Gran Alicant to El Hondo

We had not been able to get out for a while and with the temperatures getting lower by Friday 16th Bryan and escaped for a day. We followed, more or less, our usual route from Gran Alicant to El Hondo/Fondo Natural Park. It is an interesting route with many stops on the way. The first being a salinas just down the hill from the Santa Pola turn-off. This did not live up to it's potential and we quickly moved on. Next up was pull-in by the Salt Tower with not one bird in the water close to us. We saw a frenzy of activity nearer to the next pull-off and then it became very good.



Bryan's photo of the feeding frenzy of Slender-bills with some Black-headed Gulls is far more descriptive than I need to write about. The cloud of birds moved with the food source and gradually came nearer. Little Egrets and Grey Herons were paying attention too with two Great Whites close by.

In the far distance there was the usual good number of Flamingos and there was a group of 47 Spoonbills. Little Terns were flying and diving for food and a Sandwich Tern was identified by Bryan. A Marsh Harrier flew in the distance.

El Pinet was next and again we were very lucky for a Water Rail slowly walked along in front of us and then turned right along the margin. It was the best viewing I have had of this difficult to see bird.



Here there were also Little, one Sandwich, and Common Terns (about 4) with an adult feeding young. On a small island was one lone Collared Pratincole. Then we counted seventeen Stone Curlews sitting and standing among the stones of an island. Although the surrounding area can provide the habitat for them I had not seen that many, that close by and so easily seen before here. A Greenshank called and flew, a Kentish Plover came into view and one lone Godwit.

We took one of the caminos toward El Hondo looking for Rollers and probably our last sightings of Bee-eaters. We did not see the former, but the latter were very evident in some areas. We parked in the shade of an Eucalyptus tree and could hear them clearly calling above our heads. In many places it was 'as dry as a bone' and so we were on the lookout for fields being flooded by the farmers. These did not yield anything out of the usual, but we did see one field where the grass (Lucerne) had been recently cut that was full of Yellow Wagtails - maybe two to three hundred birds feeding. Moving on Bryan spotted a raptor that was high and not that close. It came our way and we had excellent views of a Short-toed Eagle - probably our last sighting until 2017.

We checked out San Felipe Neri to see what the water levels were like and whether the far lagoon was still dry or not. It still is. The water around the centre is still opaque and with hardly any margins. At the far end of the boardwalk six Squacco Herons flew out and that was about it. We do need rain and water needs to flow in.




All photographs copyright Bryan Thomas 2016