PeterHG’s sixth. Wherever it may take us.

[Zim Girl]

Well done on getting to 200, Peter.

[xelas]

Congratulations on entering into third century!

[PeterHG]

The saltpans  hosted a variety of waders, most of which I had already seen, but this one was new for the list:

 

202 P03. Kentish Plover. Algarve, September 

 

[PeterHG]

A few others that could be seen:

 

 

 

 

 

 

All good water practice shots...;)

[PeterHG]

@michael-ibkgave us a good tip on where to find Audouin's Gulls we saw quite a few of them indeed.

 

203 P04. Audouin's Gull  Algarve, September.

 

 

 

[PeterHG]

And that wasn't the only gull there...

 

204 / P05. Slender-billed Gull. Algarve, September

 

 

 

 

[Soukous]

A lovely Kentish Plover. I've not managed to find one yet

[PeterHG]

Of course we also had to drive to Castro Marim near the Spanish border in order to find the Lesser Short-toed lark. Well we did find a small group of them, immediately flying off after making clear to us by their distinctive call that they were the ones we were after. Well it was a great opportunity to test my EBC skills and I was not disappointed.

 

205 / P 06 Lesser Short-toed Lark. Algarve, September

 

 

 

[PeterHG]

The next one equally hard to grab, but at least it showed reasonably well.

 

206 / P 07. Red-legged Partridge. Algarve, September

 

 

 

[pedro maia]

Those larks aren´t easy to photograph, I saw them last year in that same spot and the result wasn´t brilliant .

[PeterHG]

The town of Castro Marim itself was quite worth visiting as well with its impressive castle. I thought my vaccination passport would prove enough to be admitted, but we were interrogated quite harshly before we could enter. No wonder Portugal is among the safest countries in Europe covid-wise .

 

 

 

[PeterHG]

One last visit to the saltpans near Fuseta produced a new tick. Well, actually we'd seen some before but quite distant.

 

207 / P 08. Greater Flamingo. Algarve September

 

[PeterHG]

This one wasn't taken there, but earlier in the Quinto de Marim reserve.

 

208 / P09. Grey Plover. Algarve, September

 

[PeterHG]

And a few we got reacquainted with:

 

 

 

 

 

[PeterHG]

We wanted to visit the steppe areas of the Alentejo, so  we found a place south of Ourique only an hour's drive fropm our previous location. Our google/ booking.com search provided us with another nice place to stay. Mind you, we only had half of this house ;). The owners occupied the other half

 

[PeterHG]

Our main goal here was to try and find bustards and perhaps some other steppe species. On our first drive we only got Corn Bunting. We'd seen it before and I even got one or two shots on one on some barbed wire, but I rather liked this setting, even though the waving grasses made a clear shot quite difficult.

 

209 / P10. Corn Bunting. Alentejo, October

 

[PeterHG]

Later on we had our first definite sightings of some Spanish Sparrows.

 

210 /P 11. Spanish Sparrow. Alentejo, October

 

 

[PeterHG]

Our next trip was rather more succesful. We spotted a large raptor over the steppes and when we had stopped the car and took a good look, it turned out to be an immature Spanish Imperial Eagle!

 

211 / P12. Spanish Imperial Eagle. Alentejo, October

 

[pedro maia]

Always nice to see a Spanish Imperial Eagle!

[PeterHG]

212 /P 013. Iberian Shrike. Alentejo, October. We saw it quite regularly, but it was always very shy. This one at least stayed put for a little while, so we gratefully accepted the ugly wire with it.

 

[PeterHG]

213 / P 14. Thekla Lark. Alentejo, October. Well, I think so, at least.

 

[PeterHG]

When we stopped at the side of a quiet road to scan the steppe for bustards, another car pulled up beside us and the two Dutch birders asked us if we'd had any luck so far. Aftre our negative reply they told us to follow them as they'd seen a little group of Great Bustards just 20 minutes ago. After a short drive we got out and scanned the fields again. And we did find 3 Bustards, which was good. The only problem was they were so far away that even in the telescope it was hard to see them properly. Nevertheless, we had our tick, though no photographs. We thanked our fellow birders for their kindness and draove back to the place we were before. Quite unexpectedly 4 or 5 Bustards flew by and landed in the fields further on. We had great views and I even managed to grab a few flight shots. They are impressive birds and their size looks like flying must be quite a challenge for them.

 

214 /P 15. Great Bustard. Alentejo, October.

 

 

[pedro maia]

Beatifull shots of the Great bustards.

[TonyQ]

Well done on reaching 200!

Beautiful shots, stunning Eagle- wow

We stayed at Olhao a couple of years ago and really enjoyed the birding in that area (and the fish!)

[Galana]

8 hours ago, pedro maia said:

Beatifull shots of the Great bustards.

I could not have put it better.