Raysut lagoons with jacanas

Yesterday afternoon, I visited Raysut after a gap of around two weeks. There are several birding sites there. This time I chose the lagoons and the settling pools. This blog only looks at the lagoons.

One of the fist birds I noticed was a pheasant-tailed jacana. This is a winter visitor to Salalah but it is apparently an occasional opportunistic summer breeder.

This bird was a good sign.

pheasant-tailed jacana hiding

I am not seeing them anywhere else at the moment. I failed to see them at the other large water body, Khawr Rori on my last trip.

pheasant-tailed jacana

I then found one swimming but noticing it was not alone. This bird was in breeding plumage.

five (out of seven) pheasant-tailed jacana

In southern India they breed in the monsoon season. The monsoon here is in July and August so there is still time this year.

Three red-knobbed coot were the other exotic birds at the lagoons.

No trip to Raysut lagoons is complete without me scanning for a vagrant African spoonbill but like on every other visit there wasn't one there.

eight Eurasian spoonbill

At the seaward end of the lagoons were however eight Eurasian spoonbill. Nearby several terns were resting. The composition of the terns varies considerably with the season. This time most were little tern and common tern with three lingering gull-billed tern.

young little grebe

The resident birds include little grebe, common moorhen and a few black-winged stilt.

black-winged stilt

A few waders are lingering. I counted three black-tailed godwit with only one in breeding plumage.

black-tailed godwit

The most numerous wader however was common greenshank.

greenshank

In winter there are many eagles in the lagoons. At this time of year there are far fewer birds of prey. One osprey was very confiding.

osprey

However it was the Bonelli's eagle that caused a commotion on its arrival. Other birds fear this one with good cause especially the grey heron. This eagle is a killing machine.

Bonelli's eagle

After the lagoons I moved on to the settling pools before dusk. There were two rarities there. I will blog about this next.

Raysut in late December

On Christmas Eve I visited Raysut once again. This industrial district on the western edge of Salalah actually has several excellent birding areas. The two best are arguably the Settling pools and the lagoons though the beach and the marina can also be very interesting.

This time I went to just the settling pools and the lagoons. In recent times I have concentrated on the hirundines at the settling pools which had turned up two vagrants.  This time I didn't mainly because there were virtually none present. For some reason their activity is much higher after noon and I was there in the morning.

greater flamingo in flight

Greater flamingo were present in the highest number I have seen all winter.

pheasant-tailed jacana

The over-spill from the main made pools is so great now that much of the site has a natural feel about it and both marsh and grasslands have taken hold. The area is so natural looking that even pheasant-tailed jacana are present.

black-headed gull

Black-headed gull are not really common in Dhofar but the settling pools are the best place to see them. 

wood sandpiper

Mid-winter is the time when green sandpiper and wood sandpiper can look the most similar with the white speckling on the wood sandpiper is the most subdued. In these birds I resorted to looking at the barring on the tail. The black bars are narrow and numerous making the birds wood sandpiper.

white stork (rear) with Abdim's stork

This winter the number of white stork has often matched the 500 or so Abdim's stork around the site. This is a big increase on last year. They were in Salalah in as large numbers but not spending so much time at the pools.

Turkestan shrike

Young and some female Turkestan shrike and Daurian shrike are often difficult or impossible to separate but at all ages Daurian shrike is a duller bird. I suspect this bright bird is a Turkestan shrike. The strength of chocolate colour on the head is also supportive.

scaly-breasted munia

For once I saw very little out of the ordinary at the settling pools if you count seeing 1000 storks as ordinary. However a scaly-breasted munia was a little odd. I never not seen one outside parks, gardens and the city farms before.

For the rest of the morning I moved on to the near-by lagoons.

black-tailed godwit

There were more black-tailed godwit here than I have seen before.

ruddy shelduck

The biggest attraction for the past three weeks though has been the six wintering ruddy shelduck. This species is uncommon in Dhofar. Indeed I saw none last winter and none were reported either. I finally managed to get all six in one picture.

black-winged stilt in breeding plumage 1

I am always alert to a rarity among more common birds. For a fleeting moment I thought I might have had a black-necked stilt (from the Americas).

However what had happened was I had come across a male black-winged stilt in the peak of its breeding plumage. Even then there is a small gap between the black on the neck and the dark mantle. Furthermore the black on the head is not extensive enough for a black-necked stilt either.

black-winged stilt in breeding plumage 2

Black-winged stilt without breeding plumage (see below) are quite different.

black-winged stilt

The lagoons are currently attracting considerable numbers of terns. I find some tern identifications in winter quite difficult. I believe the tern in the foreground is a gull-billed tern while those in the rear are white-winged tern. Freshwater places so close to the sea like this can support some coastal terns as well as marsh terns. This does not help with narrowing down the options by habitat. Please contact me if you have a different opinion and why.

gull-billed tern (front) and white winged tern (rear)

I started this blog looking at greater flamingo. In the next blog I will be looking at some very special flamingoes.

Mid June in Salalah

At times at the moment it is now cool but at other times it is very hot. It depends on whether the mists come down. Soon the mists will be permanent for three months during the khareef season.

As I drove to Khawr Rori yesterday afternoon, out of Taqah the mists came down and the temperatures suddenly became good for birding.

Furthermore, the seas were rough and the wind from SSW was strong so many of the birds which normal stay on the west side of the lagoon at Khawr Rori had moved to the more sheltered north east side. This part of the khawr allows the easiest and best views.

The khawr was crowded too. Many sooty gull and more terns than usual were making use of the calmer environment.

adult breeding pheasant-tailed jacana

For the first time this summer I managed good views of the pheasant-tailed jacana. At one stage two were very close to each other. One was a breeding adult which I presume was female as it was so bright. The females are the more brightly coloured birds.

non-breeding pheasant-tailed jacana

The second bird looked like a non-breeding adult. Near-by were twenty grey heron.

African sacred ibis

I checked the four spoonbill and all were European. African spoonbill is a known vagrant. An African sacred ibis was associating with them. This may be the same bird which has usually been at East Khawr for the past year.

great crested tern and sandwich tern

Near the two dhow exhibits at the khawr were plenty of resting terns and gulls. At the time of year along the coast the large majority are great crested tern and sooty gull. However in the khawrs and especially the largest, Khawr Rori there is more variety. Here were several sandwich tern.

sandwich tern in summer plumage

There were also many common tern, Caspian tern, non-breeding white-winged black tern and at least two whiskered tern. At least one of common tern  was of the eastern sub-species minussensis.Thanks to Tommy Pedersen for help with identification.

common tern (minussensis)

There were approaching one hundred over-summering immature slender-billed gull.

Caspian gull with two Caspian tern

There was at least one over-summering large white-headed gull too seen above just finishing off a fish meal.

Caspian gull with Caspian tern

It is most like a second summer Caspian gull with some retardation of plumage though steppe gull apparently cannot be ruled out according to experts consulted.

Other birds of note in the north east corner included a northern pintail.

greenshank

After a long look in the north east corner, I moved on to the sand bar in the south. Here were several black-winged stilt, two oystercatcher and a male cotton pygmy goose.

However by far the most interesting event on the sand bar was a very large turtle making its way back to sea from the fresh water lagoon. I understand it is a loggerhead turtle and I am very privileged to see one on land.

loggerhead turtle 

The turtle appeared perfectly healthy but the sea it was returning to was very rough.

close up of loggerhead turtle

redshank

After a while on the almost deserted west bank, I returned to the north east corner for a short stop. The only different bird I hadn't picked up the first time was a redshank.

In other news, yesterday morning I made a short stop at East Khawr before work. This was where I had recently seen a large flock of beached immature white winged black tern. Although there were no longer present there was an adult in full breeding plumage. This is an unusual sight down here.

adult white-winged black tern

There were three gull-billed tern which was tern not seen later in the day at Khawr Rori.

gull billed tern at Khawr Rori

To complete my review of mid June on the coast near Salalah, I visited both Sawnout farm and Jarziz farm on Sunday evening.

shining sunbird at Sawnout farm

Once again the much larger Sawnout farm had much less of interest than Jarziz farm.

It was once again worth the effort to get into the farm which is increasingly difficult to approach through a major building site.

The vagrant Eleonora's falcon was still present and was very confiding this time.

Eleonora's falcon 1

It flew from the pivot bar to a telegraph wire where it gave very good views indeed.

Eleonora's falcon 2

There was once again another Amur falcon present. I believe it was different from those seen two days before as one eye was slightly damaged which was feature no seen on the previous female.

Amur falcon 1

As I have said before, Jarziz farm in May and adjacent times is the best place in Arabia to almost guarantee seeing Amur falcon.

Amur falcon 2

As I was checking whether there was another way out of the farm rather than the drive through a very dusty building site, I came across a way to the edge of Dhofar Cattle Feed Company. This is actually an other farm albeit with small fields. I now have a third farm to view within the city and it was there all the time. The main entrance is closed to visitors but the side way in is to a road which goes round the edge. Importantly there are clear views and no fences.

singing bush lark at the cattle feed company

The hedges round the feed company held house sparrow. This is a rare bird in the city. You certainly won't find them on houses.

house sparrow at the cattle feed company

Provided the entrance to Jarziz farm stays open I will certainly be visiting the near-by Dhofar Cattle feed Company as well in future.

Khawr Rori with Andrew Bailey

On Saturday morning, Andrew Bailey and I visited Khawr Rori. The main section opens at 9am so we birded the wadi leading to the Khawr from the main road first. Here we found a second white breasted water hen of Andrew's trip.

Just before 9am we headed to the main gate but never got there on time. As we were driving along the long drive to it we past a wheatear which had a rusty top to its tail. We decided to reverse the car and try to find it. We did. It is a potential kurdish wheatear and we have been consulting experts before displaying the pictures more widely.

When we finally got to main part of Khawr Rori, it was its usual self with many tens of ducks, waders and other water loving species as including about 10 pheasant-tailed jacana.

pheasant-tailed jacana

For a short while we looks a bit harder than usual at the land birds given our experience with the wheatear finding among others, a tawny pipit.

tawny pipit

Perhaps, inevitably we returned to the water birds.

European spoonbill

I am not featuring ducks in this blog as I have posted so many times about them at Khawr Rori. If a common shelduck appears before the winter is out then that will be different!

Cormorant, herons and European spoonbill

Great cormorant, flamingo, European spoonbill, intermediate egret were all present along with the very common western reef heron and grey heron.

black stork

A very pleasant surprise were two black stork. A single black stork has been seen often at Wadi Darbat all winter. Suddenly we see two which may not include it. In the main regional guide it is listed as a vagrant.

whiskered tern with wood sandpiper

There were relatively few marsh tern present. They appeared all to be whiskered tern.

several black-tailed godwit

I tracked as many black-tailed godwit as I could enlisting Andrew's help but neither of us could find the long-billed dowitcher that has been reported twice here and which is known to associate with godwits.

red-knobbed coot (left) Picture by Andrew Bailey

Towards the end of our time at the Khawr, Andrew focussed his attention on the coot and picked out two red-knobbed coot among them. One is shown on the left of the photo. Its knobs, bluish bill and rounded dark feathering into the bill are diagnostic. They are easily over-looked.

This wasn't the end of Andrew's visit but it is the end of my photographs. After leaving Khawr Rori we made a final stop at Sahnaut farm before dusk where Andrew added 10 more to his 3 day list to make 157. These included ring necked parakeet, pallid harrier, white winged black tern, chestnut bellied sandgrouse and rosy starling.

I look forward to visiting Andrew in the spring in Abu Dhabi and seeing what we manage there.