register for you, he can reserve and print your tickets but only if you give him your passport number (an iqama number is not sufficient).

I understand that car tickets can also be bought this way but need more advance booking as spaces are limited. 

Travel around Farasan Kabir

There are no taxis on Farasan however many locals use their cars as private taxis. It is quite easy to see a local at the ferry terminal who will give you a ride to your hotel. Our hotel had a list of several drivers they could approach to give us lifts to wherever we wanted during our stay. Prices are reasonable. If the journey is short a hotel staff member will take you to your venue free.

Farasan Coral Hotel

We each paid 450 riyals per night for double rooms with single occupancy but it was worth it. The staff were friendly and efficient. The restaurant was better than average. Indeed most Saudi hotels don't have a restaurant! It is also the only hotel on Farasan that you can book on-line through booking.com

South coastal cliffs, Tongatapu

Tucked away towards the back of the latest lonely planet guide to Samoa and Tonga is a small section on bird watching in Tonga.


The writer alludes to the fact that there are sea colonies of noddies, terns, great frigate birds and tropic birds on all the main islands. I begin to doubt his wisdom when in the next sentence he says "possible twitching spots include Hufangalupe on Tongatapu ..." and he continues to call birders as twitchers throughout. 


Despite the fact he doesn't know the difference between a twitcher and birder, I decided to take his advice and visit Hufangalupe on the south coast.

white faced heron on highest point of the island 

I was taken by taxi to the place that the locals think of as Hufangalupe. It's the highest point on the island and there is a crater there so you have to mind your step or else you end up in the sea through the side entrance.

rainbow over Hufangalupe

Unfortunately, the only birds I saw at the spot were wattled honeyeater, red vented bulbul and a lone white faced heron.

I had a choice to make, give up or a move down the coast to find the right spot. I chose the latter course and then had to decide whether to walk west or east. I chose west mostly because it looked possible to walk that way whereas the other route looked blocked.

the headland in the distance is where I started out

As it happens the walk westward was far from easy. I kept having to go to the surfaced road and take tracks to the sea, repetitively 4 or 5 times.  Each time I tried to get a view of the cliffs ahead looking for sea birds. On the fifth try (and as the cliffs were getting a little lower by the way), I spotted some brown noddy in the distance.

brown noddy over-head

Eventually I came to a grassy headland which gave me clear views of the area the brown noddy were operating in. This was some 3 kilometres west of  Hufangalupe crater.

two brown noddy skimming the sea

To be honest they gave me marvellous displays. I just couldn't photograph them easily as their flight was never direct. It appeared that some birds were being taught how to fish. And on more than one occasion they tried to mob me. I don't think they liked me there even though I was 100 metres and a cliff face away from where they would land (I hesitate to call this a breeding place). 

white tailed tropicbird

Ironically I managed to get better photos of a white-tailed tropicbird even though I saw many less of them and less frequently. This was simply because they flew in a straight line.

a second view of the white-tailed tropicbird

I found no sign of any other type of noddy or tropicbird although I did spot a couple of greater crested tern. I suspect the near-by island (and "eco-tourism destination") of Eua might have more variation and larger numbers because it has more cliffs in its coastline and is more isolated. 

You may ask why I didn't visit there or the northern islands with the two endemics. The simple answer is cost. This 28 day holiday in the south pacific has cost limits! The slightly more complicated answer in the case of Eua is that I found that the internal flights were all booked up anyway and the ferry requires an over-night stay returning at 5a.m.

female white collared kingfisher

I had to leave the coast early to guarantee my return to the north as there is no transport in that area. Two highlights of the return journey was the sighting of another white collared kingfisher. This time it was inland on a plantation which proves they can be found pretty much anywhere on the island. 

bat roost

There was also a very large roost of flying foxes near the golf course. I wonder what they find so attractive about the venue?

This is the last blog from Tonga. The next one will be from north island New Zealand where I have spent a few days an the Bay of Islands. The birding was more varied than the birding in Auckland's park earlier in my trip. I am happy with 11 lifers from the bay.