8 + 10 May, Guadalhorce, plus odds and sods.

After a rather less than pleasant Friday morning (08/05), I was glad to have the opportunity to get down to the ponds on Friday afternoon with Federico Vallés, which provided some consolation. It was warm but there was some breeze to ameliorate it. His company is always most welcome, but he met me with the news that when coming down from Córdoba the previous afternoon, at km.90 going towards Antequera, a Black-shouldered Kite flew 15m in front of his car, which had made him extremely happy.

On the bird front there were not vast quantities of waders, nor was there so much variety with a total of 10 spp., with a slight increase in Ringed Plovers with 15+ spread around and 10 each of Redshank and Dunlin. The sight of the first small Black-winged Stilts is always very attractive. Rather more interesting was the presence of some 10 Slender-billed Gulls, one of which was colour ringed but there was too much heat haze to read it, and another showed a beautiful rose pink breast. A solitary Whiskered Tern still moulting into breeding plumage hawked its way up and down the old river. For the rest, a single European Turtle Dove was my very late first for the year.

This morning, Sunday, I was down again, in company with Bob Hibbett and Federico and although it was cool when we went in before 09h, it definitely showing the first signs of summer heat when Bob and I left just before noon. On the bird front, a Purple Boghen had been seen, thus reinforcing rumours that they might be breeding at long last!

Antonio Miguel managed to dampen our feelings by telling us that yesterday (Saturday) he had seen 3 Squacco Herons, but we managed to out-count him with first a flock of 6 along with a single Cattle Egret (had it got delusions of grandeur?) which flew over, circled aroud and we last saw them moving off E over Málaga city, and then later another 4 at the main pond, the laguna grande. Bon and I also saw, very briefly, a solitary male Little Bittern at the laguna escondida. We had also seen a flock of c.6 European Turtle Doves hurtle over and a single one showed off in the very top of one of the eucalyptus.

As usual, the old river area turned up the waders, but again only 10 spp which is not a lot for this time of year. Numbers too were very similar to those of Friday but there was the addition of a very fine Grey Plover in full breeding plumage and when returning there was another, equally fine, at the laguna grande and its photos are shown here, note also the adult male Little Ringed Plover in the left hand one.


Antonio Miguel tells me that he has controlled no less than 52 nests of Black-winged Stilt (give or take one or two each way), an increase over the 45 or so of last year. There were also 2 Little Terns to attract the eye but really little else.

From elsewhere, numbers of waders at Fuente de Piedra have fallen considerably this past week, but there could still be some interesting birds to come. A Pectoral Sandpiper was reported from there this last week, the second of this spring. (Peter Jones, per Bob Hibbett).

However, the consolation is that there are still three weeks of wader migration to come and very often the late surge of birds heading for the high Arctic can produce something interesting.

Late news at 22.30h, that today must have been migration day for Squacco Herons, as at the Punta de lagos, Vélez Málaga, this evening, at 18:00 there were no less than 22 birds (A. García, en avesforum).

And finally, whilst awaiting the definitive figures, yesterday, 9 May, an estimated 10.000 Honey Buzzards arrived in the Tarifa area from Africa, and there were large numbers of this sp. and also Black Kites today, Sunday, with more yet expected this coming week (Alex Onrrubia, in avesforum).