Five days in early February in Mallorca, for some winter birding without freezing.
Stayed with Mike Neale at his apartment in Port de Pollenca.
The island is already coated with yellow flowers. Unfortunately it is Cape Sorrel (Oxalis pes-caprae), an introduced native of South Africa considered to be a weed. It is difficult to eradicate as it propagates through underground bulbs. Eating it is one option for control (it has that sour oxalic acid taste). South Africans put it in stews.
The first butterflies are on the wing - the Speckled Wood (Pararge aegeria). Here is a male, who has overwintered as a caterpillar or pupa. To get a female he needs either to defend a sunspot or patrol the woods. Males with four spots on the hindwing tend to be defenders, and those with three spots patrollers. So he'd better stop sun bathing.
The farmlands provide a wealth of birds. Flocks of Red-legged Partridge (Alectotis rufa) scurry away as we approach. They're intensively hunted - but unfortunately I never saw them on a menu.
A Hoopoe (Upupa epops) obligingly opens its crest for the camera.
Medium sized brown birds such as robins are everywhere. I've never seen so many Song Thrushes (Turdus philomelos) in one place.
Not to be confused with the Meadow Pipit (Anthus pratensis).
Also plenty of Stonechats (Saxicola rubicola)...
...Serins (Serinus serinus)...
...and Goldfinches
There are no crows on Mallorca. The only Corvid is the biggest of them all: the Raven (Corvus corax).
Populations on islands may evolve in isolation to look different from the population on the mainland. Taxonomists debate whether these populations are still the same species or have evolved into a new one, which means they would no longer mate naturally with individuals on the mainland or produce viable young. The latter is not possible to test, so it becomes a subjective call. A compromise is to call the island populations 'sub-species' - on the way to becoming separate species.
The second smallest bird in Europe (after its cousin the Goldcrest) is the Firecrest (Regulus ignicapilla). Some people have regarded the Firecrests on Mallorca as a separate 'sub-species' to those on the mainland, because they are slightly paler and greyer. But I don't think this is officially recognized. Anyway, they look amazing.
The Warblers (otherwise known as LBJs - Little Brown Jobs) have particularly come under the scrutiny of taxonomists (the Firecrest used to be classified as a Warbler). A number of sub-species have been proposed for the Blackcap (Sylvia atricapi), though not for Balearic populations alone. Here is a 'brown-capped' female watching us in a car park.
But I came to Mallorca in search of one Warbler, which I have been trying to see for years: Marmora's Warbler (Sylvia sarda) - only found in the Balearics, Corsica and Sardinia - and difficult to see, as it skulks under dense bushes. Since my last visit the population on Mallorca has been elevated to the status of a separate species from those in the east - it is now the Balearic Warbler (Sylvia balearica)! It is supposed to look a little different - instead of uniformly grey, it has a pinkish flank and a paler throat. But the key difference is the song. And it is the song which birds use to recognise each other to mate. And if populations do not mate with each other because they do not recognize each other, they are separate species.
Mike takes me to a peninsula to the north of Cala Sant Vicenc, a few kilometres north-west of Port de Pollenca, and we walk north along a scrubby track.
Mike plays the Balearic Warbler call he has stored on his phone. Eventually a Warbler flits from one bush to another in front of my gaze. I see the bright red eye and a blur of uniform greyness, which means it cannot be a Sardinian Warbler (Sylvia melanocephala) - the only similar warbler around at this time of year and which, as the name says, has a black head. Mission accomplished.
A bonus before leaving: a Blue Rock Thrush (Monticola solitaries) - on a rock.
There are two wetland reserves in the north of Mallorca: s'Albufereta, and the larger s'Albufera.
Over the waters Crag Martins (Ptyonoprogne rupestris) dart, flashing the diagnostic white 'windows' in their tails.
The balls of fluff scuttling around are Kentish Plovers (Charadrius alexandrines).
Black-winged Stilts (Himantopus himantopus) balance on one leg.
Dunlin (Calidris alpina) hide amongst the ducks and Lapwings.
An Osprey (Pandion haliaetus) rests between fish meals.
In the inner sanctum of s'Albufera the rarer birds can be found on the canals. Nervous Marbled Duck (Marmaronetta angustirostris) keep their distance before paddling away. They belong to one of the local breeding populations around the Mediterranean.
Nobody likes to be called a knobhead, and it could explain why the Red-knobbed Coot (Fulica cristata) has a reputation of being highly aggressive. However, they seem quite tame as they potter around outside the visitor's centre with their 'dog collars' on - protected to preserve their numbers. They are limited to local populations confined to southern Spain and northern Morocco.
In the distance a Purple Swamphen (Porphyrio porphyria), looking quite prehistoric.
Another reserve, further south, is Son Real. Scrubland and rocky coast with prehistoric human sites.
A Booted Eagle (Aquila pennata) greeted us by the entrance.
On the coast sat Audouin's Gulls (Larus audouinii). A real Mediterranean species, with a bill to be proud of.
A Sanderling (Calidris alba) takes a rest on the rocks, preparing for his flight to breed in the Arctic.
The reserve has signs saying not to touch the Pine Processionary caterpillars (Thaumetopoea pitycampa). Their hairs are highly irritating to the skin. They spend the winter in communal webs on pines, going on sorties for food using pheromone trails to find their way home. When it's time to pupate in the soil, the community marches off in procession (thus the name). The 19th century French naturalist Jean Henri Fabre attached a group nose to tail, and watched them march in a circle for a week. Good job they have the hairs.
Sea-watching is not everybody's cup of tea - peering through a telescope to try and identify dark specks on the horizon that regularly disappear behind waves. But I am on another mission: Shearwaters. The taxonomists have been at work here too. The Cory's Shearwater (Calonectris diomeda) that lives in the Mediterranean is now regarded as a separate sub-species 'Scopoli's Shearwater' (C. d. diomeda) to the one that live in the Atlantic (C. d. borealis). The smaller Yelkouan's Shearwater (Puffinus yelkouan), also confined to the Meditteranean, has had more drastic treatment: it's population around Mallorca is now regarded as a separate species; the Balearic Shearwater (Puffinus mauretanicus).
Sea-watching requires good viewpoints. So first we went to the Cap de Formentor.
No mistaking the gull sized 'Scopoli's Shearwater - the bowed wings that are greyish above with a dark 'hand', the grey sides of the neck and head, the white underside, and the stout pale bill.
Look carefully and you may see a dolphin. Of the dolphins commonly found in the Mediterranean, it is most likely to be Striped Dolphin (Stenella coeruleoalba) or Common Bottlenose Dolphin (Torsiops truncates). Short-beaked Common Dolphins (Delphinus delphus) and Rough-toothed Dolphins (Steno bredanensis) are meant to be less common around the Balearics, and Risso's Dolphin (Grampus griseus) has a flat face - which the dolphin in the picture clearly hasn't.
Next observation point; a little further south to the Faro de Cala Ratjada.
And here we see Balearic Shearwater: smaller than Scopoli's, uniformly dark grey on the upper body (not black looking as in Manx Shearwater), and with a finer and darker bill. To separate it from the Yelkouan Shearwater we can see that the neck and 'armpit' markings do not have a defined contrast with the white of the undersides, but merge into it. (They also have a distinct call, like the Warbler, but to hear it you need to be at their breeding colony at night on land). All missions accomplished.
We watched the Balearic Shearwaters come and go into large congregations sitting on the surface on the water. Not a behaviour I had expected - I thought they were always on the wing.
And besides us, hunting from the cliffs, a more adventurous Osprey than the one at s'Albufera.
Mallorca isn't just sun, sea, sand and Shearwaters. The Serra de Tramuntana mountains that guard the north coast reach up to nearly 1,500 metres - and in February the snow is still falling. There be vultures in them there hills.
We walked a path starting at the Mortitx vineyards, at the end of which we could look up to some high coastal peaks.
Past the twisted trunks of ancient olive trees.
And watching us watching him watching us - a Black Vulture (Aegypius monachus).
I leave having seen 71 species of birds. Thanks Mike for the warm welcome, and the cold bedroom. I will return!
