Pedro does it again, 2nd Year!!

[pedro maia]

The White-rumped swift wasn´t my only goal, there was another rarity I wanted to try to find this time in Faro, the main city of the Algarve, 1 and a half hour distant from the mining ruins, as I said before I´m not particularly fond of looking for a single individual bird but this one is a mega rarity, a species that occur only in the Americas, the bird must have caught the wrong winds, crossed the ocean and found itself in another continent and is more or less in the same place for the past 2/3 weeks, it´s the first record of this species in continental Portugal, I don´t know if there´s any record in Europe.

 

My chances weren´t to high but nearby there is another place where i could tick a couple of species so there I was, I looked around and thought it was going to be impossible for me to find the bird but I was lucky, another birder I never met before was leaving the place, he had seen the bird and offered himself to go back to show me the spot, it had moved a bit but there it was, in a ditch where I would never see it, I thanked the guy, took a few pictures and went to another place.

 

#185, 5/6 (N27), Yellow-crowned night heron, Marinha da Garganta, Faro

 

 

 

Edited June 7, 2020 by pedro maia

[pedro maia]

After leaving the Heron I went to Quinta do Lago, a luxurious tourist destination near Faro, a gated community with big villas, luxury hotels, fancy restaurants and golf courses, not my kind of holiday destination but a great birding spot and probably the best spot in Portugal to look for my third target of the day, which I also found even if the pictures I took aer poor, the bird is small, quick and never stayed still, always flying by the other side of the pool overlooked by the hide I visited:

 

#186, 5/6 (N28), Little bittern, Quinta do Lago

 

 

 

[pedro maia]

#187, 5/6, Little tern, Quinta do Lago

 

Next picture is from yesterday in another place:

 

Edited June 7, 2020 by pedro maia

[pedro maia]

#188, 5/6, Black-headed weaver, Quinta do Lago

 

 

[pedro maia]

And an addition from yesterday:

 

#189, 6/6, Common tern, Moinho da Maré da Mourisca

 

Edited June 14, 2020 by pedro maia

[michael-ibk]

Wow for the Heron, what a cool bird to find! 

[Galana]

Altogether and excellent and rewarding outing. Well done.

[Soukous]

You're managing ot keep your total growing very nicely, well done, and all home grown too.

[Peter Connan]

Excellent! Your hard work is paying off!

[Dave Williams]

Some more excellent birds, the Night Heron particularly good find, blown in with the recent gales no doubt.

[pedro maia]

Thanks guys, this week we had two holidays in Portugal so me and my wife went out for a few days for the first time since lockdown, we went to Douro Internacional, in the northeast and bordering Spain, a place we barely knew even if it´s one of the most beautiful in our country, it was excelent, we really disconnected from work and from Covid (no cases where we stayed).

 

Douro Internacional is also a great birding area with species that are hard to find elsewhere but I must say I wasn´t lucky, missed some of my targets and got only five new species for my BY (6 if I count one super EBC I really hope that I don´t need to use ), the weather didn´t help much in the birding part, it was windy and cloudy most of the time. 

[pedro maia]

#190, 10/6 (N29), Alpine swift, Penedo Durão, Douro Internacional

 

 

 

Edited June 14, 2020 by pedro maia

[pedro maia]

#191, 11/6 (N30), Subalpine warbler, Calçada de Alpajares, Douro Internacional

Edited June 14, 2020 by pedro maia

[pedro maia]

#192, 11/6, European turtle dove, Foz da Ribeira do Mosteiro, Douro Internacional

[pedro maia]

#193, 11/6, Egyptian vulture, Bruçó, Douro Internacional

[pedro maia]

#194 (N31), 12/6, Eurasian golden oriole, Vale da Ribeira do Mosteiro, Douro Internacional

[Dave Williams]

Edging ever closer to the double century with some excellent bird sightings Pedro.

 

[Galana]

More excellent photos. 200 in sight.

[pedro maia]

While updating my bubo.org lists I found out that I didn´t count this one:

 

#195, 5/6, Common pochard, Quinta do Lago

[PeterHG]

Good additions again from your trip!

[pedro maia]

Again not the best pictures but enough to get going...

 

#196, 20/6, Whiskered tern, Lagoa dos Patos

 

[pedro maia]

#197, 20/6, Gull-billed tern, Barragem do Alqueva

[pedro maia]

Thursday night I went to the Lezíria to look for the barn owls, it wasn´t the best idea because it was quite windy and even though we saw 6 of them they were mostly flying away and the only one that stayed in a pole long enough for me to take a picture didn´t didn´t allow us to gat closer and didn´t really stay still because of the wind so the result was terrible but I´m going to use it because I don´t think I will have the patience to go back there after dark.

 

#198, 25/6, Barn owl, Lezíria de Vila Franca de Xira

[pedro maia]

Next specie was quite difficult for me this year, last year I got it in my first day but not this time so I took the chance even though it was in the shade and I didn´t have time to change the camera settings.

 

#199, 26/6, Kingfisher, Paul do Boquilobo

 

Yesterday I had a much better oportunity when a friend of mine caught one at a nest, i probably wouldn´t use it for the BY but here´s the picture:

 

[pedro maia]

My initial goal for this year (only national) was 215 species and 20 new, I have more than 20 new species and unless something happens (who would guess the covid thing in January) 215 is a short goal so now that I´m reaching 200 by mid year I´m going to set a new goal of 240 species in Portugal, and even though I still didn´t see maybe 30 species I saw last year, I won´t get some of those species and I´m reaching a point where with the exception of a couple I can find easily and a few others that shouldn´t be too difficult in the right place and time, things will get much harder from now on and I will have more than one blank outings. And also some species are starting to annoy me such as the quail, yesterday I litteraly over one, I could hear very close to my feet and it just didn´t show up...

 

For #200 I have a species that I didn´t see last year, they are pretty scarse but there are a couple of spots where it isn´t too difficult to see them:

 

#200 (N32), 26/6, Red-billed chough, Covões Largos, Serra dos Candeeiros