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Sicily Trip Report - May 2018 (2 Viewers)

Alexjh1

Well-known member
I just got back a few days ago from a trip to Sicily, and as most of the trip reports I found online were for April (or Autumn) I thought adding my own to the collection online might be useful for people in future.

This wasn't a birding trip as such, and was literally decided upon only one week before we went, so I didn't have time to do my usual research and planning in full, as such for the most part sightings were largely more incidental than I would have ordinarily liked.

As with previous trip reports I've done, species seen are bold and personal bird lifers for me are red.

Sunday 6th May - Catania
After a 6am flight, we arrived in Catania airport, after which we spent a bit of time sorting out the hire car. The airport did allow for sightings of a few common species that would be fairly ever present throughout the rest of the trip, most notably Italian Sparrow. Eventually we proceeded into Catania where we would be spending our first night, and after checking in, had a wander round the city on food. Not much on the birding front, except the sparrows, swifts, house martin, collared dove, feral pigeon, goldfinch, starlings and wood pigeon. All of these would be found commonly in more or less every place we visited.

Catania was fine for a day trip, or if you are into the specific bits of history it represents, but overall we felt like we had done enough so we decided the afternoon was enough for us, and we would continue onto our next destination first thing in the morning.

Monday 7th May - Siracusa
Our original plan had been to head down and drop in at the ancient cliff side ruins of Pantalica en route, but an unexplained satnav connection malfunction made us decide it wasn't worth the risk of getting lost and so we decided to head straight to Siracusa.

This worked out fine, as Siracusa was much more to our tastes than Catania - the island of Ortigia in particular has a lovely mix of ancient structures, restaurants and sea views which made it really enjoyable to visit. With all the previous common species still in evidence, a few new species got added to the list, most notably a pair of Little Tern out to sea, numerous Yellow Legged Gull, albeit keeping their distance and most unexpectedly, a flock of 37 Greater Flamingo flew over the city. In some of the plazas, I was also able to pick out Pallid Swift by eye for the first time ever due to how close they came.

The water around the city is exceptionally clear, and fish of several fish species could be seen from various points around the island. In all probability, this is the place in my life where I've seen most wild species of fish at once, and just looking into the water around a city.

Tuesday 8th - Siracusa and Capo Morro di Porco
A short pre-breakfast walk found us a small rocky beach near where we were staying. Not much in the way of bird life beyond swallows and distant yellow legged gull. However, a colony of Italian Wall Lizards provided some entertainment and more fascinatingly, a rocky inlet proved to be the home of a foot long moray eel (species yet to be determined) trying in vain to each two crabs who were fixated on wrestling on another.

After returning for breakfast, we checked out and headed over to the "Parco Archeologico Neapolis" - an area containing a number of Greek and Roman ruins. This wasn't really the best time to visit, hordes of school children combined with the Greek theater being set up to host some modern theater made it more difficult to enjoy the place. A distant Spotted Flycatcher , some very confiding Jay and a brief view of what was probably a Lesser Kestrel overhead were the only points of note on the bird front, plus a pair of Moorish Gecko adding some reptile representation.

We headed back down to Ortigia to get some lunch, and then set off on the fairly short drive to our accomodation for the night: "Melus Maris" a B&B situated right on Capo Murro di Porco.

After checking in we decided to go on the very short walk to the lighthouse and picked up a number of species - Sardinian Warbler was probably the most abundant species here apart from the common ones, but were also joined by decent numbers of Hooded Crow, Magpie, Zitting Cisticola and Crested Lark. A few odd migrants were also present, with a single Whinchat and a fleeting view of some mystery pipit. However, for me the big value here was the seabirds, with moving round the headland three new lifers for me: Audouin's Gull, Yelkouan Shearwater and Scopoli's Shearwater. To mirror the oddness of the day before, a new flock of flamingos flew in off the sea - perhaps the very same ones from the day before doing a commute?

Wednesday 9th May - Capo Morro di Porco and Fiume Ciane, then Aci Castello

A 6am walk around the headland threw up some more species: two Icterine Warber, a Red Rumped Swallow, another Whinchat, a heard-only flock of Bee-eater, a Red backed Shrike and a whole heap of Spotted Flycatcher, plus a rather oddly located flock of jays. I found the hotspot to be the stretch between the rocky section on the way in and the stand of trees around the end of the driveable road section - I didn't have much outside that section.

After a really lovely breakfast, we started out journey back up towards the Catania area, stopping off at a place called Fiume Ciane. This was largely making it up as we went along, but proved worthwhile; a new lifer in the form of Golden Oriole plus some good Mediterranean birds including Hoopoe, Bee-eater and Turtle Dove. This was the only location I saw accipiter species when not in a car, with some Marsh Harrier and Common Buzzard. Some very fleeting views were also had of Western Whip Snake.

When we continued on, we headed north for Aci Castello where we would spend out last two nights. Nothing much of note around the town bird wise beyond a few Crag Martin around the castle.

Thursday 10th May - Mount Etna
We set off fairly early for Mount Etna, deciding to go for the North side on account of a few reviews saying it would be quieter, more picturesque and without the cost of cable cars and such.

We stopped off at the small town of Milo where while looking out from the viewpoint, a pair of the Sicilian subspecies of Long-tailed Tit unexpectedly bounced their way into a nearby tree briefly.

From there, we wound our way up the hill to the resort of Piano Provenzana - the clouds were coming up and down the mountain regularly, so the views were constantly changing, but offered some great views of the volcano from amongst a picturesque pine forest. On the bird side of things, the highlight for me was finally defeating a global bogey bird of mine - a flock of Common Crossbill appeared shortly on our walk, apparently of the North African subspecies. A single individual later called from a tree top. Otherwise there were various common European woodland species of tit and finch, some hooded crows and a calling cuckoo somewhere in the pines that I couldn't spot, despite my attempts. At this point the clouds descended so we decided it prudent to head back down the mountain, I did watch the lava flows just in case of Rock Partridge but no luck.

We attempted to go to Taormina, but once we got there it was just too busy, so headed back to our hotel.

Friday 11th of May
Just a return to the airport - I did keep an eye out for anything lingering of note on the way, but no such luck.

Total Species List

BIRDS

1 - Yelkouan Shearwater
2- Scopoli's Shearwater
3 - Little Egret
4 - White Stork
5 - Greater Flamingo
6 - Common Buzzard
7 - Black Kite
8 - Marsh Harrier
9 - Kestrel
10 - Lesser Kestrel
11 - Moorhen
12 - Yellow Legged Gull
13 - Audouin's Gull
14 - Little Tern
15 - Feral Pigeon
16 - Wood Pigeon
17 - Collared Dove
18 - Turtle Dove
19 - Common Cuckoo
20 - Common Swift
21 - Pallid Swift
22 - Eurasian Bee-eater
23 - Hoopoe
24 - Great Spotted Woodpecker
25 - Crested Lark
26 - House Martin
27 - Crag Martin
28 - Barn Swallow
29 - Red-rumped Swallow
30 - White Wagtail
31 - Red backed Shrike
32 - Common Starling
33 - Spotless Starling
34 - Golden Oriole
35 - Jay
36 - Magpie
37 - Jackdaw
38 - Hooded Crow
39 - Sedge Warbler
40 - Zitting Cisticola
41 - Icterine Warbler
42 - Blackcap
43 - Whitethroat
44 - Sardinian Warbler
45 - Spotted Flycatcher
46 - Whinchat
47 - Blackbird
48 - Bluetit
49 - Great Tit
50 - Long-tailed Tit
51 - Italian Sparrow
52 - Chaffinch
53 - Serin
54- Greenfinch
55- Goldfinch
56 - Linnet
57 - Common Crossbill

MAMMALS
1 - Hedgehog (roadkill)
2 - Bat sp.

REPTILES
1- Italian Wall Lizard
2 - Moorish Gecko
3 - Western Whip Snake

Overall for a last minute holiday without any concrete birding plans in place, I'm not unhappy with that last. With a bit more time and research, you could probably increase that list to something pretty solid in the end.
 
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