White winged black terns in central Arabia

Bernard Brachen and I moved on from Al Hayer on Saturday during mid morning. The second stop was the lake near Riyadh cricket club.

Nearly all the passage waders have gone since the last time I visited. Nevertheless it was still thronging with birds. Most of which were incredibly nervous of people. 

There is very little cover at this gravel pit and most birds either fly or swim fast away at first sight. 

white winged black tern

Three noticeable exceptions were all white winged black tern. They allowed us as close as the water's edge would take us. They were clearly tired or tamer than the local birds or more likely both. 

Interestingly the distribution map in the Helms regional guide doesn't have this species inland in Saudi Arabia. Though it does for every other country on the map! This sighting was no fluke as a birding friend has told me several were seen at Al Hayer at around the same time on Saturday.  

ferruginous duck

While the terns were remaining calm, the ducks were anything but. Five ferruginous duck repeated flew over seemingly not daring to land.

mallard

Five mallard swam as fast as they could towards reed cover. A common snipe and a small flock of little stint also vacated our area before we got within 30 metres. Most other birds swam to the furthest part of the lake away from us and crowded themselves there.

little stint

Clearly some hunting is going on and also there is a real lack of cover as you descend into the gravel pit. At ground level there is only thick reed.

spur winged plover and other birds

The far corner of the lake was crowded with spur winged lapwing, coot, moorhen, little grebe and black winged stilt. When they finished flying or swimming away the ferruginous duck had gone deep in reed cover like the mallard before them.

cattle egret

Just before we left for the day, a flock of cattle egret arrived. Like the white winged black tern they were probably strangers because they stayed in the open.

little grebe

Finally I want to draw attention to one little grebe who did not run away. For some reason the one above swam brazenly  near us and the three resting white winged black tern.


List of 45 species seen on Saturday at Al Hayer (H) and/or cricket club lake (C)
Little grebe C
Grey heron H
Purple heron H 
Squacco heron H
Little egret  C
Cattle egret C,H
Little bittern  H
Mallard  C,H 
Ferruginous duck  C
Marsh harrier  H
Moorhen  C,H
Coot  C
Black winged stilt  C,H
Green sandpiper  C
Ruff  C
Little ringed plover  C
Little stint  C
Common snipe  C
White winged black tern  C
Rock pigeon  H
Namaqua dove  H
Collared dove  H
Laughing dove  H
Blue cheeked bee-eater  H
European bee-eater   H
Little green bee-eater  C,H
Crested lark  C,H
Pale crag martin  C
Barn swallow  C,H
Sand martin  H
Yellow wagtail  H
White eared bulbul  H
Graceful prinia  C,H
Eurasian reed warbler  H
Great reed warbler  H
Common whitethroat  H
Northen wheatear  H
Isabelline wheatear  H
Red backed shrike  H
Asian grey shrike (aucheri)  H
Common myna  H
Streaked weaver  H
House sparrow  C,H
Spanish sparrow  H
Ortolan bunting  H

Flamingoes, pelicans, terns and more

Mansur Al Fahad and I visited two main water bodies on our trip to Jizan. One was the fresh water Lake Maliki and the other was the red sea coast south of Jizan.

Some other birds seen have been posted in previous blogs but this is a round up of the remaining water-loving birds.

Flamingo

Every body loves flamingo. Greater flamingo were seen at several points down the coast. Lesser flamingo is known here but sightings are mostly in the summer.

Whimbrel

Other large water birds included a fair number of both whimbrel and curlew although the former were more common.

Gull billed tern

We saw only two types of tern on the coast. These were gull billed tern and Saunders tern. I find the easiest way to recognise gull billed tern on the ground in winter is the mini black  mask behind the eye. I find this more useful than working out the bill size.

Pink backed pelican

A few water birds were seen both at Lake Maliki and at the coast. One important example was pink-backed pelican which is a resident bird here and which I saw on my last visit to Jizan.

spotted redshank

Not surprisingly, several waders such as Green sandpiper were found at both places but it was a surprise to see my first spotted redshank in Saudi Arabia not on the coast but at the fresh water inland. Mansur saw the one above and I saw one in a large group of water birds. 

little grebe at Lake Maliki

Two terns were only seen at Lake Maliki. These were the marsh terns, whiskered tern and white-winged tern.

They were present in very large numbers and this was most apparent just before dusk.

whiskered tern

In winter, I don't find these birds very easy to separate.  Whiskered tern has a grey rump while white winged tern has a white rump. The black on the head tends to be more extensive on whiskered tern too.

white winged tern

The bill of a white winged tern is slightly finer too but I can only normally use this feature after the field event while looking at photographs.

rear view of white winged tern

Thanks again to Mansur Al Fahad who provided all the pictures except the ones of the little grebe and the pink backed pelican.

 

Non waders at Jubail

Yesterday I looked at the waders found at Sabkhat al Fasl at Jubail. This large wetland has plenty of other types of bird too.

Terns were almost immediately apparent when we arrived and continued to be seen all day.   

white winged tern

There were three types. These were white winged tern, little tern and Caspian tern. The former was a first for me in Saudi Arabia. 

part of the lake

Caspian tern were all seen close to the more saline end of the complex.

Caspian tern

Despite the terns, arguably the most obvious family of birds seen on Thursday were the herons. Even a non-birder wouldn't fail to notice them. It's not just their size but the numbers. There were tens of grey heron and large numbers of little egret and squacco heron. There were also a small number of both purple heron and little egret. However, Lou and I were surprised not to see any little bittern which is common in reed areas in central Arabia.

Squacco heron

There were several marsh harrier patrolling all day long. A male pallid harrier was also seen. Indeed it just after seeing this that Lou Regensmorter and I bumped into local birder Phil Roberts who has been birding this area for the past 7 years. Thanks to Phil for some useful tips which helped us on our way round. It always seems strange to meet other birders in Saudi Arabia but happily its becoming increasingly frequent.

Marsh harrier

There were other birds of prey present. An osprey was seen on two or three occasions.

osprey

Just after midday, three eagles passed over head, slowly heading south but they were too distant for us to identify them. A picture is shown below.

eagle

There were surprisingly few passerines. However we were lucky enough to see a common nightingale out in the open. It looks like the eastern sub species which some people feel should be a full species of its own.

common nightingale

Yellow wagtail was the most plentiful passerine. Many were of the sub species beema sometimes called syke's wagtail like the one below.

yellow wagtail 

We probably saw only a couple of wheatears.

pied wheatear

Although we had passing glimpses of a very few warblers, we actually didn't see any for long enough to identify all day. We thought this was very strange.

spotted flycatcher

This spotted flycatcher was more accommodating.

blue cheeked bee-eater

One of the final birds we saw was a resting  blue-cheeked bee-eater.

All in all Sabkhat al Fasl makes for very interesting birding.  

The next blog continues to look at more birding in the eastern province.We spend Friday on the coast in the Khobar and Dammam area. This is a little south of Jubail. I'll start to tell you what we observed there.