Dear Colleagues/ Hola companeros,
I may plan a trip near Vilafafila this spring. Of course the aim is to see some great bustard (and other birds). What is the recomended period?
Any tips welcome about surrounding places.
Thanks in advance and best regards
Yves
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!
Hi Yves,
here's part of a trip I made there a few years ago, I can't imagine the area changing very much so the info should still be good.
Have a look on Google Earth and you'll see the road I'm referring to.
If you need any more info etc just get back to me.
regards
John
6th May. Left for Villafafila about 8.30am via the E5/A1 to Aranda de Duero, the 122 to Valladolid, the E80 to Tordesillas and the A6 as far as Villalpando, where I picked up the minor road to Villafafila.
Most of the best birding areas are along, or off, this road including a couple of hides and several good tracks and lagoons, this combined with a short trip down the road to Otero de Sariegos gave plenty to see including a colony of Lesser Kestrels breeding on the houses there.
A drive down the first track I came to produced 6 Great Bustards, one standing on the track itself, several Montagu’s Harriers, a Short-eared Owl hunting over the cereal fields – this was at mid-day so feel sure it must be breeding here, 2 Booted Eagles and a Black Kite overhead.
Back on the main road again more Great Bustards were soon seen, (50 + by the time I’d reached Villafafila), several more Montagu’s, 70+ White Storks, another Short-eared Owl, Red and Black Kites, Booted Eagles, Calandra and Crested Larks, Northern Wheatears, Corn Buntings, Yellow and White Wagtails, Spotless Starlings, House, Tree and Rock Sparrows (all three side by side on one of the hides), Fan-tailed Warbler, Turtle Doves, Hoopoe, Red-legged Partridge, Quail, Raven, Carrion Crow, Magpie, Jackdaw, Kestrel, several Lesser Kestrels, Swifts, Swallows and House Martins, Mallard, Gadwall, Shoveler, Coot, Dunlin, Knot, Sanderling, Ringed and Grey Plovers, Lapwings, Redshank, Greenshank, Black-winged Stilts, Avocets, 15+Whimbrel, Gull-billed Terns, Black-headed, Yellow-legged and one adult/sub-adult Audouin’s Gull – which I think must be unusual for the area.
A short drive back along the main road in the evening looking to get some photos of Great Bustards was great, they were everywhere you looked, singles displaying, small groups of young males fighting, females watching the older well-whiskered males in full display and others just feeding in the cereal fields, some coming quite close to the road, this was what I’d been looking for the past few years, somewhere where you’re at least in with a chance of getting a picture, so I rigged the tripod up in the car and just sat quietly waiting for one or two to come closer, and they did.
