Text & Photos © Max Baumgarten
Back home in
Germany I found some time to finally give an update on what happened in
Azerbaijan's birdlife in June. Most apparent were the omnipresent babies of
various species. Although some species were already in the second round others
just started breeding or were still courtshipping.
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| Crested Lark fledling |
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| Can you ID this bird? |
Besides babies and rather secretive parents, June started with something
nice and unexpected. Oystercatchers could be observed in Kura River close to
the Georgian border where they were described breeding back in 1884 in Radde's
„Ornis Caucasica“. The birds showed typical breeding behaviour and were once
observed laying down in a way they would only do on eggs, shaking left and
right while slowly laying down.
The Kura river also held good numbers of Terns (Little, Common &
Whiskered), Little ringed Plovers and Common Sandpipers. Everything that was
supposed to be in a natural river of that size was present.
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| Whiskered Tern |
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| Little Ringed Plover: Common breeder along the Kura river |
From the Georgian border where Raphael had his last day in early June I
moved on to close gaps and visit places that I had not been to before. Some
still holding surprises like the highest density of Western Rock Nuthatches (8
Ind. in 10 minutes) so far.
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| This is where Nuthatches thrive |
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| Injury feigning clearly shows it's a wader! |
In mid June
a good friend of mine Simon Ostermann joined and we made a little tour around
the country also visiting the Caspian Tit and Shikra sites. In one week we
managed to observe nearly 200 species and had very nice observations of
elsewhere rare species like Imperial Eagle on the nest or Marbled Teal close to
the sleeping place. We even managed to find an Eastern Rock Nuthatch in Zuvand upland.
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| Simon making his way toward Caspian Tit |
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| Beautiful place to pitch a tent |
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| Horned Larks can be relatively tame |
In the Zuvand area we encountered comparably high densities of Pale Rock
Sparrows which occur only sporadically.
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| Only present in some years: Pale Rock Sparrow |
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| Herding is often done in Suits |
After Simon had left I had only a couple of days left which I used to
try to confirm some previous breeding suspects and map some more agricultural
areas which I had not done before in June.
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| Turtle Dove: In Azerbaijan still a common bird |
In total I
saw 250 species over the three month of my fieldwork and found several new
breeding sites for species of conservation concern which makes the time a full
success and proves once more that Azerbaijan is still hiding some nice secrets!
Cheers
Max
