The 7th Eilat Bird Festival is behind us and despite not getting to our usual final checklist of 240 species, we stillmanagedto get a nice assembly of species, some not very commonly seen neither at any of the past festivals nor every spring like these Hill Sparrow,Black Bush Robins &PharaohEagle Owland no less than 3 White-tailed Plovers!
During the last 2-3 days a big wave of Warblers,Hirundines, Wheatearsand Raptors throughout the region and today we got our first Subalpine Warbler at the IBRCE ringing station and more were seen and photographed in many wadies around Eilat.
A report of 2 Lichtenstein’s Sandgrouse at Holland Park from this morning (Y. Baser) shuld also be mentioned with respect to the species scarcity over the last 10-15 years. I hope that the many green patches in the desert, after the last winter, will help the very sensitive local population which has droppeddramaticallyin numbers.
Below is a small collection of bird photos taken by Eilat resident photographers Yael & Shimon Shiff…
Itai Shanni
Itai Shanni is the coordinator of the Eilat Birding Blog, which is jointly written by the Israeli Ornithological Centre (IOC) and the International Birding and Research Centre Eilat (IBRCE). Itai is working to promote bird and wildlife conservation throughout this area. As an Israeli A licensed ringer, he also gives support for the IBRCE staff when needed. Itai has also developed a real passion for Odonata watching and spends many hot hours chasing also Dragonflies and Damselflies.
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