Craig Shaws Digiscoping Birding Blog: Spain Part 1

EXTRAMADURA
Right here goes, Keith and I had planned this trip for some time now, (Cough!) well OK Keith had planned this trip for some time now, great job he did too ;-). I just tagged along really ;-).

Day1
Ok here goes, we caught the plane from Liverpool to Madrid using Easy jet, nice flight, on time and really smooth. Landing early afternoon and picking up our hire car from Avis. We left the airport heading for our wonderful Hotel Casa Babel 260km away and our host Jose. On the way were nice birds such as the Spotless Starling, Corn Buntings, Serin White Stork and a few Larks. Black Kites seemed everywhere but Red Kite were less common. Golden Eagle was a nice surprise, It was nice to pick up a few common birds on the drive down. We ended up at the Arrocampo nature reserve at dusk This was a fantastic start to our trip as we had our only Bluethroat, Spanish Sparrow, Savis Warbler, Purple Swamphen and we were amazed to pick up our first Purple Heron. Then we saw another and another and another counting about 25 in the end, they were here on nests breeding, amazing were normally lucky to see just 1. We had made it for the evening roost and this was just phenomenal with Herons and Egrets coming from miles around. Cattle egret being the most common but still good numbers of Little and Great Egret. Oooo listen Bee eaters bingo, little did we know we were gonna see literally hundreds of these. We got to Casa Babel quite late to meet our host, sorry, Jose. Click on pictures to Enlarge

Egrets Cattle and Great

Black Kite

Cattle Egret

Purple Heron

Purple Swamphen

Day 2
The Next day was our Mountain day, Pico almanzor, 2592 mtrs 8500ft.

Pico almanzor

We had promised Jose he could tag along today as he don't get out much poor lad ;-) and we had the challenge of finding him some lifers. This was a day of generally birding from the car as it was some drive, so come 7 am we were on our way picking up a few raptors such as Booted Eagle, Short toed Eagle, and more Black Kites.
At , amazing place, we saw Black Stork nesting, Peregrine nesting and a few other bits n bobs such as Griffon Vulture, about a 100 of them, a Hobby dropped down from the mountain above and flew off down the gorge of the rio tajo.

Penefalcon crag

Black Stork

Griffon Vulture

Black Redstart and Rock Bunting were nice aditions. Down at the bridge we checked the martins, All the common stuff including nice views of Red Rumped Swallow and BRILLIANTLY Alpine Swift 20 of em, calling.
Further down we stopped for Cirl Buntings, Nightingales, Woodchat Shrikes and our first and probably our only Rock Sparrow.

Alpine Swifts

Black Redstart

Cirl Bunting

Nightingale

Rock Sparrow

We headed on past Plasencia up the Valle de Jerte, birding as we went. Up onto the mountains we spotted Blue Rock Thrush a few more Raptors and my first lifer of the trip and a target species, Black-eared Wheatear, male and female wow ..Another stop produced a stunning looking Sub Alpine Warbler and another surprise, Bullfinch (possibly another lifer for Jose), who was getting very anxious as we were passing good Dipper spots, a lifer he wanted to see. So we did stop at a few areas over the river and bingo a flyby Dipper. It flew past a couple of times but never stopped for Jose to get a good look.

Female Black-eared Wheatear

Male Black-eared Wheatear

Sub alpine Warbler

On the way up to the platforma de gredos, stopping on the way, we spotted Firecrest, Short-toed Treecreeper and Goldcrest.
We continued right onto the top 'The Plataforma de Gredos' where we had a pair of stunning Water Pipits, Spanish Ibex and a great looking Northern Wheatear. Booted eagle was sat in the grass. We couldn't find our much wanted Rufous Rock Thrush Doh!.
At another stop we had Crested Tit but couldn't find Citril Finch. We did find Jose a another lifer, a Common Crossbill at the hotel parador de gredos. A detour on the way back by the embalse de Rosario we picked up Little ringed Plover and amazingly a Black Shouldered Kite landed on a telegraph post by the car all but briefly. We arrived back at our digs quiet late after a wonderful but tiring day and lifers for all of us...

Spanish ibex

Northern Wheatear

Day 3
It was just Keith and I today 0630 start, we headed for the centre of Trujillo for the brilliant Lesser Kestrel, as soon as we pulled up there were at least 3 birds circling. We moved up onto the castle and watched the Kestrels, Storks, Serin, Red Rumped Swallows, Pallid and Common Swifts from here.

Trujillo

Female Lesser Kestrel

Lesser Kestrel

Male Lesser Kestrel

White Stork

Red Rumped Swallow

We didn't want to leave but leave we had to for the brilliant Carceres Plains picking up loads more Bee-eaters. The nest of the Bonelli's eagle we found last year was occupied by 2 chicks and the adult close by on the pylon watching.

Bonelli's Eagle

On the plains a tractor went through a field putting up our first Great and Little Bustards bingo! Thekla and Crested Larks were everywhere and it was great to see so many Calandra lark too, some reasonably close. Eventually we were stunned to find 6 Roller another target, what stunning birds they are topping the Bee-eater now in the flash birds stakes. On the bumpy track we found another target the Pin-tailed Sandgrouse and eventually 3 Little Owl hidden in some rocks. Loads of common birds were seen and our second look at a Little Bustard.

Thekla Lark

Crested Lark

Calandra Lark

Roller

We were running out of faith finding our final target species the Black-bellied Sandgrouse and it wasn't until we were heading back to Casa Babel that we finally saw our quarry 15 Black bellied Sandgrouse as they landed in a field, distant but scope views were OK. On the same road were more Great Bustards. Time was ticking on now about 7pm and our last bird of the day was an amazing one and most unexpected, a flyby Eagle Owl Brilliant!!!!!

Great Bustard

Little Bustard

Pin-tailed Sandgrouse

Little Owl

Day 4

This was gonna be a day with not so much driving as we were heading back to the Penefalcon Monfrague NR area, Walking up to the Castillia de monfrague, here we spotted, Ravens, more Griffon Vultures, Egyptian Vultures, Black Redstarts, our first singing Golden Oriole, Blue rock thrush and a few other common bits n bobs.

Castillia de monfrague

Keith looking for chough

View from Castillia de monfrague

Blue Rock Thrush

At Penefalcon crag we spent a bit more time with the Black Storks, Vultures including the Black Vulture, Rock Buntings and Black Redstarts. The Peregrine put in another appearance. Onto the bridge again for more cracking views of the Alpine Swifts and various Raptors.

Alpine Swift

The Alpine Swift Bridge

Black Vulture

Corn Bunting

Rock Bunting

At the cliffs of the Embalsie De Torreyon Tietar great views of more Nesting Vultures and Black kites. Booted eagles were around as were Hawfinch.

Hawfinch

On to portilla de el teitar Where the Spanish Imperial Eagle was nesting and showing very very well just an amazing bird. A Short toed Eagle sat giving us the opportunity to photograph it.

Spanish Imperial Eagle

Short-toed Eagle

Our final stop was back at the nature reserve of arrocampo. Here out first Terns, Gull billed Terns, just brilliant. A couple of Little Bittern,Water Rail, Savis and Great Reed Warbler and to our surprise a flock of Red Avadavat. A Magpie ate a massive centipede, with great awkwardness. We followed a back road giving us plenty more Bee-eaters, a couple of Great Spotted cuckoo and a few Cettis Warblers. We headed back to hide number 2 where we again watched part of the roost before heading back for an early night, early start for our trip to Donana tomorrow another great trip to Extremadura...