Just time for one more quick post tonight… time for you to get your thinking caps on.
I took the following (rather poor) photos of a wheatear sp out along the approach to Auberge Yasmina, in the Rissani / Erfoud area. At the time, I thought it was one thing, but then subsequently realised that I’d screwed up the ID, it was something else, and I’d learned something. Well, I think so, anyway!
So, what’s this then? Answers on a postcard comment, please!
As you may well have gathered from other people’s blogs , I’ve not long been back from a great trip to Morocco, travelling from Marrakech over the Atlas to the Erg Chebbi near Merzouga and back. It was my second visit to the country, and once again thoroughly enjoyed it – the combination of some pleasant winter warmth, seeing excellent birds without millions of other people crawling all over them, and enjoying wonderful hospitality while generally surrounded by jaw-dropping landscapes is pretty hard to beat. And it’s all so easy to do…
A full trip report with useful stuff like where we stayed, where we went, what we saw there, and what it all cost is coming, eventually. But right not, I’ve not got enough time to sort out more than a handful a few photos – so you’ll have to be patient! (Anyone going out there sooner, drop me a line, and I’ll help you out).
By way of introduction, the trip was characterised by huge contrasts in the landscapes, the birds and even the weather. We travelled out to the edge of the ‘real’ Saharan desert, trekking over dunes of pure sand…
… to eventually find one of the classic speciality species, and one of the two new birds for me on the trip, Desert Sparrow.
Then, after plenty more top-notch birding (photos to come), we headed back west, delayed by some shocking weather and flash flooding. This was the main road in Boumalnes de Dades one morning:
Note the waves forming on the edge of the tarmac!
But then, after this had subsided a bit, and an entertaining journey towards the Atlas, we found ourselves up in the High Atlas in fresh snow and glorious sunshine… what a place!
And, unlike the sparrows which had required a pretty long and arduous trek, my other new bird for the trip (Levaillant’s Green Woodpecker) appeared right by the roadside, landing directly above my head!
So: an awesome country, quality birds, and an excellent trip. Watch this space!
Howard’s been busy over the last few days writing up a full report on our trip to Morocco, and it’s now available on the ELBF website. Click the courser to open it – though be aware that it’s about 4MB in size (blame the many photos), so might take a moment or two to download!
In addition, while we were killing time in Marrakech airport and celebrating 1500 Moroccan miles without hitting anything, we worked up an “I-Spy Book of Moroccan Highways and Byways”. Click the donkeys (common road hazards) to open it, and enjoy!
A few shots of some more Moroccan specialities – we enjoyed cracking views of African Desert and Scrub Warblers in the south east of the country. Desert Warblers were relatively easily found in two areas: north of the track to Auberge Yasmina, about half way between the main road and the hotel; and in the few strips of sparse vegetation between the Hotel Kasbah Said and the Auberge Derkaoua, south east of Erfoud. Both sites held at least two or three singing males.
Scrub Warblers were found 48km west of Er Rachidia, in prickly bushes along the wadi south of the road. (Another site nearby is at 43km west of Er Rachidia, though this involves a lengthy walk north from the road). These birds were full of charisma, spending much time on or near the ground with cocked tail sometimes held almost vertical. Compared to the illustrations in the Collins guide, they had surprisingly pronounced black eyestripes – more like the guide shows the Middle Eastern races.
And although these break the trend from warblers, here are a couple of other stunning birds photographed in the same habitat – Desert Wheatears and Moussier’s Redstarts were frequently seen.
One of the highlights of the trip was our stay at Auberge Yasmina, alongside the dunes of Erg Chebbi near Merzouga in the SE of the country. Having bumped along 15km of rutted dusty track in the dark to get there, we didn’t quite realise how stunning the scenery would be the next morning. Suffice to say I can’t recall a better view from the breakfast table anywhere in the world… but a bit of pre-breakfast birding produced an additional sight for sore eyes: a very confiding male Tristram’s Warbler. Fantastic bird!
And here’s that view… it’s not bad, is it?
After breakfast, a leisurely return to the main road produced several Desert and Spectacled Warbler, a selection of of the desert lark and wheatear species, and a Brown-necked Raven…
Howard, my Dad and I got back very late last night after a superb 8-day trip to Morocco: our first visit to the country certainly did not disappoint! A full trip report and lots more photos will follow ASAP, but in the meantime, here’s a quick gallery illustrating one of the birding highlights. We saw a grand total of 11 different lark species… or should that be twelve? (Clue: see Dutch Birding’s taxonomic recommendations re the last photo!)
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