Sometimes – albeit rarely! – we do go birding outside The Straits, and one of our favourite areas to take our guests to is the eastern side of Coto Doñana. Only an hour and a half away from The Straits area, it offers some fabulous southern Iberian birding!
1st Stop!
After an early start, we arrive at dawn to a private site among extensively-managed organic vineyards, where the mosaic of habitats and low-intensity management gives the perfect breeding site for our first magical target species. As we get out of the minibus it is the first bird we hear, and the increasing light soon reveals them! The magical Rufous-tailed Scrub Robin! Their glorious song fills the air and we are delighted with the views as they sing from the vines and forage among the rows.
The Spanish name Alzacola – meaning “lift-tail” – is arguably more descriptive than the plethora of available English names! The dazzling, distinctive pattern of this bird’s frequently-displayed tail is a large part of what gives it its charm. Studies show that those with larger tail-end markings have elevated breeding success and lower rates of nest predation. The size of the white terminal patches positively affects reproductive success – the larger the white bits, the more desirable the bird! Conversely, the size of the black sub-terminal patches has a negative relationship with nest predation – the larger the black bits, the more successful the bird is in drawing predators away from the nest.
As the breeding season wears on, the delicate white end of the tail wears off, becoming abraded and eventually disappearing. The black patches, strengthened by melanin, do not wear so easily and effectively form the new terminal part of the tail. Mind-blowingly, it’s thought they delineate the perfect aero-dynamic shape for a long-distance traveller, a shape which is reached just as the bird is ready to leave on its migratory journey, crossing the Sahara to winter in the Sahelian belt.
Red-listed in Spain, these birds are doing really well here thanks to a locally-managed project, retaining sensitive management and artisanal farming methods in the vineyards to produce nature-friendly sherry.
2nd Stop!
Our second stop is timed to perfection. As the day heats up, gorgeous Little Swifts increase their forays from their nesting and roosting site. This colony is the most stable and accessible in the Iberian peninsula and this recent colonist from Africa is seemingly doing well!
As we arrive we are surrounded by low-flying giggling Little Swifts with Common Swifts zooming past at even higher speed! It really is a site to behold and you don’t even need binoculars! People walking through the area are interested and often come and share in the magic of the Swift mayhem!
We normally have to calm down at this point so we have a coffee whilst still watching the Swifts as they disperse further from the nest and roosting site and the mayhem subsides. We have a second breakfast hobbit-style of tostada con tomate – which normally ends up partly in my binoculars!
3rd Stop!
Nearby we visit Las Salinas de Bonanza – where famously Bill Nighy virtually visited with us in the TV series Worlds Most Scenic River Journeys! This end-point of the splendid Rio Guadalquivir is a treasure trove of ornithological wonder and could be even better if converted to traditional sustainable salt production – in the future that may be possible.
For now we are already viewing a myriad of shorebirds – Red Knot, Little Stints, Curlew Sandpipers and more – as Pied Avocets and Black-winged Stilts attack any fly-overs including Little, Gull-billed and Caspian Terns! Gorgeous Slender-billed Gulls paddle the shallows as rows of Glossy Ibis fly over.
It is easy to just look at the waders between their legs, but the Greater Flamingoes are worthy of scope time too!
Scanning the water reveals Black-necked Grebes, Eurasian Spoonbills, masses of migratory shorebirds and then some nervous-looking Marbled Ducks! With good reason as there is an Osprey sitting right above them!
The Marbled Duck is a super-rare species and many visiting birders want to get this one on their lists! It was an abundant species in the 1800s and first half of the 1900s, but due to habitat destruction, intensive irrigation for agriculture and polluted wetlands, populations crashed. Thankfully intensive conservation measures have prevented the species from disappearing in Spain but more work needs to be done on the source reasons for decline.
We end up finding 14 of these gorgeous ducks so we are all super-happy ! As a partially migratory species, it is adapted to spatiotemporal fluctuations in the availability of flooded wetlands, and moves nomadically before and after breeding to make the most of available ephemeral habitats.
4th Stop!
Now we find ourselves travelling through back streets and narrow roads to a little known area which we affectionately nickname ¨Las Lagunas de los Suenos¨
Here we find another rare duck and one that many people will be familiar with, given the risk to already declining populations from introduced Ruddy Duck. The drakes look absolutely stunning, their white heads contrasting with their bright blue waxy bills (shoes should come in this colour!) and their gorgeous chestnut brown muscular bodies! They charge at each other and splash about the water competing for females by sorting out their positions of dominance.
Considered globally Endangered, the White-headed Ducks which we are enjoying here are extinct as a breeding species in Europe ,with the exception of Spain. For such a well known species there are quite a lot of gaps in our knowledge of this species including breeding success and paternity of males, mate selection by females, dispersal, adult survival and further data on population sizes.
Among the reeds and scrub, an Isabelline Warbler creeps out into full view (one of six we saw and heard). This species that winters in The Sahel is an incredibly-range restricted breeding species in Europe and another much sort-after species.
We also gaze upon Black-crowned Night Herons, Red-crested Pochards, Western Swamphen and a Black-headed Weaver – a species introduced and now naturalised in this area.
Suddenly a Little Bittern barks then flys out across the pool to disappear in the reeds.
Our final species target for the day reveals itself calling from the pool edge but out of view and then it swims out right in front of us – the very cool Red-knobbed Coot! We can see well its blue-white bill looking like it has been sucking on a leaky biro, those comical red adornments on top of the shield, different shield pattern and subtly different posture to Common Coot.
In Sub-Saharan Africa it is a relatively abundant and common species but here in Europe and North Africa it is close to extirpation with both range and populations decreasing alarmingly. Again, agricultural pollution, water abstraction and habitat degradation are to blame and sadly the decline of this species is representative of some of the biggest problems we see from unsuitable unsustainable agriculture bordering Doñana National and Natural Park.
Would you like a days #birding like this? Join us on our Swift Weekender tour and experience this and a whole lot more excellent birding!
Great stuff.
I paid a Winter visit to Donna, El Rocio, for 3 nights in early Jan for a bit of out of season birding bookended between Seville.
I hadn’t been for 5 years and that was a May visit when it was as dry as a bone.
Upon approaching El Rocio this time i was shocked to see several miles of Plasticulture – if this is the legal stuff then it’s no wonder the water situation is dire considering the amount of illegal Fincas in the area.
Donna is dying by the death of a thousand cuts.
The drying out of the habitat is plain to see as is the ever-dwindling Winter wildfowl.
This is a Ramsar site and the Spanish government should hang their collective heads in shame…..
Hi Laurie – The situation is truly terrible in the national and natural park. This area we visited this day sits largely outside this area and as a result of the tragic issues in the centre of Doñana now offers better birding opportunities than that main area.
Niki wrote a well balanced and researched article in September 2023 issue of Birdwatch magazine which gave a damning account of the situation of unsustainable agriculture. Certain political factions (PP, VOX etc) defending the continued destruction for literally jam today but none tomorrow! Watch this space we will be aiming to publish that article as a blog shortly!
Wow, is it really 35 years since I visited these sites? I checked my diary and it seems I saw most of the species you mention in Andalucia that year – I was there for two months – but not the rufous-tailed scrub-robin. Even looking for it under the old name of rufous bush-chat, I don’t have it in either my diary or my bird lists. Apparently I didn’t see it until I got to Greece a few months later. And yet, I only associate it with Spain. How our memories can deceive us!!
But I do remember ‘the road from Ayamonte to El Rocio via la Palma, with its thirsty red earth, never ending orange groves and plastic covered strawberry beds’. I didn’t think it could get any worse, but everything I read about the area suggests that it has.
Thanks for the extra information about the scrub-robin – that’s fascinating.