The flock of eleven Dead Sea Sparrows found in the Jubail area on 26 February were still in the same general area on 4 March. This is only the second time this species has been seen in the Kingdom with the previous record also in the same area when a flock of 60 – 70 birds were seen at Jubail Golf Course on 13 November 1991.
The species is a vagrant to most areas of Arabia with other records coming from Bahrain (one record) and the United Arab Emirates (two records) with no records from Qatar, Yemen or Oman. Kuwait has had more records since the first sighting in 1996 but they are rare even here.
The closest place for this subspecies to come from is Jordon so it is a very good record. The birds are quite vocal and stay together by calling to each other.
Whilst watching the group they split up into smaller groups but always return to make a single group after a short period. The makeup of the group of birds is five males and six females.
Jem Babbington
Jem Babbington is a keen birder and amateur photographer located in Dhahran, Eastern Saudi Arabia where he goes birding every day. Jem was born in England and is a serious local patch and local area birder who has been birding for almost forty years and has birded in more than fifty countries. Jem is learning to ring birds in Bahrain as a perfect way to learn more about the birds of the area. Saudi Arabia is a very much under-watched and under-recorded country.
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