Day 05
We said farewell to Mitzpe Ramon and birded south to Eilat. Mitzpe Ramon is situated on the northern edge of a very extinct volcanic crater. Almost immediately after leaving the town and heading south, the road does a number of slow switchbacks to descend to the plain. We stopped, just a few kilometres from the hotel and birded the Nekarot Wadi. This river course was dry, despite the recent rain, with plenty of shrubs and bushes growing in the wadi and on its banks.
We then returned to the hotel for a final breakfast and retraced our initial steps back south but stopping at the top of the crater rim to observe an out-of-town flock of Nubian Ibex, much fitter than the urban flock near the hotel.
Whilst there we had the first of the day's encounters with a Champions of the Flyway team. Yes, it was race day.
We descended back down onto the crater plain and birded here and there as we went. There were plenty of fighter jets flying overhead and tanks and military personnel moving along the roads. There was a bit of sabre-rattling going on politically and the Palestinians in Gaza had fired some rockets into Israel.
The spring migration was in full swing too. A lot of birds from Europe migrate into Africa via Gibraltar and Italy but do their return trip via Israel. They channel up to the northeast corner of Africa following the Rift Valley which actually continues most of the way up Israel ending at Mt Hermon which is the northern border of Israel with Lebanon and Iran. Jordan is on the east side of the Jordan River which sits in the Rift Valley and ends in the Dead Sea, 400 or so metres below sea level! The migrating birds choose to channel across the Sinai Desert and end up flying into Israel at Eilat and the Negev Desert.
The migratory birds we were keeping an eye out for included wagtails, warblers and raptors, storks, basically anything that moved! At one site, a CotF team stopped (I think they knew Meidad) and we pointed out a bird on the other side of the road to which we were looking. They went a tad ga-ga, ticked it and zoomed off. It turned out they were the winning team and they won by one bird: obviously the bird they saw with us!
The White Storks numbered into the thousands.
Flocks/swarms of wagtails and swallows were at ground level.
There were plenty of raptors chasing a meal on their way north.
Blackstart Cercomela melanura
Lesser Whitethroat Sylvia curruca
Cretzchmar's Bunting Emberiza caesia
We then returned to the hotel for a final breakfast and retraced our initial steps back south but stopping at the top of the crater rim to observe an out-of-town flock of Nubian Ibex, much fitter than the urban flock near the hotel.
Whilst there we had the first of the day's encounters with a Champions of the Flyway team. Yes, it was race day.
We descended back down onto the crater plain and birded here and there as we went. There were plenty of fighter jets flying overhead and tanks and military personnel moving along the roads. There was a bit of sabre-rattling going on politically and the Palestinians in Gaza had fired some rockets into Israel.
The spring migration was in full swing too. A lot of birds from Europe migrate into Africa via Gibraltar and Italy but do their return trip via Israel. They channel up to the northeast corner of Africa following the Rift Valley which actually continues most of the way up Israel ending at Mt Hermon which is the northern border of Israel with Lebanon and Iran. Jordan is on the east side of the Jordan River which sits in the Rift Valley and ends in the Dead Sea, 400 or so metres below sea level! The migrating birds choose to channel across the Sinai Desert and end up flying into Israel at Eilat and the Negev Desert.
The migratory birds we were keeping an eye out for included wagtails, warblers and raptors, storks, basically anything that moved! At one site, a CotF team stopped (I think they knew Meidad) and we pointed out a bird on the other side of the road to which we were looking. They went a tad ga-ga, ticked it and zoomed off. It turned out they were the winning team and they won by one bird: obviously the bird they saw with us!
The White Storks numbered into the thousands.
White Stork Ciconia ciconia
Flocks/swarms of wagtails and swallows were at ground level.
There were plenty of raptors chasing a meal on their way north.
Eurasian Sparrowhawk Accipiter nisus
Marsh Harrier Circus aeruginosus
Common Eurasian Kestrel Falco tinnunculus
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