Jem's Birding & Ringing Exploits in the Eastern Province and elsewhere in Saudi Arabia
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15 July 2013
Bar-tailed Godwits in various plumages – Dhahran Expro Wader Roost.
Another early morning trip to Dhahran Expro Wader Roost, arriving just before high tide, produced the first returning Broad-billed Sandpipers of the autumn. Three birds were present but remained at the very back of the site and did not allow photographs to be taken of them. A good number of Bar-tailed Godwits have now arrived with some in almost full breeding plumage.
Bar-tailed Godwit
Bar-tailed Godwit
Other waders in summer type plumage included Curlew Sandpiper with a few reasonably well marked Lesser Sand Plovers and Greater Sand Plovers. Other waders seen included plenty of Kentish Plovers, three Ruddy Turnstones, five Whimbrel and ten Eurasian Curlew of the long-billed Subspecies orientalis we get in the Eastern Province. This sub-species breeds around the River Volga and Urals east through central Russia and northern Kazakhstan to central Manchuria and winters in West, East & South Africa, and from the southern Caspian Sea south to the Arabian Gulf and east through southern Asia to eastern China and southern Japan, and south to the Philippines and Greater Sundas.
