Pages

13 March 2016

Dead Sea Sparrows still present – Jubail

The flock of eleven Dead Sea Sparrows found in the Jubail area on 26 February were still in the same general area on 4 March. This is only the second time this species has been seen in the Kingdom with the previous record also in the same area when a flock of 60 – 70 birds were seen at Jubail Golf Course on 13 November 1991. The species is a vagrant to most areas of Arabia with other records coming from Bahrain (one record) and the United Arab Emirates (two records) with no records from Qatar, Yemen or Oman. Kuwait has had more records since the first sighting in 1996 but they are rare even here. The closest place for this subspecies to come from is Jordon so it is a very good record. The birds are quite vocal and stay together by calling to each other. Whilst watching the group they split up into smaller groups but always return to make a single group after a short period. The makeup of the group of birds is five males and six females.
Dead Sea Sparrow

Dead Sea Sparrow