2 weeks in Dolomites/Lake Garda early September - loads of great mountain walks and some good birdy spells, only small travel bins. I am not expert enough to recognise short-toed from ordinary treecreepers but got several lifetime ticks on the trip
ie Black Redstart (quite common around houses and gardens) Crested Tit Nutcracker - fine bird! Saw quite a few on the Arolla Pines. Alpine Accentor
Also
Jay Raven Alpine Chough +++++ especially in the Puez/Odle mountains Golden Eagle Buzzard Red Kite Peregrine Willow Tit Treecreeper Goldcrest Siskin
What I was going to say before it messed up was its a great 'compromise' holiday and the food was incredible.all I would say is the coach trips really felt like coach trips as you spent the majority of the time on the bloody things.if I went again I would hire a car.nearly forgot I got 5 minutes birding in when I went to Venice as the boat trip passed by a saltmarsh. Little egret Redshank Curlew Sandwich tern Marsh harrier And finally a green pigeon in st marks square! Intrigued by this I googled it and found that an artist thought it would be a good idea to paint them to make them more palatable to the tourists! Cheers Chris.
Just spent a week on lake garda with Mrs d on a non birdwatching trip but I tried my best.would have liked to explore more but some good bird still seen.
Monte baldo area
2 visits here produced the best birds including two ten minute spells when everything seemed to happen at once. While I was looking at a juv blue rock thrush Mrs d said she had 'something' further down.after the thrush had flown off I made my way down and looked at the photos and she had found a firecrest!luckily it was still about and showed well briefly before flying off.all the while this was going on a couple of golden eagles were soaring in a valley below us calling to each other.didn't know where to look! second spell started when we had a brief walk into the pines.a tit party passing through containing coal and willow tits also contained one or more crested tit.as I was watching a crested tit at eye level not far away a treecreeper landed in the tree next to me and started calling.that sounds weird.short toed treecreeper!luckily I have a German bird app and confirmed the call with that.other birds present included: Water pipit Black redstart Buzzard Kestrel Hooded crow Wheatear Whinchat Goldcrest Nutcracker Alpine Chough Raven Crossbill Siskin Plus lots of common birds
Lake garda
Best birds on or around the lake
Black necked grebe(3 adult winter plumaged but still with ear tufts!stunning looking) Red crested Pochard Peregrine Yellow legged gull White wagtail Italian sparrow
Dolomites
Crag martins feeding with house martins and being shadowed by a female sparrowhawk Lovely views of a pair of dipper on one of the village rivers White stork(on one of the lakes) Alpine accentor(heard at the pordoi pass-responded to my call)
I understand that the Italian sparrow was declared a species in its own right in 2011 but happy to hear otherwise.
Yes, Italian Sparrow (Passer italiae) was recognised as a species in the Clements 2012 update but not by other taxonomic authorities including the AERC or IOC yet.
I've just returned from a business trip to Venice and Mestre, a town not too far away from Venice - it's a hard life . I didn't get chance to do any real birding but I kept my eyes and ears open and saw the following:
Feral pigeon
Collared dove
Grey heron
Blackbird
Chaffinch
Little egret
Yellow legged gull (up close and lifer)
Italian sparrow (as yellow legged gull)
Indeterminate terns (my travel bins weren't good enough)
Buzzard
I understand that the Italian sparrow was declared a species in its own right in 2011 but happy to hear otherwise. The lagoon looks agreat place for birding. One for the future.
Well it was 25 degrees when we took off from sunny Venice (Treviso) this morning and 6 degrees when we landed at rainy Leeds/Bradford.
I recommend checking RyanAir for bargain flights on this route. It was only £22 return including fees and taxes and easy to take a bus from Treviso airport into Venice.
But last Tuesday 24th we didn't do the culture run and drove straight out of Italy, through a bit of Slovenia and into Croatia, to the holiday island of Krk.
Here lots of the birds one might expect: Pristine Black-eared Wheatears, Nightingales everywhere, Hoopoes, Stone Curlew, Subalpine Warblers, Woodlarks, Blue Rock Thrushes, but no Rock Partridge despite intensive searching.
Wednesday 25th, we visited the huge Risnjac National Park just to the north of Krk but it only yielded Hobby and Firecrest among the commoner species so we crossed the border back into Slovenia (beautiful wild countyside and scenery) to another preserve, Kocevski Rog N.P.
Hawfinches abounded but migration is slow over there as well so no Collared Flycatchers, Willow Warblers, Redstarts etc yet. just a few Chiffchaffs. Then one of the main targets gave itself up - a stunning White-backed Woodpecker almost in the same field of view as Three-toed Woodpecker. Great-spot and Green made a foursome.
Thursday 26th, up early to another primeaval forest at greater elevation, Rajhenavski Rog. The undoubted highlight here was the Brown Bear that crossed the road in front of the vehicle. Birding was slow and we had to make do with Nutcracker, Crossbill and views of the snow capped southern Alps.
It was one of those days and after White Stork and Black-winged Stilt we didn't get a whole lot more that couldn't be seen back in the UK. So we drove back towards Trieste ready for our next and last birding day.
Friday 27th, A much harder drive than anticipated but we finally arrived at the Po Delta. A vast area to cover so we just called in to 2 locations.
Mind-blowing. 100s Greater Flamingos, c200 Spotted Redshanks, c35 Wood Sandpipers, c60 Black-winged Stilts, c40 Slender-billed Gulls, Pygmy Cormorants everywhere, c15 Spoonbills, c8 Cuckoos..... Montagu's Harrier, Whiskered Terns, Great Reed Warblers, Great White Egrets, Garganeys, Glossy Ibises and Coypus.
Friday night in Treviso - Slap-up Italian meal, lots of wine, an early start this morning and back to this awful weather
Cheers, John
-- Edited by John Rayner on Sunday 29th of April 2012 02:34:43 PM
