Mission accomplished

Week 24, 13 July 14 - Jahra East Outfall

At last a visit to a different site...

Neil Tovey, an experienced birder from UAE has recently re-located to Kuwait and it was great to finally meet him and spend a morning birding together.

We decided to check on the Warblers at Jahra East Outfall, specifically looking for Basra..

We arrived just on sunrise which is 04h50 in the morning and it took longer than we thought before the dawn chorus started - it was pretty pathetic by South African standards, I must admit. Nevertheless we walked and checked the reeds along the outfall (it sounds exotic, but it is a dirty water outfall - meaning sewage)

There were Caspian Reed Warblers aplenty as these breed here in the summer

Breeding Caspian Reed Warbler (Acrocephalus s. fuscus)

As do Graceful Prinia's

Graceful Prinia (Prinia gracilis)

But no big Acro's to be found anywhere (normally Indian Reed is present).

Finally as we decided to leave we heard a call that was different to the others we had heard all morning - low and behold a Basra flew out of some dense reed cover to chase another warbler before disappearing into cover - no image, but mission accomplished