MONTFRAGUE HOTEL WALK TOWARDS ARROYO DE LA VID - TRUJILLO PLAZA - TRUJILLO LESSER KESTRELS - RIO ALMONTE - BELEN PLAIN
WEATHER: a prefect day! Clear blue sky, warm sunshine and a loevely temperature.
Our birding started today with a walk from the hotel along a well trodden track that leads you into the National Park. The habitat is open, cork oak woodland, with patches of broom and a wide margin of wild flowers and grasses. Dry stone walls surround the woodlands and fields.
walking the local track this morning
Lots of birds were singing and I don't blame them, it was a beautiful morning! We quickly totted up a good list of common species and one or two that we most wanted to see. A Woodlark sat on a dry-stone wall posing for our cameras, Woodchat Shrikes seemed be dotted about on many bushes, there must have been a bit of a migrant arrival overnight, I counted 19 Woodchat Shrikes in the area! We also found a couple of Northern Wheatears.
Woodchat Shrike - one of many seen today
Corn Buntings, Thekla's Larks, Spotless Starlings, Common Stonechats, Blue and Great Tits, Iberian & Eurasian Magpies, Red-rumped Swallows and Crag Martins all put in an appearance.
Thekla's Lark
Woodlark
An Orphean Warbler sang out to us, I love those "hee-be-jeebee" melodic notes in his song, we never got to see the bird. We had more than one sighting of the Eurasian Hoopoe, which delighted the group as they most wanted to see one close-up and personal. Xanthe especially had a craving for the Hoopoe and we had excellent views from the bus of a perched bird.
Xanthe's Hoopoe picture taken from the bus through the window
The sky was full of hirundines, also a few Common Swifts came over, Black Kites, Vultures and Buzzards joined them. We found some interesting insects too! The Red-stripoed Oil Beetle captured some attention and fascination from Lauren and Xanthe which rubbed off onto the rest of the group. We also saw our first Iolas Blue Butterfly, lots fo caterpillars, Pond Terrapins, a Marsh Frog and a Wall LIzard.
Iolas blue - one of the largest blues in Europe
From there we headed to Trujillo, stopping one along the way to view some suitable habitat for the Black-eared Wheatear, a short search produced nothing new except for a distant Grey Shrike.
the plaza at Trujillo
Francisco Pizarro watching over us at lunch
We then drove to the 'Plaza Mayor' in the centre of Trujillo! What a fabulous place, surrounded by ancient buildings with dozen of White Storks nests on them. We watched Lesser Kestrels, gangs of screaming Common Swifts, Jackdaws, Spotless Starling and a Booted Eagle came over putting all the pigeons into panic mode.
We ate lunch under the watchful eye of Francisco Pizarro, the infamous conquistador, he sat on his high horse over looking the plaza.
When we visited the Lesser Kestrel colony at the silos thge other day is was dull, misty and drab! So, today, in bright sunshine, we thought a second visit was called for. It was so much better, fantastic to see the kestrels in bright sunshine.
a nest box scheme in Trujillo for the lesser Kestrels is proving very successful
a pair of Lesser Kestrels
The afternoon was spent on Belen Plain, we visited lots of places and made a few short walks, all in search of Great Spotted Cuckoos. We saw none! However, it was wonderful out there, although it did get a little hot.
European Bee-eaters, Iberian Shrikes, Hoopoes, Iberian Magpies, Larks and Corn Buntings coming out of your ears, vultures, kites, Storks, kestrels and dozens of hirundines - all keeping us busy with our optics focused.
more Tongue Orchids were seen today
We found Zitting Cisticola, a small party of Common Waxbills with Red a Avadavat in tow (both of these latter two species are invasive escapee's). We stumbled upon a pile of dead pigs which were covered in Black Kites, it was gruesome and very smelly.
At 5pm we made our way back to the hotel, the last of our bvirding was over. Tomorrow we have to leave early in the morning to catch our flights. It had been a lovely trip, a little disappointing as far as migrant species were concerned, so few of them! The weather for the first couple of days was adverse as far as birding was concerned, high winds are not conducive to good birding.
Nevertheless, we had a great trip and saw over 100 species in our short stay, everyone was happy with their sightings.