The Handbook of Birds of the world have just split Arabian Green Bee-eater from Green Bee-eater. Philothrus cyanophrys Cabanis and Heine, 1860, Arabia = mountains of Al Qunfudhah, southwestern Saudi Arabia. Usually treated as conspecific with M. viridissimus and M. orientalis, but differs from both in its very short stub-ended central tail feathers; bright blue […]
Tag: Bee-eater
Birders flock to see exotic bee-eaters
Exotic bee-eaters have had their best ever breeding attempt in the UK with eight chicks fledging from two nests, conservationists said. Two pairs of the brightly-coloured birds, which are normally found in the Mediterranean, have nested on the Isle of Wight this year. Three chicks fledged from one nest on National Trust land, in a […]
Signs of hope
The current monitoring work which was designed, is aiming to give some more specific insight about migration along the Arava but also to check target breeding species. Over the last 10 years numbers of Arabian Warblers have dropped dramatically in the Arava and in fact in the last breeding season, I could not locate even […]
POLL: Should bird hunting in Cyprus be banned?
Cyprus is a stopping place for hundredes of millions of migrant birds moving between Africa, Europe and Western Asia each year. 300 different species use Cyprus as a stepping stone during their difficult and very tiring flights across the Mediterranean. Illegal shooting and trapping of birds ( with lime sticks and netting) is a persistent […]
Jahra Pools Reserve, Kuwait
Summer in Kuwait is searing hot and is traditionally a quiet birding month, however in late Spring we do have some species breeding at the Pools and mid-summer we have many Tern species breeding on the off-shore islands. Little Ringed Plovers (Charadrius dubius) have remained through the Spring and Summer and are suspected to be […]
Nearly Autumn
It is mid July and the daily average temp’ is around 35-37 deg’ with daily max’ temp raising to 40-42 (and sometime even higher up to 45-47). The nights are short with average temp of 27-29 with daily min’ temp of 22-24 deg andyet, another Summer is going to come to its end soon and […]
New Spring Alive record: more than 270,000 bird observations in Europe
From February to June, participants in Spring Alive, a long-term BirdLife educational programme, observed and registered the arrivals of five migratory bird species in Europe and made more than 270,000 observations of migratory birds, the highest number ever! The people taking part in the programme, mainly children and their families represent countries across Europe, from […]