Paphos revisited....April 11th-18th 2015 (1 Viewer)

KenM · Apr 23, 2015

Our arrival in Paphos was somewhat less than welcoming, with the pilot having been an ex Rodeo star, and clearly hell bent on ''driving a hard landing'' certainly raised a few gasps! and cries! from the encumbered passengers, whom had been relatively muted throughout the entire 4 hour flight.
Emerging from the hotel the following day was certainly refreshing, an un-abating wind out of the West circa force 3-4 for the whole day, kinda kept most things down, apart from small parties of Baltic Gulls (fuscus) heading WNW into the opposing winds. My!...what apparantly short tails and long wings they have (gotta be a split there someday).

Day 1 Apart from the Baltic Gulls, and in keeping with the Black and White ''Theme'' of the day, the day's highlight had to be a very handsome less than pedestrian White Wagtail...a real stunner in my book!

Day 2 was a little more colourful and got me running for the first time...in a long time, easily outpacing the guy with the ''Bazooka'' lens, ''dipping'' at the imaginary tape, whilst franticly hitting, and missing the buttons on my Bridge Camera before adding Hooded Wheatear to my European Black & White list!

If that wasn't enough!...a touch of colour with Masked Shrike and Hoopoe certainly got me an adrenalin rush, followed by a black ''Americano'' for good measure. To be continued

KenM · Apr 24, 2015

Paphos revisited...April 11th-18th 2015

Day 3 Tuesday, gave me a not dissimilar array of ''core'' birds as the previous day albeit as nearly always, with new additional species passing through. M.f.beema type and M.f.feldegg, Yellow Wags.,Tawny Pipit, Corn Bunting, Red-throated Pipit, Linnet, Goldfinch, Greenfinch, House and Spanish Sparrow, Zitting Cisticola, Crested Lark, Woodchat Shrike, Sardinian Warbler and Northern Wheatear along with not infrequent Lesser Whitethroat, with one individual that looked distinctly paler than the norm (unfortunately I was unable to snap it :-C

Although I failed with the former, I got (with difficulty) lifetimes best views of a single (one and only) Bonelli's Warbler, and getting some reasonable shots ''to boot''. To be continued

KenM · Apr 24, 2015

Paphos revisited...April 11th-18th 2015

Day 4 Wed. Walking past the harbour (early am), I noted a flight of 5 Purple Herons, 3 Black-winged Stilts and a Grt.White Egret, plus the resident Yellow-legged Gulls representing a slightly ''wet'' diversion from my land based quests. My first newbies (for the trip) were two Short-toed Larks, then a familiar ''tirruck-tirruck'' song of Reed Warbler, emanating from a dense carpet stand of yellow flower sp. soon followed by Spotted Flycatcher (the first, of only two encountered during the trip). A visit to the toilet block on exit, had me staring up into a dense (Pine sp) where I had noted a furtive movement (extremely well hidden) at the top of said tree. It took me some time to process the body splintered parts, that were momentarily on view at any one time...then the penny dropped. This rather heavily shadowed bird was indeed a Thrush Nightingale! Unfortunately once more...not for want of trying, another, that I was unable to image. To be continued.

KenM · Apr 24, 2015

Paphos revisited.....April 11th-18th.

Day 5 Certainly a ''jaw-dropping'' day by anybody's standards, It started off with a female Sprawk being inadvertently flushed from the ''Toilet Block'' Pine by some raucous Hoodies, which eventually succeeded in driving it from the tree belt over the headland, towards the Lighthouse (reminiscent of the St.Agnes Lighthouse....a dead ringer! There were times during the day when looking up to the ''beacon'', I would momentarily forget where I was :eek!: It was whilst watching the Sprawk disappear over yonder hillock, that I noted a small shrike sitting on a lone pine in the continuous tree belt...Red-backed I exclaimed, a stunning male! What a sight for sore eyes, didn't see them last year, this indeed was a bonus!

Meandering on, I found a second RBS in an adjoining field plus Whinchat, and 2 Ortolan Buntings that dropped in close to the second Shrike giving it the ''once over'' before taking flight, closely followed by a superb Black-eared Wheatear..what a great start to the day I thought! Little did I know, that which was about to befall me, gazing over a dry-stone wall, I noted the ''flash' of a male Common Redstart flying between two low bushes perhaps some 5metres away.

However there was something not quite right with the nano-second image that was registering in my ''minds eye?'' There were some maintenance staff cutting the grass in the field behind with some particularly irksomely noisy strimmers, and yet, I thought I could hear a weak chat like warble, but because of the background noise, it sounded somewhat distorted.

Thus I thought I'd made a mistake on my sound interpretation, and I moved away further down the track. Eventually the ''strimming'' stopped, and I returned to the site, when after five minutes ''the bird'' suddenly morphed into view atop an evergreen shrub, perhaps 5m distant. Already extended I ''slowly'' raised my camera and waited an interminable ''lifetime'' 3-4 seconds, before the ''out of focus''....focused!!

Just as the ''two requisite Anglo Saxon words'' left my lips, followed by White-Throated Robin! I hit the shutter button, and still thought I was dreaming! To be continued.

joannec · Apr 24, 2015

Nice Ken. I was in Cyprus just over a year ago and saw some amazing birds. So this is the day 5 report.......... have I missed earlier reports for days 1-4? Will have to do a search.

joannec · Apr 24, 2015

Aren't those Masked Shrikes great?! We saw them loads of places when we were there.

joannec · Apr 24, 2015

Congrats on the Bonelli's!

KenM · Apr 24, 2015

joannec said:
Aren't those Masked Shrikes great?! We saw them loads of places when we were there.

I only encountered (two) different birds for the week, they are definitely a bit special! Cheers

KenM · Apr 24, 2015

Thanks Joanne!....that was my first in many a long year.

KenM · Apr 24, 2015

joannec said:
Nice Ken. I was in Cyprus just over a year ago and saw some amazing birds. So this is the day 5 report.......... have I missed earlier reports for days 1-4? Will have to do a search.

Apologies Joanne, I have redefined the ''Days'' in bold type, hope this helps. Cheers

KenM · Apr 24, 2015

Paphos revisited.....April 11th-18th.

Day 6 Still on a ''high'' from the day before and beginning to wind down as Stansted was almost on the horizon, I (from some distance) inadvertently flushed a Spur-winged Plover (didn't know it was present), so that was responsible for the odd single repeated notes...p(v)ik! Once again unable to image, disappearing behind a belt of trees before I could frame it.

Later on I bumped into Dave and Jan Walker resident Brit.Birders who had come for the WTRobin but sadly to no avail, however they got me onto a (briefly) superb male Collared Flycatcher, a tad embarrassing, as I would dearly have liked to have extended the courtesy, C'est la vie, also an odd looking Grey Com.Redstart, plus my second Spot.Fly of the trip.

A walk back, past the archaeology ''forum'' site in the grass field, were the usual Northern Wheatears plus a couple of Black-eareds, RTPipits, Yellow Wags (beema and feldegg types and this ''not quite there ''supercilliaris''. Getting back to an empty pool at the hotel, was an opportunity that I didn't miss after the heat of the day. To be continued

ApusApus · Apr 24, 2015

KenM said:
Apologies Joanne, I have redefined the ''Days'' in bold type, hope this helps. Cheers

Maybe it would have been easier to follow if you had started off with one post and then just added to it!

Shane

KenM · Apr 24, 2015

Paphos revisited......April 11th-18th

Day 7 The last morning had me up for an early breakfast and a ''last hurrah!'' breakfast was more than adequate, however I passed on the Quail thinking it was a bit rich for so early in the day :eek!: Must have struck the hotel during the night, and duly landed on the terrace (an attractive bird, and one I don't ever expect to get quite as near to again).

A slight haze during the morning seemed to keep things under wrap, until I neared the Northern tip of the headland (was standing on one bare foot, leaning against a dry-stone wall, whilst taking out the ''spiteful'' ears of barley from my sock, then just as the sun broke through, so did the ''manic'' soft crick of the Hoodies, looking up, still balanced precariously on one bare foot, a stunning ''lifer'' Juv.Pallid Harrier being mobbed by Hoodies!

Operating the camera under these conditions was certainly testing, especially swivelling round (on said bare foot), as the birds soared above my head...I think perhaps as a ''spectacle'' my gyrations came a good second to the quarry.

On the heels of the Pallid Harrier with accompanying Corvid still in hot pursuit, another soft crick! with an oncoming Black Kite running the gauntlet of yet once again Hooded Crow! It was enough to make you want, to have your socks on! :-O

It was time to leave, the Cab to the airport was beckoning, another Hoopoe and a Cuckoo were as I thought...my ''last hurrahs'', but then just as I passed the last ''big tree sp'' before leaving the headland, an unknown ''warble'' high up in the tree, prompted me to ''extend the zoom'' at the ready, eventually not brilliant views, but another Cyprus lifer in the shape of an Olivaceous Warbler! The ''Gods'' had been kind.

In total circa 68 species seen for the week on just the headland, plus 17 species seen last year and not this, gives circa 85 (to include Baltic Gull and the 3 ssp of yellow Wagtail) not a bad haul for just 14 days.

I hope to return next year Cheers

KenM · Apr 24, 2015

ApusApus said:
Maybe it would have been easier to follow if you had started off with one post and then just added to it!

Shane

I believe that the maximum number of files allowed is 5 per post?

Cheers

markspirito · Apr 24, 2015

Some nice pictures ken, and some nice birds, ...I am guessing White Throated Robin is a rarity on Cyprus ? It looks a little stunner

Mark

delia todd · Apr 24, 2015

KenM said:
I believe that the maximum number of files allowed is 5 per post?

Cheers

Hi Ken

I think you may be getting confused between "posts"" and threads".

Certainly the limit is 5 images per "post" but there is no limit to the number of posts you can have in a thread; and therefore no limit to the number of images you can upload.

So if you have more than 5 pictures to upload just start a new post in the same thread. Personally I think it's less confusing to have the whole trip report in the same thread, but it's up to you really.

PS if you like I can try and merge your threads for you.... but it's your choice.

KenM · Apr 24, 2015

delia todd said:
Hi Ken

I think you may be getting confused between "posts"" and threads".

Certainly the limit is 5 images per "post" but there is no limit to the number of posts you can have in a thread; and therefore no limit to the number of images you can upload.

So if you have more than 5 pictures to upload just start a new post in the same thread. Personally I think it's less confusing to have the whole trip report in the same thread, but it's up to you really.

PS if you like I can try and merge your threads for you.... but it's your choice.

Of course you're quite right! a vertically challenging ''undersight'' on my part, having to dash out now for a few hours, thus if you can amalgamate the threads Delia, I would be much obliged. Cheers

joannec · Apr 24, 2015

Good idea to amalgamate them but maybe leave out the posts referring to other threads.

KenM · Apr 24, 2015

markspirito said:
Some nice pictures ken, and some nice birds, ...I am guessing White Throated Robin is a rarity on Cyprus ? It looks a little stunner

Mark

Thanks Mark, when found I was unsure as to it's exact status (although I suspected that it wasn't of regular occurrence). It's a long story, but circumstances and events prevented me from getting the news out through the appropriate channels, suffice to say all has been satisfactorily explained to the local recorder.

Cheers

delia todd · Apr 24, 2015

Why did I offer

Think I've got them all safely merged into the same thread now.

If someone would tell me which posts (if any) should be deleted I'll try and tidy it up later.

Paphos revisited....April 11th-18th 2015 (1 Viewer)

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