This was one of those trips that had very little pre-planning, having lost my father earlier this year whilst in the middle of a very heavy workload, shooting the model sequences for the new 007 movie, I really did need a break. My daughter, Holly, has been training to be a make-up artist and we have not seen to much of each other either, always more of a problem due to her mother and I being divorced, she too needed some time to relax, so I did a search of late bookings on the net and three days later we boarded a plane at Gatwick airport, bound for the island of Fuerteventura in the Canaries.

I managed to get quite a bit of info prior to going, a request for recent trip reports via Euro bird net bought in lots of good info, (many thanks to all who replied) and a trip to Norfolk the day after booking meant that I could get a copy of Tony Clarke & David Collins book " The birdwatchers guide to the Canary Islands" this was most useful.

Of course taking my daughter meant that I would not be 24/7 birding, not to much of a problem as in the heat of the main part of the day birding was not at all rewarding, early morning and evening being the time that birds were most active, Holly, my not so little girl, is not an early riser, so I was off out at dawn leaving her to sleep, returning in time for a 9:30/10ish breakfast, this gave me three or four hours of birding each morning, then we could spend the day having a tourist type holiday, and on some days I would get two hours of birding in the late afternoon, Holly joined on a couple of these trips and was happy to see Cream coloured Courser and Hoopoe, feeding the Ground Squirrels was also good fun.

Cream-coloured Courser   Cursorius cursor bannermani

The first day was a bit of a late start as we did not get to our apartment at Broncemar beach in Caleta de Fustes until midnight, the first job was to return to the airport to pick up the hire car, it was not a good day, very overcast with rain blowing in the wind though it looked brighter to the north so we headed off towards Corralejo sightseeing. The dunes at this end of the island are a spectacular sight.

We did see a few birds, but I was beginning to get the feeling that it might not be as good a site for ornithology as I had read, the rusty signs warned of Houbara Bustard but there was no chance with all the sun worshipers around, but we did get to see the local race of Southern Grey Shrike (Lanius meridionalis koenigi) in fact they were quite numerous, along with Berthelots Pipit  (Anthus b. berthelotii) it turned out that these two species would be seen on all days.

Southern Grey Shrike

It struck me as amusing that NUDES is an anagram of DUNES, this area was indeed full of both, the former being nearer to the sea at all times, this did however make it very difficult to scan the shoreline or sea with binoculars or scope without being perceived as a pervert. Holly and I headed inland towards La Oliva seeing Kestrel (Falco Tinnunculus dacotiae) and Raven (Corvus corax tingitanus) along the way. We then went back to our apartment for a well earned drink, I have to say that I was more than a little disappointed with the bird list so far.

Holly wanted to sit and read in the late afternoon sun, so I packed my cameras and headed down the road to the salinas and Barranco de la Torre, oh how the time of day made a difference, Osprey, two of them flapping slowly along the shoreline, and Yellow-legged Gulls, Trumpeter Finches, Spectacled Warbler, lots of Spanish Sparrows, and Linnet, this was a bit more like what I wanted to see. The best was yet to come though, about 2 Km further up the main road, a dirt road branches off to the right and heads past a quarry to a village called Los Alares, as soon as I turned onto this track I saw about sixty Lesser short-toed Larks a Canary islands Chat, Berthelots Pipit and thirty nine Cream-coloured Coursers, this being one of my target species having only seen distant and brief views of them in Morocco, its not the same race, but these were as close as 5 metres I burned a lot of film and pixels and headed back very pleased indeed.

Cream-coloured Courser

Osprey

Canary Islands Chat  above     Berthelots Pipit   below