Fuerteventura Endemics

Here's a few notes on some of the endemic forms (subspecies and species) that I encountered on Fuerteventura. Would welcome any comments on taxonomic updates etc.  

 'Canary Island Houbara Bustard' C.u. fuertaventurae. Present on the eastern Canary Islands and differs from nominate (which occurs across North Africa) in more heavily vermiculated upperparts

 Canary Island Stonechat - Endemic species confined to Fuerteventura 

  'Canary Island Egyptian Vulture' N.p.majorensis According to Clarke 2006 this subspecies differs from nominate in the rufous on the head, tail, coverts and breast which appears to be shown well in this individual

 'Canary Island Common Buzzard' B.b. insularum. To my eye a very distinctive Buzzard with light brown colouration and less contrast than nominate. Forsman (2016) doesn't make much fuss of either Egyptian Vulture or Common Buzzard on the Canary Islands. 

 'Canary Islands Great Grey Shrike', L.e. koenigi. According to Shirihai and Svensson (2018) this insular race is rather small and dark with a contrasting white throat. This form differs from Iberian Grey Shrike in less distinct (often lacking) supercilium and grey (not pink) underparts. Similar to Desert Grey Shrike (L.e. algeriensis/elegans) but smaller with shorter wings and tail. 

'North African Raven' C.c.tingitanus. According to Shirihai and Svensson (2018) this is the smallest race of Raven within the WP, with the tail shorter than the primaries, with a deep well arched culmen. The strong nasal bristles help to separate from Brown-necked Raven in North Africa. 

Other Canary Island endemic forms that I saw but didn't photograph include Canary Island Kestrel F.t. canariensis , Eastern Canaries African Blue Tit C.u. degener and Canary Island Linnet C.c. herterti and other Macaronesian endemic forms seen include Plain Swift, Berthelot's Pipit, and Atlantic Yellow-legged Gull. I didn't see Canary Island Robin, Goldcrest, Chaffinch or Chiffchaff on Fuerteventura so presumably they don't occur there? 

RERFENCES:
Tony Clarke, Birds of the Atlantic Islands, 2006, HELM
Hadoram Shirihai & Lars Svensson, Handbook of Western Palearctic Birds, Vol 2, 2018, HELM
Dick Forsman, Flight Identification of Raptors of Europe, North Africa and Middle East, 2016. BLOOMSBURY

Foreign Projects and Travel Review 2019

Here's a personal review in pictures of this year's travel with friends and family both to Little Oak Group birding and nature conservation projects HERE and some jollies to do a bit of World and WP ticking.

LITTLE OAK GROUP

 JANUARY- FUERTEVENTURA 

A family holiday (4 WP and World ticks)

 Juvenile/first-winter Allen's Gallinule 

 Adult Dwarf Bittern 

 Canary Island Stonechat 

 'Canary Island ' Houbara Bustard (More on Fuerteventura endemics HERE)

FEBRUARY- GHANA

A visit to the Manso Nkwanto region to set up an ebird hotspot and look into establishing a recording project for birds, moths and butterflies and to investigate the possibility of purchasing a small forest reserve. 

 Black Dwarf Hornbill 

 Black Bee-eater

 African Piculet

 Marsh Tchagra

Honey Buzzard 

APRIL/MAY -MAJORCA

Family holiday (3 WP/World ticks) 

 Balearic Warbler

 Mediterranean Flycatcher 

 Moltoni's Warbler

JULY- UGANDA 

World listing trip: We had 476 species of which about 200 were world lifers TRIP REPORT HERE

 Eastern Gorilla 

 Shoebill 

 African Grey Parrot 

 Grauer's Broadbill 

 Green-breasted Pitta

 Chimpanzee

Our Birding Group

THE AZORES NATURAL HISTORY TRIP (JUNE) AND THE BIRDER'S PELAGIC (SEPTEMBER) 2019

I was away for both of these this year so both trips were led by Vincent Legrand. More on this HERE

 Band-rumped Storm Petrel (Presumed Grant's). Both Monteiro's and 'Grant's' Storm-Petrel can be found on the birder's pelagic.

 Wilson's Petrel 

 Common Dolphins

Sowerby's Beaked Whales 

 Spotted Dolphins 

Azores Pelagic Birders 2019 

AUGUST/SEPTEMBER- EURO ROAD TRIP TO THE BALKAN ECOLOGY PROJECT

As alternative modes of transport (to flying) was a theme of 2019 we drove in our camper van to Bulgaria. We put on offer in for a small 2000m2 piece of land where we plan to build a bird/moth recording observatory and develop some habitat , did some recording and visited the main Balkan Ecology Project (of which the Black Sea project is a satellite)  in Shipka HERE. 

 Male Pied Wheatear

 First-winter Citrine Wagtail

 First-winter Black-headed Bunting 

 Found this Terek Sandpiper - a Bulgarian rarity 

 Marsh Warbler

 Montagu's Harrier 

 Jersey Black Arches 

 Pale Shoulder 

OCTOBER- CORVO 2019

Did a week on Corvo (a birding community founded by Little Oak Group) 

 CORVO BLOG HERE. 

 Hermit Thrush-a WP lifer 

Northern Parula 

We published the 2016 Azores Rare and Scarce Bird Report just in time for the Corvo season 

LITTLE OAK GROUP

Madeira Days Six and Seven

Jacob was still recovering from his sickness on Saturday so while Holly played nurse again I took the opportunity to try and get some photos of Trocaz Pigeon. I headed over to Palheiro Gardens on the recommendation from a post on Jono Lethbridge's blog and sure enough this has to be the easiest place on Madeira to see these birds well. It's also a site where you can clean up on the other landbird endemics too which are also common in the gardens. Furthermore the gardens are stunning, a fresh departure from a lot of formal gardens and more towards a sprawling and fluid layout and a bit of a biodiversity hotspot too with many butterflies, wilder areas and good bird populations. Ebird list here.

On Saturday afternoon Jacob was back to himself so we spent the afternoon on the beach.

Sunday was our last day so we headed over to the Whaling Museum in Canical which also gave me a quick opportunity to check out the harbour gulls - a nice little group of 'Atlantic Gulls' and the first Black-head of the trip.

FINAL TRIP REPORT HERE. Only 23 bird species but three WP lifers. Also a nice selection of local moths, will do a separate post on that. 

We stayed at the wonderful rural Calhau Grande HERE and all our logistics were arranged by the amazing Archipelago Choice HERE. Thanks to Catarina and family for such a warm welcome and once again thanks to Ian Coates for another great trip (Ian organises our Azores Pelagics etc). 

We've done a few of these 'stealth birding' family holidays on islands now (Majorca, Fuerteventura, Gran Canaria and now Madeira), where the main focus is on family stuff but embedding some WP lifer targets into nature themed family events and quick sneak outs amongst the foam parties and sand castles. Still got Cyprus, Corsica and Iceland to do and can also do a few short breaks to places to fill in some gaps in my WP list like Estonia (for Stellar's Eider and Pine Grosbeak), back to Turkey (to get the Brown Fish Owl), back to Spain (still need Dupont's and White-rumped Swift for WP) and Northern Morrocco (Atlas Fly, Magrheb Owl). Beyond the WP there's also islands like Seychelles and Bermuda where there are a few manageable targets. So basically loads of young family holiday ideas before the boys are old enough to do some proper trips.  

Trocaz Pigeon (above) 

Canary Red Admiral - a lep lifer and a stunner too 

Speckled Wood- despite plenty of checking I failed to find Madeiran Speckled Wood or the Grayling. Also had Small White and Clouded Yellows but no Madeiran Brimstone. Would certainly have been good to have more focused time out here. 

The stunning Palheiro Gardens- if on a family trip and need to mop up the local landbird endemics quickly- just do a couple of hours here. In all of the Macronesian islands nothing compares to Madeira in terms of the proliferation of gardens and gardening - absolutely stunning and very inspiring. Can't wait to get our garden back.  Will do a separate post on some of the plants we encountered. 

View from Palheiro Gardens over Funchal 

The Canical Whaling Museum - another great little family nature themed attraction- really modern and great graphics and tech