I'm in Malta at the moment on a 'business' trip. This was supposed to be part of our five year investment plan to save up a million quid to buy a private nature reserve/small holding but since the sad passing of Holly's dad this xmas we will probably have to move out of our 'commune' (The Old Vic) because of affordability reasons so I actually don't know what the hell is going on (until after probate). Anyway the wheels are already in motion over here and we are building a new flat on top of a flat that we already own in partnership with a neighbour and local developer in order to double our equity and have a new rental income stream.
So my first work meeting is tomorrow so I had a free day today. Malta is an island of two halves- an eastern over-developed, mass tourism, cruise ship, over-crowded and congested real life matrix-like hell half and a western Mediterranean hidden natural gem half. I did a bit of orientation today and visited areas I've never been to before (I've been to Malta many times as my Mum is from here but this is the first time on my own to do as I please). I started off in the north of the island over looking Comino and Gozo, popped into Ghadira nature reserve quickly and then spent a bit of time at Malta's main national park , Majjistral, mainly an area of Mediterranean Garigue (pronounced gari-goo) habitat. I then explored the escarpments around the Victoria lines before heading back south to my base in Marsascala and spent the late afternoon at Delimara. No point in sharing the Ebird lists as there really aren't that many birds in Malta this time of year but today's highlights included a couple of Greater Flamingos at Ghadira, a Great Cormorant off the Delimara, a few Blue Rock Thrushes, Black Reds, Sardinian Warblers and Zitting Cisticolas.
There are no endemic birds on Malta but there are several endemic plants (including endemic Pyramidal and Spider Orchids) and there is also Maltese Wall Lizard and this is the only place in Europe to see Algerian Whipsnake. There are also good numbers of Mediterranean Chameleons and other decent herps like Western Whipsnake (Black morphs), Cat Snake and Leopard Snake and even a few Terrapin exotics and Painted Frogs. However I'm here at the wrong time of year to see any of that.
2 comments:
Made me quite nostalgic. I spent 18 months in Malta when I was younger (which was about 50 years ago). From what little I remember, I was told that the sparrows were Italian at the time but then that they had been reclassified as Spanish. I don't think I ever saw that many birds there but obviously lots of finches in cages. I may have seen a great snipe although I wasn't 100% sure. And a tern, that I couldn't ID because someone took a potshot at it before it came close. Ghadira was just a pond in those days, and you had to tread through some deep mud to get to the hide. But I do recall seeing little egrets and a pintail there.
Hi Ken, Yes the hunting and finch trapping is notorious although I haven't seen any of it going on so far this trip, presumably it's mainly during spring and autumn migration.
I've done a bit more reading up on the sparrows here, seems like the jury is still out with possibly either the whole population being a hybrid swarm between Spanish and Italian or there are still 'pure' Spanish and Italian Sparrows here amongst the swarm??? Will do a bit reading up on it all.
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