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Conference Birding - An autumn morning in Dubai - 4 October 2016 (1 Viewer)

MKinHK

Mike Kilburn
Hong Kong
Another red-eye flight from Hong Kong for a two-day conference allowed me an exciting few hours of birding – this time in Dubai - at the height of the autumn migration. A review of the excellent UAE birding website threw up Al Mamzar Park as a site that I could access via a 15 minute taxi ride from my hotel on the northern edge of Dubai Creek.

The park does not open until 0800 (and closes to men on Wednesdays) so I had time to revive myself at the hotel’s splendid breakfast buffet before making a start. There were four Cattle Egrets on the roadside verges on the approach to the park and having paid the 5 Dirhams entry fee I started heading up the eastern side and immediately picked up a Hoopoe, a couple of Indian Silverbills, the first of many Purple Sunbirds and a cracking Spotted Flycatcher – my first since a previous work trip to Abu Dhabi for a similar conference in 2014 – hawking from a perch above a dripping hose.

This area turned out to be very good producing a long-billed, tail dipping Eastern Olivaceous Warbler, a hulking yellow-eyed female Barred Warbler and the first of several Lesser Whitethroats. I was also pleased to nail down my first Ménétrie’s Warbler, a rather brown and bulky sylvia with a white throat. The bill was distinctive – a mostly pale lower mandible with a pale patch bleeding up onto the centre of the upper mandible, and a dark culmen and tip giving a hooked, somewhat “gonzo-like” profile. There was also a juvenile shrike sp. that I started out thinking was Red-backed, but the jury is very much still out, and any thoughts would be most welcome.

Common birds here included House Sparrows and House Crows, Common Myna, Asian Pied Starling, Collared and Palm Doves, White-eared and Red-vented Bulbuls and a few Ring-necked Parakeets. Out on the sea, well over a thousand Socotra Cormorants were foraging in a big rolling pack.

Just in front of the restaurant is a sunken amphitheatre with broad grassy steps and a long almost shockingly green lawn running northwards down the centre of the park. This held the first Whimbrel of the day, more Hoopoes and a magnificent pair of Indian Rollers flashing brilliant blue wings as they hunted from the arms of the streetlights.

More to come . . .

Cheers
Mike
 

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Ducking back into the sandy-floored eastern side of the park I was delighted to stumble upon a couple of European Nightjars. After they flushed they cooperated superbly, perching along a couple of low-ish branches and pretending they were invisible while I snapped happily away. As I headed towards the northern tip I found a trio of Red-wattled Lapwings in the shade and then the real surprise – a squirrel sp. that shinned up a tree and peered at me from safety. I can find no reference to any squirrels in the Emirates, so I’d welcome any insight.

Coming back down the west side I was delighted to find a juvenile Masked Shrike in a large tree on a stretch of lawn which also held a couple of Hoopoes and a Whimbrel. Not a hundred yards away a flight of four Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters that were hunting from the top of a casuarina tree.

The next bird was the real head-scratcher of the day – a sylvia foraging at mid-height that looked distinctly smaller and more nimble than the three or four larger and more lumbering Ménétrie’s Warblers I had been seeing previously (the jizz would be like comparing Greenish Warbler to the heavier Arctic Warbler – there are no sylvias in Hong Kong for a closer comparison). Having caught my attention, it absolutely riveted it when I looked up to see a peach-washed throat separated it from a hood of an almost equal shade of grey-blue a rather poorly-defined white moustachial stripe, a yellow eyering with a red iris and a distinctly smaller and darker bill. I immediately wondered whether this could be a Subalpine Warbler without realizing that it has never been recorded previously in the Emirates. I had bits and pieces of the bird on and off over the next ten minutes but, regrettably, made no effort to get a photo before it disappeared. After a very useful email discussion with Mark Smiles of the UAE Records committee I still believe it was Subalpine and will submit the record accordingly.

On the way out I picked up a few more birds including a couple more Indian Rollers, a Turkestan Shrike, a Wryneck, a Wood Warbler with a softly yellow face and super but limited yellow on the breast, and a second look at a juvenile shrike I suspected of being Red-backed, but am far from certain. Other bits and pieces included a Willow Warbler, a small group of Graceful Prinias, a female Blackcap, two Yellow Wagtails and the last of the dozen Spotted Flycatchers that had thoroughly enlivened the day.

I did also see a few birds from my hotel at the Festival City Intercontinental. Every morning six or eight Caspian Terns were patrolling the creek and even came in close to search the inlet between the helicopter pads. A couple of Green Bee-eaters appeared to be nesting in one of the rather lonely-looking trees on the esplanade. Other bits and pieces seen far down the creek included a couple of large white-headed gulls, a Curlew and a couple more Red-wattled Lapwings, but really this visit was all about a cracking morning in the park.

Cheers
Mike
 

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Hi Mike,
Your squizzel would be the introduced Indian Palm Squirrel (Funambulus palmarum)
Al Mamzar is a great park - we were there beginning of the month

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Another Successful conference birding isn't it? The Spotted Flycatcher is a cracker shot, Mike. I'm wondering how many species you have squeezed in these conference trips. Envy!
 
Many thanks David and Sarah and Dev.

At some stage I will compile a list of my trip birds from this job (and perhaps from all work-related trips). For the last four years I estimate 300-400 taking into account 120+ in Brisbane, and almost 100 in Mexico, plus fewer additions in Seattle, Delhi, Taipei, KL, Abu Dhabi, Jordan, London/Paris and Phuket.

The Spotted Flycatcher was exceptionally well-behaved and the RX10iii did the rest.

Cheers
Mike
 
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