Greater Hoopoe Lark is known
to take advantage of various items to help it regulate its temperature and slow
down water loss during the heat of the day. Using the large burrows of Arabian
Spiny-tailed Lizards to get out of the sun has been well documented as one way
they achieve this. Whilst we were at a large farm near Jubail we saw may
Greater Hoopoe Larks around the edges of the fileds with possibly up to thirty
birds seen. Some of the fields had just been harvested and made into bales and
a few of these were square types made into three sided low blocks. One Greater
Hoopoe Lark was seen using the shaded and cool area in the bottom of these hay
stacks as an area to retreat from the sun and keep cool. When disturbed it
would jump up ontop of the bale of hay and look around but when it was quiet
again it would move back to its cool resting area.
