I hope more birders start going to south Morocco - Golden Sparrows must be just a tip of iceberg of Sahelian bird species visiting fringes of Western Palearctic!
I think Richard Bonser and co. had Sudan Golden Sparrow in Mauritania 10 or so years back - the country then became mostly off-limits to western birders due to Al-qaeda issues (think the German/Scandinavian camper vans still continued through to the coastal strip though!). Mali would have been interesting to visit, but that became basically off-limits too I believe.
S. Morocco (W. Sahara as was), then became good for Cricket Longtail, Dunn's Lark, Black-crowned Sparrow Lark of course as regularly occurring species, with Pied Crow, African Collared Dove, breeding (probably) Ruppell's Vulture and Bee-eater (forgot the sp.), that dead gallinule sp. in Dakhla Bay amongst the 'commoner' Moroccan desert/southern fare (I'm sure Mohamed or others will know the complete list/fill in the gaps
) - oh and the Royal and Lesser Crested Terns of course.
Don't know, but there must have been half a dozen or more western crews hitting the area per year average over the last 8 years or so?, plus some Moroccan birders/scientists? Although perhaps most birders, due to limited time have retraced much the same route; a lot of the country remains difficult without good resources (eg 4*4, spare fuel can or more). Of course there's an awful lot of driving if approaching from the traditional Moroccan sites to the north, but flights to Dakhla would substantially ease that (car hire available there of course) - except you'd then miss out on sites en route.
Blue-naped Mousebird was one species touted as becoming possible, wonder what other species could be expected as possible/likely additions to the region (there was a lark or two also) ?
