Kazakh steppes

The final days of the Rockjumper tour I was leading were spent in the steppes and wetlands around Nursultan (until recently Astana...). Together with our sharp-eyed local guide Andrey, we birded one day west of the city, and another day south. Birding was fantastic, with non-stop action both in quality and in numbers. Insect load was seriously heavy this year, perhaps due to exceptionally wet winter and very hot spring (climate change anyone?), and did effect our birding, especially in the vicinity of wetlands and during the hot mid-day hours. However, despite this limitation, we all had a great time. There are too many highlights to include in a single post, so I will try to be concise.

Perhaps the rarest species we saw is the globally Critically Endangered Sociable Lapwing. We had them in several sites on both days, enjoyed and appreciated them immensely. I know them well from Israel in winter, but seeing them on their breeding grounds, in full breeding plumage, was something else. We treated them with utmost care and respect, and did not chase them around for better photos or angles. This pair actually flew towards our minibus and posed. We drove off quickly.

Sociable Lapwing - male

Sociable Lapwing - female

We often found the lapwings accompanied by another threatened species, Black-winged Pratincole. Lovely birds.

Another prominent steppe bird was Demoiselle Crane - elegant, beautiful and pleasantly common:

The lark scene on the steppes was dominated by two quality species, both Central Asian specialties - Black Lark, and White-winged Lark.

Black Lark

White-winged Lark

It was brilliant to see Booted Warblers in good densities at more humid steppe sections. Now I feel prepared to find one in Israel. Interesting that in Uzbekistan we found them breeding in deep desert habitat, compared to Sykes's Warbler that breeds there in Tamarix scrub.

Booted Warbler

In the same habitat by wet meadows and wetland edges, Bluethroat, Sykes's Yellow Wagtail and Siberian Stonechat also breed in good densities.

Two prominent hunters, patrolling over the steppes, were Short-eared Owl, frequently encountered day-foraging, and the stunning Pallid Harrier.

We had one encounter with Saiga on the steppes - two youngsters that were rather tame (shame on the horrible heat haze and harsh light that killed my photos). Their mother fled at amazing speed as soon as it spotted us.

The wetlands were rich and exciting. Each one was different, depending on their water levels, salinity, nutrition richness etc. Some wetlands held fantastic numbers of Red-necked Phalaropes and other staging shorebirds. One wetland held an estimated 30,000 phalaropes - it was impossible to capture this by camera.

Mixed flock of Red-necked Phals, Curlew Sands, Dunlin and Little Stint

Another wetland held a large breeding colony of Pallas's, Steppe, Russian Mew and Slender-billed Gulls.

Pallas's Gulls and guests

Steppe Gull 

Other wetlands held large numbers of breeding White-winged and Black Terns, providing excellent photographic opportunities as they surface-forage.

Wetland reedbeds and wet grassy edges are what Paddyfield Warbler need - some males were singing ferociously from reedtops:

Scattered woodlands held the beautiful Pine Bunting, and breeding Red-footed Falcons:

I eBirded on the road all the birds seen on tour, and took many more (too many?) photos during my days in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. My eBird checklists, and photos and audio I uploaded to Macaulay Library, can be seen through my public eBird profile here (KZ and UZ).

This concludes my Rockjumper 'Best of Central Asia' tour updates. I hope you enjoyed - join me there in 2021?

Pine and Gold

Yesterday morning I visited Tzurim Valley NP in north-east Jerusalem. It's a unique little urban wildlife site, a beautiful valley sandwiched between the Old City, Mt. Scopus and Mt. of Olives. The political context is so complex, but I do my best to focus on the wildlife and stunning scenery. In winter, its ancient olive groves attract finches and other seed eaters; the large deciduous pistachio trees are perfect shelters for these birds.

Panoramic view from the top - Old City and Dome of the Rock on the left, Mt. Scopus on the right

About a week ago my friend Piki found a lovey male Pine Bunting there. It's a traditional site for this rare winter visitor - until few years back, every winter a flock of 30-40 Yellowhammers would normally host one or two Pine Buntings. Sadly, the Yellowhammer flock deserted the valley, so this lone Pine Bunting observation was a welcome surprise. I have a long history with this species in Israel - I am old enough to have experienced decent numbers in the late 1980's. Every childhood winter in Jerusalem, I'd appreciate 15-20 Pine Buntings in a beautiful valley not far from the house in which I grew up. Now this valley is lost under concrete and asphalt. I clearly remember a flock of 70 Pine Buntings within a flock of hundreds of Yellowhammers up on Mt. Hermon ages ago - these sights and sounds are lost too. In recent decade both Yellowhammer and Pine Bunting numbers have dwindled considerably in Israel, and Pine Bunting has become quite a novice species, especially such a lovely male.

Back to late 2018, I had a plan to connect with the bunting, and hopefully even get a decent photo -  I had no photos of it in Israel. I even had an ambitious wish to photograph it with the backdrop of the Dome of the Rock... I met up with Amir early and we started working the valley down, together with a couple more birders. At first it was cold deep in the shaded valley, but some finches were already feeding on the slopes with the spectacular backdrop of the Dome of the Rock.

Then the sun started shining on the northern slope, bringing it back to life, and finch activity increased there. We worked the skittish finch flock down in the olive grove very carefully for quite a while, without a sign of the bunting. I had a flyover 'funny' serin - either Syrian or Red-fronted (their flight calls are very similar to my ear), a few Siskin, Dunnock, Brambling but the star bird wasn't on show. I sat down to eat my sandwich, then heard the familiar bunting rattle. Sandwich back into the bag, and I went around the corner to see THE bunting sat up nicely on a pistachio about 40 meters away. What a stunner! The deep rufous rump and horn-coloured bill shining at me, beautiful facial pattern so lovely to see. I fired off a few initial photos - this is a large crop:

Then I figured out that a few steps to the left and I have my killer shot - bingo!

The bird perched for a mere 30 seconds, then flew off rattling for no apparent reason. I was joined by the others, and we had several more distant and rather brief views of the bunting - it was shy and mobile. But personally I can't complain.

Here it is, demonstrating its lovely rufous flank streaks and white belly:

Feeding on the ground with a Chaffinch:

Full eBird checklist here. A few more bird photos:

Syrian Woodpecker climbing up an olive trunk

European Stonechat doing the decent thing

Black Redstart

In the afternoon I had some work to do in the Dead Sea region - such a contrasting environment, only 30 minutes away. In one of the few unfenced date plantations several Mountain Gazelles were feeding:

After dusk we had two Pallid Scops Owls calling nearby - no views. Can't wait till June.

Fine bunting

This morning I went birding at Wadi Kos which is in southern Jerusalem, near the neighbourhood of Gilo. Avner Rinot found there last week two Pine Buntings among a nice flock of Yellowhammers. Arrived there in the morning and was joined by Ron Haran. Together we worked our way down the wadi birding the slopes covered with almond and olive trees. Took us some time to get onto the bunting flock but eventually we found a flock of 15. They were very very shy and mobile, like they usually are here in Israel. Took me a while to scan through them but eventually managed to get only brief views of a female Pine Bunting - no image. 

Yellowhammer

Other than lots of common finches and thrushes, one Fieldfare was the only other bird of note.

So common that Ihave never bothered photographing them before - Hooded Crows:

This was quite a sentimental morning for me. I grew up in Jerusalem, very close to where we were birding this morning. I used to bird this area as a kid almost daily. In winter we had a regular flock of about 100 Yellowhammers and 25-30 Pine Buntings in that area, but since the huge developement in that area, buntings went missing from this area for some years. So it was really good to be back in the area, bird in the habitat I know so well from childhood.

Wadi Kos

Birding in the Upper Galillee

This morning I met up with Nadav and his team up in the Galillee mountains. Our main mission was to ring Goldcrests. This seems to be a very good winter for this rare bird in Israeli standards. In this particular spruce grove, we had 10-15 birds, which is an Israeli record I guess!
As you understand we caught nothing; the birds just wouldn't come down low enough to get caught. I spent some time trying to photograph them but no results at all - they're so fast! This is how my images looked like:

But this is not totally useless as these pretty spruce branches could make excellent perches for future projects:

Anyway, after that failure we had some time to check the beautiful pistachio and almond orchards of Birya. This is Israel's prime site for Pine Bunting, and indeed we had two - I had a female (all too brief) and Nadav had a cooperative male. They were hanging around with 30 Yellowhammers - another good bird:

Apart for that a flock of 20 Woodlarks were nice:

They actaully perch on trees!