TRANSFER TO TALIOUINE FROM MERZOUGA WITH STOPS AT: RISSANI – AGDZ – TAZENAKHT – TALIOUINE HOTEL GROUNDS
WEATHER: a chilly start with lovely sunshine all day.
After an early breakfast we made a start for the long journey to Taliouine, but before we left the area we had unfinished business with the Fulvous Chatterer, we headed for Rissani to repeat our search of two days ago. It took 40 minutes to get there, the roads were quiet, we had the place more or less to ourselves. We walked with the bus following behind us, we did this three times, walking for about 1km each time and each time we never saw a Chatterer. Finally, after and hour or so we found a group of them, marvellous, they showed fairly well but disappeared soon enough.
the Fulvous Chatterer, this picture was taken last year by Tony Moore. We didn't get near enough to photograph them today
During our walks we found several other species too: Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters were fabulous, lots of Turtle Dove were gorgeous, Common Bulbuls were neither gorgeous or fabulous, just plain noisy! We found our first Orphean Warbler, a nice male, we saw Blackcap, Subalpine and Bonelli’s Warblers and a surprise, a Pied Flycatcher. Also ticked off were Common Redstart, Olivaceous Warbler, Laughing Dove, Magreb Lark, Brown-necked Raven, lots of Woodchat Shrikes and four Booted Eagles.
the open, empty road to Alnif
Not long after getting back into the bus and setting off, we saw another Chatterer, you couldn’t have written this script! We then put a few miles on the clock and headed towards Alnif, we stopped twice to look into wadis for the Desert Warbler. During the second stop we found another group of Fulvous Chatterers, I couldn’t believe it!
The wadi habitat where we saw the Desert Warbler
Desert Warbler, we couldn't possibly have taken a picture today the bird was far too elusive. This Picture by Tony Moore was from last year's trip
We saw Bar-tailed Lark at the same site and then we found the Desert Warbler it was very elusive and tricky to pin down, but eventually it sat out for all of us to admire, another target in the bag. During this birding episode we saw several Woodchat Shrikes, a Great Grey Shrike, Northern Wheatear, Spectacled Warbler, Desert Lark and a few other species.
Now went drove in earnest and only made one short toilet stop, where was saw House Bunting, before we arrived in Agdz where we stopped to buy lunch. We ate our picnic in the shade of an acacia tree a few kilometers out of town. A short birding walk produced Blue-cheeked bee-eaters, at least 4 Hoopoes, Woodchat Shrike, Laughing Doves, Olivaceous Warbler, and the usual common warblers.
Blue Cheeked Bee-eater taken near Agdz
Two hours later we arrived at the stoney plains just east of the town of Tazenakht, we walked for 30 minutes on the sloping plains looking for Black-bellied Sandgrouse and Thick-billed Lark. Two of the group had a probable sighting of Thick-billed Larks but none of the rest of the group did. We also found Temminck’s Lark, Thekla lark and Desert Lark and the obligatory Woodchat Shrike.
Desert lark taken on the stony plains near Tazenakht
We arrived at our hotel in Taliouine just before 6pm, it ad been a long day in the bus and we were eager to get out for another walk. An area of wooded agricultural farmland is situated between the hotel and a river, we walked along the edge of that. A Cirl Bunting sat out singing for us, we found a group of Spanish Sparrows, a Nightingale was seen and Sardinian Warbler went on the list after being absent for a few days. Guess what? We saw three Woodchat Shrikes too!
Swallowtail Butterfly, one of many butterflies seen today
We sat down to dinner at 8pm and by 9pm we were all tucked up in our rooms ready for an early night.