Mughsail in late October

I made a short trip to Khawr Rori afeter Khawr Swali on Saturday. Here I came across Bart the Birder from Belgium.

He spoke about the first three days of his two week visit to Dhofar and five excellent birds he had seen at Mughsail. I had seen none of them.

After a short time at Khawr Rori, I decided to get in the car and drive all the way across the city and out west to Mughsail. His birding had sounded so exciting there.

Well, I spotted none of his birds!

However in the end I wasn't too unhappy.

intermediate morph western reef heron

The coastal pools were no that great this time. There were plenty of western reef heron and grey heron as well as the same lone flamingo as at my last visit.

black-tailed godwit and black-winged stilt

A black-tailed godwit was the most interesting of the waders there.

I soon decided  to cross the road and go to the two inland pools.

osprey

An osprey flew overhead as I did this.

European roller

An adult European roller was darting about the fields.

northern wheatear

On the way to the second and most inland pool, I came across several wheatears. Finally one of them was a definite northern wheatear. This was another first for me in Oman and my fourth addition to the list on Saturday. Some features that mark it as northern are: strong supercilium, ear coverts darker than crown, no isolated dark alula, grey crown and a tail that reaches the ground. The last feature is new to me following research. It appears Isabelline wheatear are so short tailed that even when standing erect, their tails don't quite make it to the ground.

The back pond was previously unknown to me but thanks go to Belgian Bart for informing me about it. I spent 90 minutes there waiting for some action. Bart had seen a Baillion's crake. 

I wasn't so successful. There were fifteen or so moorhen.

female northern pintail

As some sort of compensation, I saw my first northern pintail in the country.

gadwell

There were more gadwell there too.

northern shoveller

It is becoming obvious that these khawr are going to attract many ducks and other waterfowl this winter. One of the last birds I saw before I left for the day was a northern shoveller on the main pool.

Four birds with one shot

Hunting is not as common in the Riyadh area as further north such as Hail. However on Friday a hunter was seen in the area of the blue lagoons, Al Hayer.

I went there with Mansur Al Fahad to show him this new venue.It was the place that on Thursday I added great snipe and short toed eagle to my Saudi list.

The hunter actually did us a great favour. We only heard two shots. The first one threw eight ducks and four snipe into the air.

Pintail(1), Gadwell (4) and Garganey (3)

With these few birds, Mansur added four lifers(including all the ducks)! and I added two more birds to my Saudi list. The great snipe from the day before was among the snipe that took to the air.

However we followed the ducks rather than the snipe to photograph. It turns out that it was a mixed flock of pintail (in the lead), gadwell (larger) and garganey (smaller). I sent the picture to BirdForum to confirm and there was agreement.

two common snipe

The second shot a few minutes later sent five snipe up. Unfortunately all were common snipe this time.

female Marsh harrier

The wagtails from the day before had moved on from the area. The green sandpiper were still plentiful. There was no short toed eagle to be seen. However the variety of birds of prey was a little larger. There were Marsh harrier, greater spotted eagle and steppe eagle.

Osprey

An osprey also gave good views.

Following the sighting of pintail and gadwell, my Saudi list total is now up to 249. However the big test will be this weekend when Mansur and I visit Jizan.