Wintering birds still showing at Raysut

On Wednesday afternoon last week, I paid a call to Raysut visiting both the settling pools and the lagoons.

The overall theme was that important wintering birds were still around when I had been expecting more passage.

The highlight was three white-breasted waterhen up a bare tree just outside the perimeter fence at the settling pools. This equals the record number of this species seen in Oman.

I didn't even notice there were three until they moved. I had seen one towards the top of the tree. Whether it was me or something else that disturbed them, the bird I was watching flew off a short distance into a larger and more foliated tree. The surprise was that one more and then another followed it from lower down the original bare tree.

white-breasted waterhen

This species is known as a winter migrant however the bird I could see longest had the colouration in its bill, only seen in the breeding season.

steppe eagle

Most of the hundreds of wintering eagles around Raysut have one departed. However I easily found an Eastern Imperial eagle and two steppe eagle.

pheasant-tailed jacana

Earlier at the lagoons, pheasant-tailed jacana were present at the inland stretches. This bird is more numerous in winter but is known to occasionally opportunistically stay and breed. The longer they stay the more likely this is to happen.

Eurasian coot

The same goes for the less glamorous Eurasian coot though I only observed one at the lagoons on Wednesday.

common moorhen

In stark contrast its relative the common moorhen will breed in large numbers almost where ever there is water and some cover.

pheasant-tailed jacana (l) and pin-tailed snipe (r)

Of course not all wintering birds will consider the option of staying and breeding. The pin-tailed snipe above will surely leave soon.

grey heron

Grey heron is in another category, although it doesn't breed here a few of the non-breeding birds will over-summer. There are very large numbers at the lagoons currently. They will soon thin out.

marsh sandpiper

Other notable migrants at the lagoons included marsh sandpiper and garganey duck. Both winter here but there is noway of knowing if they are passage birds on their way through or those that wintered.

garganey

Pretty much all the ducks are in full breeding plumage now and the big majority are either shoveller or garganey.

osprey

Although this blog is mostly about wintering birds I can't ignore the osprey scattered all up and down the lagoons even though most other birds of prey have gone.

ruddy shelduck

Ruddy shelduck does not visit Dhofar every winter. However, this year originally six and now five have been faithful to the lagoons site for months. This wintering bird will soon be gone.

Pallas's gull

Yet another late leaver is a Pallas's gull seen there on the last two visits. It is seriously late. 

I suspect on my next visit to Raysut the bird cast will have changed quite radically as the winterers move on.

At the weekend I went into the desert again to try to catch part of the passage. I am very pleased with the results. I will use the next three blogs to explain what I saw.

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.

Stone curlew and much more at Raysut

As well as the settling pools, the industrial area of Raysut has other important bird areas. There is the rubbish tip itself but also the lagoons and the beach. Each can have a unique set of birds.

This year the water levels at the lagoons are much higher than last year and the area around has been landscaped. It shouldn't be missed if you bird in the Salalah area.

I decided it was going to be Friday morning's birding area. I started at the inland end and moved down towards the coast. The inland section includes most of the site's moorhen although it is apparently more sparsely populated by birds than the other end or indeed the middle. 

pheasant-tailed jacana

That didn't stop a pheasant-tailed jacana showing itself prominently at the inland end.

great reed warbler

On the far bank I caught sight of a great reed warbler moving from reeds to a tree.

Eastern Imperial eagle

Most of the eagle activity was at this end. Greater spotted eagle, Eastern Imperial eagle and steppe eagle were all observed.

citrine wagtail

The most common wagtail all the way along the lagoons was citrine wagtail with white wagtail only dominant in the shaded areas under the cliffs.

common redshank

There were plenty of waders in the mid-section of which common redshank was the most numerous.

However the density of birds is obviously much higher at the southern end. 

greater flamingo

The big numbers started to appear after the first large group of (young) flamingo.

The track along the lagoon gets much more difficult at this point and here is where I made an fortuitous decision.

I needed to get round the back of the birds with the sun behind me to have good views. This meant either walking close to the bank for a while or taking a long detour away from the bank. I chose the latter.

By doing this, I came across a stone curlew completely by chance. It flushed from under a tree when I walked by but I hadn't seen it. Instead it was now in the open. 

stone curlew

As I gingerly walked towards it, it started to crouch down and then sit. This made it remarkably difficult to see unless my eyes were trained on it.

stone curlew crouching

This was the first stone curlew I have seen not just in Oman but in the Gulf.

stone curlew sitting

I eventually continued round the lagoon and could see several tens of ducks and waders ahead of me. However I was drawn to the odd one else which was close to me. It was a collared pratincole which is very uncommon in winter in Oman.

collared pratincole

Other birds were more predictable including more flamingo, three Eurasian spoonbill and plenty more ducks and waders. There were also a few yellow wagtail.

black-tailed godwit (l) and pheasant-tailed jacana (r)

In some of the deeper edges were black-tailed godwit. While shallower edges had dunlin and little stint among others.

little stint

One of the birds I wanted to see was ruddy shelduck. It's uncommon in Dhofar. On my last visit to the lagoons there were three. Now there were six though I only managed to get four in any one photograph.

ruddy shelduck

Soon after seeing them I made the short trip to Raysut settling pools and met up with Hanne and Jens Eriksen.

This was not for general birding. After all the excitement with vagrant hirundines in recent days we were all trained on the swallows and martins.

wire-tailed swallow

Both the two wire-tailed swallow and the streak-throated swallow were still there. However attention was on what else might be there among the more prevalent barn swallow and pale crag martin.

unknown martin (above)

One candidate is the unknown martin above. It is either a sand martin or a pale martin.

unknown martin

Certainly it's breast band is weak and its overall colouration appeared pale.

sand martin

A definite sand martin was present but never perched at the same time to allow some sort of comparison.

I had to leave while Hanne and Jens were still surveying. However later I researched beyond the guidebooks to find that colour is often tricky as a determinant because of light conditions and the breast band can be very variable in both martins. Apparently the best characteristic is structural. The tail on a pale martin is hardly forked at all. If I had known that then I would have concentrated on those views rather than waiting for a frontal look. Next time I will be ready.

Species at Raysut lagoons on Friday

Ruddy Shelduck 6
Northern Shoveller 8
Northern Pintail 10
Garganey 12
Eurasian Teal 3
Little Grebe 6
Greater Flamingo 50
Grey Heron 5
Western Reef-Heron 3
Squacco Heron 4
Indian Pond-Heron 1
Eurasian Spoonbill 3
Greater Spotted Eagle 2
Steppe Eagle 2
Eastern Imperial Eagle 1
Eurasian Marsh-Harrier 1
Common Moorhen 8
Stone Curlew 1
Black-winged Stilt 12
Common Ringed Plover 6
Pheasant-tailed Jacana 3
Common Sandpiper 5
Green Sandpiper 4
Common Greenshank 6
Wood Sandpiper 5
Common Redshank 10
Black-tailed Godwit 6
Ruff 8
Curlew Sandpiper 1
Dunlin 3
Little Stint 12
Collared Pratincole  1
Slender-billed Gull  8
White-winged Tern  4
Whiskered Tern  5
Laughing Dove  6
Daurian Shrike  1
Crested Lark  1
Pale Crag Martin  4
Barn Swallow  1
Great Reed-Warbler 1

Blackstart 1

Desert Wheatear  2
Western Yellow Wagtail 2
Citrine Wagtail 10

White Wagtail 7
Ruppell's Weaver 4

Raysut lagoons and tricky spoonbills

I received a tip off on Saturday night that no fewer than three birds which weren't on my Oman list had been sighted in the same place that day I don't like twitching but this was too good an opportunity to miss. So at dawn on Sunday morning I headed to Raysut lagoons to look for 3 ruddy shelduck, 2 African spoonbill and 2 common shelduck.

It had been a few months since I visited here. The place has changed radically for the better. It has been landscaped and the water level is higher than I have ever seen before. The water is clean too.

Well, the ruddy shelduck were easy to find and immediately became bird 305 on my Oman list.

ruddy shelduck

Indeed they were still asleep when I found them.

sleeping ruddy shelduck

The other two species were much more problematic. The common shelduck were nowhere to be seen among the literally hundreds of birds I looked at.

sleeping spoonbill

I thought I had found the African spoonbill. Two sleeping spoonbill appeared to have dead skin around the base of the bill.

awakened spoonbill

However when they awoke the leg and bill colours caused doubts. A juvenile African spoonbill has a yellow bill and dark legs. The adult has a grey bill edged pink and dark pink legs. The combination of pink bill and dark legs is consistent with a young European spoonbill.

spoonbill (left) with flamingo

I continued to track them perplexed. I did come across another spoonbill but this one was definitely a European spoonbill. No sign of bare skin here.

European spoonbill

Interestingly it did not associate with the other two more ambiguous spoonbills.

glossy ibis

Apart from the target birds there were over 35 other species present including a large flock of glossy ibis. I counted the flamingo and there were a few over 200.

osprey

In the sky, osprey and steppe eagle were being perpetually hounded by the local Indian house crow.

little grebe, shoveller and garganey

In the water were pintail, shoveller and garganey as well as a dozen or so little grebe and moorhen. I expect the arrival of ruddy shelduck is the harbinger of other ducks including diving ducks which are usually seen mid-winter.

European coot

Just a single European coot was observed.

a creche of flamingo

Often the young flamingo keep themselves separate from the older birds. I call this a creche.

ringed plover

I didn't have time before work on Saturday morning to study which waders were present though it was easy to see there were very large numbers of common redshank. Others included ringed plover.

slender-billed gull

The only gulls on the water were slender-billed gull.

citrine wagtail

The wagtails near the water were citrine wagtail while those mostly in the shade of the hills were white wagtail.

common redshank with common sandpiper at Raysut

Given the importance of both common shelduck and African spoonbill, I decided to go back to Raysut again the next morning at dawn.

I know common shelduck like mudflats near the sea more than ruddy shelduck so I went first to Raysut beach which is the far end of the wadi that holds the lagoons. I was not successful but among the sleeping whimbrel and Caspian tern, I came across a crab plover.

crab plover and whimbrel

Having failed to find the common shelduck again (and I haven't seen them reported by anyone else since either), I turned my attention back on the spoonbills. I found them at completely the other end of the lagoon from the day before.

one spoonbill

They allowed me very close this time. The bare skin looks real enough.

two spoonbills

In between visits, a search of google images at home shows that there is a short period in the development of African spoonbill where the yellow billed, dark legged juveniles go through a pink bill and dark legs before turning into grey billed and dark pink legged adults. In other words they look a lot like juvenile European spoonbill. However in all these pictures of the intermediate phase of African spoonbill I can see small patches of pink on the legs.

close up of both spoonbills

So I don't know which spoonbill there are! This is two birding sessions running when I have had a bird identification left hanging.

As well as seeing the spoonbills again there were two other highlights of my second visit.

young bonelli's eagle

A young Bonelli's eagle let me close while perched. Next to it on the ground about 30 Indian house crow had massed and sure enough they mobbed it the moment it took off.

pheasant-tailed jacana

On Sunday's visit I had seen one pheasant-tailed jacana in the distance. This time I had three much nearer. There presence shows what a good site this currently is.