Blue Eyed Birder: Oman - An Arabian Adventure

We were up with the Bulbuls and after an early breakfast were back down at Al Ansab for our allotted 7am entry time. Our crew were the only people there and they were quite happy for us to bimble around. From the shade of the visitors centre wall we scanned the shallower pit. There were a few more waders amongst those of last night including 33 Ruff, Black-tailed Godwit and a Green Sandpiper as well as at least five creeping Temminck’s Stints and a mixed group of Kentish and Ringed Plover. Snipe were dotted about and with some underwing shots and careful checking we were happy with two Pin-tailed and 12 Common. It was all very subtle and I am not sure that I would be so bold back home with an odd looking Snipe. A pair of Gadwall were a new quacker and while watching them a pair of Graceful Prinias came up and put on a show with Purple Sunbirds in the same bush and Arabian Green Bee-eaters catching breakfast from the very top.

Graceful Prinia

Purple Sunbird

Purple Sunbird - almost all the males were plumaged like this

Buzzy Wagtails caught our ear and we found a couple of Citrines and a single Sykes’s Yellow as well as sharp looking Whites. It was good to catch up on Citrine sound once again. A Clamorous Reed Warbler came up to sun itself and was obviously still a little dozy and kept nodding back off.

The trail was followed around towards the stream and deeper pool that we had seen from above the previous evening but there were plenty of distractions along the way with Indian Silverbills and Prinias in the grasses and at the pools several more erupting Snipe, Another Temminck’s Stint and two more Citrine Wagtails.

Hu-weeting Common Chiffchaffs were in the bushes that were suddenly full of boisterous, querulous Arabian Babblers. The gang came in to check us out before gliding back into the scrub where they could be heard calling.

Arabian Babbler

Red-vented and White-eared Bulbuls were joined by a third species – the White Spectacled and a male Common Redstart and female Black Redstart were both seen too as well as an adult Daurian Shrike and a crashing and gurking in the Acacias became a Clamorous Reed Warbler that broke cover and then sat up on top and put on show for all of us. A subtly different shape to the familiar Great Reed that we all know.

White-eared Bulbul

Red-vented Bulbul

White Spectacled Bulbul

Arabian Green Bee-eater

Clamorous Reed Warbler

Daurian Shrike - I reckon

As we approached the hide the weir we could see a young Greater Spotted Eagle perched up not far away and we managed to get inside with it still in situ allowing fantastic views. It was not in the bit bothered.

Greater Spotted Eagle

Down below there were Stints, Common Sands, Greenshank and a few dabblers and they were joined by a Citrine Wagtail and then a cracking male Red-spotted Bluethroat that popped out to feed before flashing across the water with a splash of rufous tail sides.

Red-spotted Bluethroat

Common Sandpiper

Common Sandpiper - very yellow legs!

Greenshank

Little Stint

Battle Royal with Little Stints

Little Stints - 'stay down!'

Little Stints - 'no!'

Little Stint

Great Cormorant - the light was wonderful

Grey Heron

Indian Pond Heron

Out on the main lake both Ferruginous and Tufted Duck drakes had found ducks and a pair of Wigeon were new too. The same herony selection paraded around the edges and a couple of Whiskered Terns patrolled.

Little Grebe

Ferruginous Ducks and Pochard

Ferruginous Ducks

Pleased with our efforts we started to walk back adding Indian Rollers and scampering Grey Francolins and on a stony ridge a Long-billed Pipit was found striding around.

House Sparrows - all very very dapper and very pallid

This appears to be a Rock Semaphore Gecko - Pristurus rupestris

Back at the car the sprinklers were on under the trees and we found Common Sandpipers enjoying the environment and a sandy female samamisicus Common Redstart (sometime known as Ehrenberg’s) flashing large pale wing panels dipped down after prey between swirling cycles.

A quick pop back to the hotel to pick up the remaining KFC to go with our LuLu hypermarket lunch supplies and we were back off once again. The Tahoe has an icebox between the front seats so all appropriate comestibles, sandwiches, Pocari Sweats, chicken and Dom Pérignon could be kept expertly chilled.

Tasty

The road took us west to the inland Barka fields – an area of market gardening, crops and fodder and we drove slowly along looking for fields that had been mown in which we could search for passerines and waders.

We started with Crested Larks and the odd Daurian Shrike and Arabian Green Bee-eater but soon found a random field that looked more promising. It was a good call with hawking Sand Martins and Barn Swallows and there were Tawny Pipits weaving in and out and Indian Rollers and a Steppe Grey Shrike were dotted around on sprinklers.

Arabian Green Bee-eater

Steppe Grey Shrike

Crested Lark

Indian Roller

There were three Isabelline Wheatears standing upright and then we realised that the lapwings present were not just Red-wattled but Sociable too! A first count gave us three but it quickly climbed to ten and then they were spooked by a dog and eleven were flying around us.

Sociable Lapwings

To see so many was automatically the high point of the day and a sight that I would never ever experience. They drifted back down again and continued to feed and we soon left them to their foraging and were even joined by a Hoopoe!

Another brief roadside stop saw us watching a delightful Black-winged Kite circling around us while we watched White-eared Bulbuls, long-tailed Namaqua Doves and a heavy billed Arabian Grey Shrike with a thick black mask that went slightly over the top of the bill. How these and the Steppe Shrike are the same species puzzles me somewhat?

White-eared Bulbul

Arabian Grey Shrike

Black-winged Kite

The next cut field was checked and Arabian Babblers were pushing through the trees alongside and it seemed that every other sprinkler in this particular field had an Indian Roller attached and I counted 14 in one sweep. Amazingly there were three more Sociable Lapwings in the field taking us up to 14 for the morning.

Sociable Lapwing

Twenty years ago minus one day on 4th December 2005, Mike Dent and myself found a Sociable Lapwing on Aveley Pool at RSPB Rainham Marshes while we were conducting the monthly wildfowl count. Back then there had not been one in the UK for ten years and the global population was thought to be as low as 200. It proved quite popular over the next 16 days and we opened the reserve especially to let everyone in.

Sociable Lapwing - Barry Wright

Sociable Lapwing - Reg Mellis

Sociable Lapwing - Les Harrison

Conservation work has led to the population being on the up but they are still incredibly rare but can be seen in Arabia as they move south from their Steppe breeding grounds. It seemed quite apt that today my friends and I should find 14 of this wondrous globally threatened wader while checking irrigated fields in northern Oman.

From here we looped back up to the coast to Ras Al Sawadi to check a vast expanse of intertidal sand for waders and such like. There was an outside chance of Crab Plover but were we were unlucky but there was plenty to see with hundreds of Kentish Plovers and a few Sand Plovers amongst them along with Curlews, Bar-tailed Godwit and some Siberian longipes Oystercatchers with white cut-throat collars so large that their heads almost fell off. This is the default form in Arabia and it was good to see them where they should be after finding the one on Lesvos in the autumn.

Siberian Oystercatcher

Sooty Gulls were the commonest and the big ‘white-heads’ now included Caspians with the Heuglin’s and Steppes. An Osprey was nesting on the tower on the near offshore island and a Barbary Falcon appeared in time to give grief to a passing juvenile Bonelli’s Eagle. The latter then circled over our heads. I amused myself with searching the shells on the beach before it was time to move on again – albeit with a brief stop for our first male Desert Wheatear on the way back out.

Sooty Gull

Sooty Gulls

Bonelli’s Eagle

Desert Wheatear

We made our way back inland and up into the foothills and spent the twilight hours exploring at wadi near Nakhal ostensibly for the chance of Omani Owl. I can’t remember the exact name but someone joked about Showaddy Wadi and it sort of stuck.

The drive in was excellent and there were new birds for me with some regularity. A smart male Hume’s Wheatear was followed by a lavender grey Blackstart (which is actually a true wheatear too) and then a pair of Scrub Warblers. I was sure that before I came away the Arabian birds were known as Levant Scrub Warbler to differentiate from the Saharan ones but it seems things may have changed once again. A Little Owl was found on the rock face as we ate our winner winner ex-KFC dinner and cheese rolls. We slowly worked our way up the wadi, stopping, walking, picking car up and moving on. In this way we found a male Menetrie’s Warbler, Asian Desert Warbler, Common Chiffchaffs and surprisingly a 1w male Arabian Warbler.

Blackstart

Hume’s Wheatear

Little Owl

There were several stripy Striolated Buntings, White-spectacled and Red-vented Bulbuls, two Blue Rock Thrushes and a bobbydazzler of a male Eastern Black Redstart along with several cold grey Desert Lark with cinnamon flanks.

Eastern Black Redstart

At the end of the wadi it opened up into a rocky floodplain and as the light dropped, the near full moon rose while the last of the sun painted the mountains in rich irony reds. The rest of the crew were back at the car apparently snacking while I ambled and took in the silent vista that was only broken by the rattling of browny Eastern Lesser Whitethroats and the night-time crickets starting up.

Amazing mollusc fossils within some gigantic limestone boulders

One Pip Policeman - much bigger than I expected

This lovely goat was calling for its buddies across the valley in a very un-goat like and quite freaky manner. I was quite relieved when I found the shouty beast!

Two Sandgrouse erupted in front of me and I got my bins on them in time to reveal my first Lichenstein’s. I quietly ‘shouted’ back to the car as I knew they all wanted this bird. I could see nobody so I trotted back over the cobbles to discover much snoozing and snoring from inside. I had only been gone ten minutes!

We spent the next twenty minutes failing to then re find said Sandgrouse while a couple of large biscuit coloured bats with obvious pointy ears circled us. They were not Egyptian Fruitbats but I am at a loss to what they were at the moment.

As it got dark the moon took over illumination duties and we set about trying find Omani Owl. It was so bright that you could see colour and moonlight shadows followed us around. One was heard to call twice but that was that and we did not get a further hoot all evening but at least we knew they were present.

This was taken with my phone - I know it drags in more light but it was almost as bright as this

Pallid Scops Owls were also meant to be here but likewise only a couple of calls were heard but as we were driving out having decided to call it a night, Good eyes Tom picked one out in the torchlight. Astonishingly it did not fly and we walked back up to it and spent a few minutes enjoying its company as it changed its shape from spherical to tubular before leaving it to continue hunting. It never flew away.