In the northernmost field of NADEC farm on Thursday, Lou Regensmorter and I came across a female pallid harrier. The field is adjacent to route 90 which goes from Kharj to Haradh
female pallid harrier
What was interesting is that six hours before, we had stopped the car journey at the outskirts of Kharj on the way out to Haradh to view another pallid harrier. That time it had been a male which was also in a field adjacent to the same road but 120 kilometres further west of the NADEC sighting.
second view of female pallid harrier
The sightings of pallid harrier didn’t finish at NADEC. On the way back on the same road we noticed two other males together following the road travelling at about 25 kilometres an hour.
On four occasions we drove ahead of them, stopped the car for them to catch up and tried to take pictures.
male pallid harrier following route 90 east to west
Finally after a few kilometres they diverted into a near-by field.
second view of male pallid harrier
However that wasn’t the end of the story. I posted the pictures of the female harrier on BirdForum to confirm the identity.
first winter male pallid harrier
One of the pictures taken after the female had left her perch turned out to to be a first winter male which must have been in the same field and crossed her flight path when I stopped following her.
This means that we saw 5 pallid harrier all along the same road, two of which were proven to be on migration though the others probably were too.
They were using the road as a route.
Robert Tovey
Dr Rob Tovey is a scientist by training and more recently an English teacher. His profession allows him to travel to some of the more difficult-to-get-to places and stay there for years if his inclination takes him. He is a keen bird watcher, blogger and amateur photographer. He has worked in Azerbaijan and Libya and is currently in Saudi Arabia. Rob also has a base in Bulgaria so overall is becoming a bit of birding specialist in very general terms where East meets West.
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