Irish Bird Images

Fuerteventura, July 2003

End of July trip in search of Courser, a special bird which eluded us in so many other countries. This Island must be the best site in the world to see this species. As luck would have it we saw them every day sometimes without trying, as they can just fly across the road.

Site guides use: A Birdwatchers Guide to the Canary Islands, Tony Clarke & David Collins also Gosney Guide to Canary Islands.

Car hire was straight forward, at the airport. Citroen Saxo for € 220 from Europacar, this included full cover which as it turned out we needed. A herd of goats destroyed the paint work and wing mirrors at the farm above the dam of Barranco de Rio ( Willis's Barranco ) the English way of pronunciation see Gosney Guides, very useful for this type of information, we brought the car back to Europacar and they mended what was needed to keep the car on the road straight away. No default cost was charged. We shall use them again.

Food and wine is similar to the rest of Western Europe and certainly a lot cheaper than Ireland.

Collins Bird Guide is all one needs to take to Feurtevenura.

Some sites we visited: Barranco de Rio Cabras is known for the Chat and we easily saw 3 birds here, but one should fall into these species on any given day depending on where one is birding. Other birds of note were breeding Black-winged Stilt, Little-ringed Plover, Common Sandpiper, lots of Stone Curlew, breeding Plain Swift in the large metal shed used to house the goats. Berthelots Pipit, Lesser Short -toed Lark and Trumpeter Finch were part of the landscape.

La Oliva: We visited the Bustard site twice but only saw 2 birds on the second occasion, they really do creep in to the fig farm or fly from a great distance. One has to stay as late as possible. Beware the Farm Turkeys breeding and feeding in the same Fig roosting fields as the Houbara. Other birds of note Barbary Partridge, Stone Curlew, Turtle Dove.

Trinquivigate: Here we saw our first Cream-coloured Courser a family party, fantastic birds which could and did vanish into the desert as soon as we stopped the car. Feurteventura Chat was also present here. North of here and viewed from the road was a small reed fringed pond with mud exposed on one side, here we saw 10 Corn buntings and Little Crake. We returned early next morning to see if we could see the Crake again but no joy.

Costa Calma: In the South at the windmills, early morning we saw hundreds of Lesser Short - Toed Larks, up to 40 Cream-coloured Courser, and plenty of Black-bellied Sandgrouse. Also present Buzzard hunting in pairs outside rabbit burrows. Beware of the wild dogs also hunting rabbits and other prey, an unfortunate down side to the Island, as these dogs cause havoc among the breeding birds.

Catalina Garcia Lagoon: Here we found the Island first Ring-necked Duck, a beautiful eclipse male, and possibly the best digi-image we have taken at time of writing. This Lagoon was put on the map that day as other birders visited it later to see the duck which was still present in October 2003. Also found in October Lesser Yellowlegs, Pectoral Sandpiper, in November 2003 their were 2 adult male Ring-necked Ducks present. Other species present Chiffchaff, Grey Heron, Buzzard, Egyptian Vulture, Little-ringed Plover, Kentish Plover, Curlew Sandpiper 2 adult summer, Sardinian warbler, and Great-grey Shrike.

We took a return ferry to Lanzarote one evening hoping to see seabirds but all we saw were lots of Corys Shearwater.

All in all we enjoyed the trip without any hiccup's except for the goat incident which was quickly solved. With the exception of Houbara Bustard, all target species were easily obtainable. The sun light is fantastic for taking images and most birds are rather obliging. I would suggest a winter trip with the guarantee of sunshine and the possibly of finding a American vagrant blown off course in the autumn.


Fuerteventura Chat Barrance Fuerte, Fuerteventura, July 2003. Our first day on Fuerteventura was calm an sunny and we ventured out towards the Barranco. This male Fuerteventura Stonechat was seen by the roadside. Endemic to this Island only

Fuerteventura Chat Male.

Fuerteventura Chat Female.

Fuerteventura Chat Female.

Berthelot's Pipit Fuerteventura, July 2003. Common and endemic

Blue Tit Fuerteventura, July 2003. 2 birds at the village of Betancuria, note the Great Tit like mark running down the belly. Endemic
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