Throughout my trip with mates near Cannes in southern France, my precedence was after all to catch up and spend some high quality time with my good friend group from college. Other than my birding journey to the Coussouls de Crau, I couldn’t cease birding once I was outdoors.
A spotlight was recognizing two Yelkouan Shearwaters with the scope from the shore. Far more frequent, and thus considerably much less thrilling, had been the Yellow-legged Gulls. They did show fairly entertaining nonetheless with their sheep- and cat-like calls.
A Cirl Bunting within the neighborhood was additionally good to observe. It was singing regularly, which made it simple to find on the treetops. This species is far more frequent in southern Europe than in central Germany the place I noticed it lately, however is spreading northwards at a speedy charge attributable to larger temperatures.
The rocky hills proper above the coast had been significantly good areas. Frequent Swifts and European Crag Martins had been the commonest species, however I additionally noticed just a few Pallid Swifts. Or moderately, I ought to say I recognized just a few and might need seen far more, I nonetheless discover it a problem to confidently establish these birds in lots of conditions.
I used to be significantly excited to see a pair of Alpine Swifts. I haven’t seen this unusually fairly swift species many instances their moderately giant dimension mixed with the pied markings make for a fairly spectacular beast.
There are fairly just a few species of warbler that happen within the scrubby coastal vegetation, however I solely managed to get good views of the widespread and customary Sardinian Warbler. I hoped to see Western Orphean and Western Subalpine, however solely had possible views of the latter. Compensation got here within the type of (transient) views of Blue Rock-Thrush.
Though I didn’t consider this space – which is moderately recognized for its coast and cities – as a spot to go birding, I used to be positively stunned. The world supplied a great stability between missing something of curiosity in birding phrases and being very thrilling with numerous specials. This prevented me from being pissed off by the dearth of excellent birds round (even when the aim of the holiday was not birding), whereas on the identical time there not being an excessive amount of to find and distract from the rationale why I went on the vacations within the first place.