Gilly and I embarked on our now annual trip to
Morocco by taking the Balearia ferry from Algerciras to Tanger Med port
which is about 60km east of the town and old port which takes ferries
from Tarifa.
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| Common Bulbul |
After sorting out our entry forms on the boat we did
a bit of birding as we came into the harbour. We spotted Cory's
Shearwater and Gannet to get our list off the ground. Apart from
birdwatching we were also delivering 17 binbags full of clothing to our
adopted "suburb" of Imlil, a trekking village up in the High Atlas
Mountains. Moroccan Customs asked us to unload. Having extracted about
half of the cargo the supervisor came over and asked, "Have you any
guns?" (If I had, did he think I'd admit it?) " Have you a motorbike?"
Seriously? As we had neither he let us through.
We made our way to Larache where, just prior to
the town is the Oued Loukkos Marsh. A passable road leads you beside
the tidal river and then through wetlands and reedbeds. The
highlights here were flocks of Red-knobbed Coots, 15-20 Spoonbills,
numerous Squacco Herons, Red-crested Pochards, Purple Herons, Collared
Pratincoles, Stone Curlews, Marbled Ducks and large numbers of Marsh
Harriers. We also picked up Nightingale and Golden Oriole. A bonus was a
Montagu's Harrier. We then made our way into town where, in the
circular main square, we had Little Swifts above us. We stayed in a
cheapo hotel where I had been before. €20 for the night. I don't know
what they charged the couple in the room next to us who only stayed an
hour!
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| Eleonora's Falcon |
The next day we had the long drive down to El
Jadida, passing Casablanca and Rabat. On the way we made a brief stop
at Moully Bousselham, just north of the Merdja Zerga where the probably
extinct Slender-billed Curlews were prone to overwinter. Here we added
Oystercatcher, Turtle Dove and a very obliging one-eyed Little Owl to
the list. Arriving at our destination in good time, we headed further
south to a salina area. Here we addded Little Tern, Whimbrel, Bar-tailed
Godwit and Curlew Sandpiper before returning to the hotel.
Todays destination was Agadir. On the way
down we stopped at Essaouira estuary where Eleanora's Falcons were
constantly overhead. The other birds of note here are Brown-necked
Martins at their nest site. We stopped in the Tamri area but failed to
see the resident Bald Ibises.
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| Cream-coloured Courser |
We had an early start to meet Lahcen, our guide for the day around the Sous Massa bird reserve. I'd failed to see Black-crowned Tchagra last time,
but Lahcen got a pair of them within half an hour. In the shrubs we had
Spotted and Pied Flycatcher, Moussier's Redstart and numerous
Olivaceous Warblers. A Wood Warbler was a great bonus as was a Black
Tern. We then went to search for Cream-coloured Coursers. We first got
some Stone Curlews but soon had what we were looking for. It was at this
point my lens's autofocus gave up the ghost, a big dampener on the
holiday. Also seen with our guide were Little Bittern, Palm Dove, Cirl
Bunting and Western Orphean Warbler. Gilly hadn't seen Mongoose, so
Lahcen bought some sardines and placed them on a riverbank close to lots
of shrubs. We made our way to the opposite bank and waited. Sure enough
after about half an hour a mongoose appeared. As arranged he took us
back to his house where his italian wife had prepared a fish tagine
followed by spaghetti bolognaise.
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| Palm Dove |
Not wanting to haul all the clothes into the
Sahara and back again, we cut across country heading up the Atlas
Mountains to Imlil. Not done this route before. Road very narrow in
places and I won't be doing it in winter! On route to the village we
saw Woodlark, Blue Rock Thrush, Black Wheatear, Grey Wagtail and Rock
Bunting. The truck was unloaded to its and our relief. Our contact and host offered us lunch so we opted for a cheese omelette. When it
arrived it had cut up cheese triangles in it! Eatable but I'll go for a
plain omelette next time. In the woods surrounding the village we had
North African subspecies of Chaffinch and Blue Tit as well as flocks of Red-billed
Chough above us and Levaillant's Green Woodpecker in the walnut trees.
We headed for Marrakech for a couple of nights.
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| Alpine/Yellow-billed Chough |
We woke up to grey skies and rain....not what
was expected. We were going up to the Oukaimeden Ski Resort some 65km
up in the Atlas Mountains. We drove through the clouds and just as we
reached the resort we climbed into blue skies and sunshine. There was
very little snow so the Horned Larks and Crimson-winged Finches were
nowhere to be seen, but we did see Mistle Thrush, Black Redstart, Rock
Sparrow, Alpine Chough and Seebohm's Wheatear.
It was off towards the Sahara today. Drove over
the High Atlas Mountains, seeing our first Griffon Vulture in Morocco,
plus an obliging Woodchat Shrike as we had a cafe au lait. As we got
down onto the plain the otherside we started to see the desert birds.
The very common White-crowned Wheatear, the rare Mourning Wheatear and
Trumpeter Finches. We also saw our first Desert Lark of the trip. We
reached our destination of Ouarzazate. Slightly beyond it is a large
barrage, reservoir, where hundreds of Ruddy Shelducks were in residence.
Also saw Avocets and Sanderlings and our first Rufus Bushchat.
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| Long-legged Buzzard |
Travelling further into desert conditions we
stopped at the infamous rubbish tip just outside Boumalne. Gilly almost
immediately got her first Thick-billed Lark amongst the detritus. We
also had Red-rumped Wheatear, Long-legged Buzzard, Desert Wheatear, and Temminck's Horned Lark. We carried on towards Efoud picking up
sightings of Bar-tailed Lark and Hoopoe Lark. As we pulled in to the
Riad hotel Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters were flying above us.
We were up early the next day. We were picked
up by our two guides and another man who hopefully knew where Houbara
Bustards were. He was an out of work Houbara Bustard security guard
employed by the Saudi's to protect their illegal supply so they can ship
the birds back to their country for falcon prey. As they only paid him
from September to April he was supplementing his wages with a bit of
freelancing. All I'm allowed to say is we travelled north from Efoud for
some kilometres, then took a track to the left which eventually petered
out into rough ground and with low lying shrubs and grasses. After
about an hours searching Gilly eventually spotted one. In the end we saw
3-4, one flying. Our 5 year search was over!
We dropped off our guard and
went south towards the big dunes. We added Brown-necked Raven and
Desert Sparrow before making for the Merzuga lake where we saw more Ruddy
Shelducks and Greater Flamingos. In the evening we went to a great
little spot just outside town, pointed out to us by one of the guides
where we would've had superb photos of Rufous Bushchats and Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters had the lens been fu....nctional (Grrrrrrgh!)
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| find the Pharoah Eagle Owl! |
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| Moussier's Redstart |
We were out with another guide called Lahcen in
the Rissani area the next day. He took us to the Pharaoh Eagle Owl site
and soon found the bird in a hole high up on the cliff face. Next it
was to the Lanner Falcon site where we saw both an adult and juvenile
flying. He then took us to a sandgrouse area. We observed a small group
of Spotted Sandgrouse, a first for both of us. We then spent ages
trying to find Fulvous Babblers but failed. You can't win them all!
The next day we failed to anything new to the
list. Going back towards the mountains we scraped a Stock Dove and a
pair of Barbary Partridges. Back at Imlil I was determined to add to my
woodland bird list so drove into the pine forest above the village. With
the help of my phone I managed to attract Short-toed Treecreeper and
Coal Tit. Later we logged Crossbill, Short-toed Eagle and Great
Spotted Woodpecker as well.
The next few days were spent travelling back to
Marrakech and then Casablanca. On the penultimate day we stopped off at
the Larache marsh. It turned up trumps again with sightings of Great
Reed Warbler, Glossy Ibis and Purple Swamphen.
149 species for the trip. Good birding and mostly good friendly people.
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