Autumn migration continues

Week 40; 06 October 2017 - JPR

This and the next few months posts from JPR will be together with Jaden as he conducts his weekly surveys at JPR for his DoE Award and it is time together that I really enjoy. We also try and predict what has changed since the previous week, based on weather patterns which is quite fun.

As it is a formal survey, we stick to the same time and transect for each weekly visit. At the big tower, the expected Western Marsh Harrier was seen, in fact a few more had arrived in the week and almost all are female.

Female Western Marsh Harrier (Circus aeruginosus)

Our resident Ferruginous Ducks were pretty active

Ferruginous Duck (Aythya nyroca)

On our slow drive we had Purple Heron fly by 

Purple Heron (Ardea purpurea)

Followed by a massive flock of 50+ Black-crowned Night Herons that were flushed by the Harrier

Black-crowned Night Heron (Nycticorax nycticorax)

The big pool had White-winged Terns, but the Black Tern was not to be found

White-winged Tern (Chlidonias leucopterus)

Again we had Black-tailed Godwit in the same pool

Near Threatened European Black-tailed Godwit (Limosa l. limosa)

On the banks of the same pool, a Citrine Wagtail which was not present last week

Citrine Wagtail (Motacilla citreola)

Down at the beach, as single White Stork came in from the sea

Western White Stork (Ciconia ciconia)

Away from the reeds, we had other autumn passerine migrants; Daurian Shrikes

Daurian Shrike (Lanius isabellinus)

Northern Wheatear

Northern Wheatear (Oenanthe oenanthe)

And Common Redstart

Female Common Redstart (Phoenicurus phoenicurus)

A surprise was an Indian Silverbill, although I suspect this one was an escape - however they are resident in other areas of Kuwait

Indian Silverbill (Lonchura malabarica)

Overall a good species and abundance count for the day..