International Vulture Awareness Day

As you must have heard, today, 5 September 2009, is International Vulture Awareness Day.

Here are my experiences of vultures. My first encounter was with some friendly (or hungry?) Griffon Vultures in a French zoo. We walked through their enclosure and they flew over to perch on the handrail by the path. I wasn't scared but more impressed by their huge wingspans.

My next vultures were real, wild ones: Palm-nut Vultures in The Gambia. They get their name from their preference for Oil Palm nuts over meat. Odd birds.

I saw more wild, free vultures on a trip to Spain in 2005: Griffons again. We drove towards Tarifa, wending our way through hills, lakes and wind turbines. All the time, a stream of Griffons passed overhead on their barn-door wings. And at Punta de Paloma, we looked up and there were dozens of vultures circling around with even more swifts.

On another visit to Spain this year, we had the vulture experience again. While we sipped coffee and ate ice-creams at the mirador, Griffons appeared over the hills and Sparrowhawks, Booted Eagles, harriers and other birds of prey arrived from Africa, across the Strait of Gibraltar, in front of us.

In the mountains above the coast, we watched Griffons cruising at low level and landing at their cliffside nest. One bird brooded a chick, looking out across the Atlantic and over the hills while Bee-eaters made landfall and Spanish Festoon butterflies skittered past.

Unfortunately, things aren't very rosy for vultures in other places. Some vulture species in Asia are teetering on the brink of extinction, thanks to being poisoned by the veterinary drug Diclofenac which is used to treat cattle. BirdLife International and others are doing sterling work to breed them in captivity until Diclofenac is eliminated from the vultures' environment, and a Slender-billed Vulture chick has been reared in one of the giant Indian aviaries this year, but their future is far from secure...

photo taken with Canon EOS 30D, EF 300mm f/4L IS USM

Andalucia

I'm back from four nights in Tarifa, southern Spain. I didn't take as many photos as I wanted, but there are a few nice ones, I hope you'll agree.


Spanish Festoon

We were a bit early for butterflies, I think. There were plenty of (migrant?) Painted Ladies about, and a couple of unidentified whites, but apart from that, we saw a couple of Spanish Festoons, some Wall Browns and a single Large Copper (I think) at Baelo Claudia


This mirador (viewpoint) on the main road between Algeciras and Tarifa was a superb place to watch birds of prey and other big things arriving from across the Strait.

On the way from the airport, we stopped awhile and saw dozens of Booted Eagles coming inland, plus Montagu's Harriers, Sparrowhawks and White Storks. I can also recommend the coffee

A thunderstorm over the mountains near La Janda


Lots of wildflowers growing on the roadside


A Cattle Egret breeding colony (in Spanish probably called an egreteria or something) was fun to watch


We went whale-watching with Turmares in the Strait of Gibraltar

The two-hour trip cost €30 and was money well spent. We sailed out towards from Tarifa towards Morocco and cruised around, looking for cetaceans. We struck gold, and found a total of 15 Pilot Whales, including a calf, and about 10 Bottle-nosed Dolphins.

Seasoned whale-watchers Del and John said the views of the Pilots were the best they'd ever had, as they rode our bow wave (the whales, that is) and breached full-length out of the water in front of us! One of the dolphins in particular was a proper show-off, tail-slapping the surface and sending a jet of water our way.

We'd stationed ourselves right at the front and got a bit wet, but it was nothing short of awesome to watch the whales and dolphins about 10 feet below us. Sometimes the dolphins turned on their sides to have a look at us and the sea shone turquoise on their white stripes.

Flipper, eat your heart out.

It was also pretty special to see migrating birds. As well as the expected Cory's and Balearic Shearwaters, we watched two Montagu's Harriers and a Hen Harrier crossing the Strait. It looked hard work... the birds had to keep flapping or they started to drift seawards...

Unfortunately, no photos cos it was a bit bouncy and I was a) concentrating on enjoying the superb views, and b) hanging onto the side.

I got quite used to having a roof terrace...

We rented an apartment overlooking Plaza San Martin, in Tarifa's old town. A fantastic place to stay, clean, well-equipped, tastefully decorated (in contrast to the others' '70s nightmare fleapit) and handy for all local amenities - shops, seafront, restaurants, bars... I'd definitely stay there again.

Screaming Pallid Swifts and squawking Lesser Kestrels overhead were the icing on the cake.

Pallid Swift over said terrace. Took lots of shots, but they were flipping difficult


Griffon Vulture near Bolonia

We made a couple of visits to a mountainside somewhere above Bolonia, on the Atlantic coast. Another good place for watching migration - eagles, harriers and Bee-eaters. Nearby were cliffs with a couple of Griffon Vulture nests, singing Blue Rock Thrushes and the wonderful Spanish Festoon.

Artful graffiti in Tarifa


At Baelo Claudia, the remains of a Roman fish-sauce factory.

Well worth a visit, for the Black-eared Wheatears alone, and it was also quite interesting. And free. Baelo Claudia was famous throughout the ancient world for its garum - the fish sauce that Heston Blumenthal tried to make

More photos are on my Flickr account

photos taken with Canon EOS 30D + EF 300mm f/4L IS USM, or Canon Powershot A640