I’ve been coming to my house in Gran Alacant for the past 12 years, usually for 3 months in Spring and 2 months in autumn. Each season has turned up its surprises; it seems that each time I visit there is at least one remarkable occurrence in the Clot, and the end of the year
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I received a message the other day from Barry, our esteemed former GA Advertiser editor. He had been asked by another reader if I could answer a few questions about all the white egrets which descend on the Clot during the evening to roost in the reed beds. As many of you will know, the
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Most birders keep lists of the birds they’ve seen. We can’t help it, it’s just one of those things we do, and we keep different lists for different places. I have a UK list (278) a USA list (109 – well it was only a two-week visit in 2006), a Spain list (194) an Offshore
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Earlier this year, while I was at home in the UK, I was somewhat irritated and envious when my birding friend Greta (who lives in Gran Alacant) posted a photograph she had taken in the countryside near La Marina. It was on a Facebook group dedicated to bird sightings in our area, and showed a
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I don’t really recommend the summer months for wildlife watching, it’s all too uncomfortable and there are much better things to do! It can become very unpleasant to be out in the midday sun (accompanied by the odd mad dog) and besides that, most birds will be seeking the shade and making themselves difficult to
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Ask any keen birders what their best moment was while birdwatching, the chances are high that the story will involve a raptor. There’s something about these aerial warriors which brings out the Jeremy Clarkson in birders – Jezza would rather talk about Ferraris and Bugattis than Fiats and Fords, birders want to talk about Eagles,
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NIGHTINGALE Each time I visit Spain, it is clear that changes are taking place. Every visit has its star birds for me – I see lots of one particular species, but on the next trip they are hard to find. This spring has been no exception, and I will be remembering it as the Spring
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Sometimes it’s quite simple to identify a bird out here on the Costa Blanca – once you know what a Hoopoe is, for example, you’ll know one when you see one, an unmistakeable starling-sized pink bird with black and white wings and a crest – easy-peasy, and you’re likely to see at least one on
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How many bird songs do you know? No, I’m not talking about “Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep” by Middle of the Road, or the massively insane “Surfin’ Bird” by The Trashmen (look it up on YouTube!), but actual birdsong. Most regular birdwatchers could probably identify 30 or more; if you’ve got a good memory for sounds
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This month, I was ready to tell you all about the many summer migrants which will be arriving in the Clot throughout the month, at the start of one of the most exciting periods for local birdwatchers. The swallows will undoubtedly be back by now, and there are many more species to come. However, events
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Everybody knows the House Sparrow, you probably have them around your house or you encounter them when you’re having a meal at an open air restaurant, where they attempt to look as cute as possible in order to attract a stray crumb, or recklessly dive-bomb your table at the risk of a good swatting. You
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I was going through my past archive of all the birds and animals I’ve written about for the GA Advertiser over the past few years, and was surprised to find I’d missed out on one of the easiest birds to be found in the Clot – the Little Grebe, which you are almost certain to
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Once upon a time, in a land far away, there was a big tree, and in this tree there was a big nest, and the big nest contained a big egg. Now the parents of this big egg were very special birds, because there aren’t many of them about, so the people of the land
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FERRUGINOUS DUCK Last month I told you about a new bird species which has been found in the Clot – the Crested Coot (our esteemed editor decided that the alternative name for it wasn’t very appropriate!) and I spent several days in October trying to find it, without any success. It’s probably hiding in the
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Autumn – most birdwatchers will tell you that this is the best time of the year, with summer birds leaving, winter birds arriving and this year’s crop of young birds dispersing to new areas. In addition to this, birds are moving through on migration and generally getting lost, which means that there is a good
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WHAT’S THAT IN THE CLOT? Well it looks like I’ve been lumbered yet again with trying to think up something to write for this month’s GA Advertiser, it’s a tedious job but somebody’s got to do it. As the Spanish would say – estoy encargado con el mochuelo – I’ve been given a Little Owl.
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WHAT’S THAT IN THE CLOT? Welcome to the hot days, for some people the best time of the year. You can lounge by your swimming pool or on the beach, ice cold drink to hand and a parasol to move beneath if you are beginning to crisp at the edges. You can strip off layers
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Even if you’re not very familiar with different bird species, you might possibly guess that the bird in my picture this month is a Green Woodpecker, and you’d be right. No, wait a minute – you’d be wrong. You’d have been right if you’d said that more than about 7 years ago, but the powers
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One of the great advantages for me of living in Gran Alacant is that the Clot de Galvany is within a ten minute walk from my front door, and anyone interested in nature will find a variety of things to observe in their natural habitat. There may be one or two of you however who
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WHAT’S THAT IN THE CLOT? Last month, there was a posting in the online Gran Alacant forum (search for Gasbags on Google – it’s a great place for local information!) from the redoubtable John Hannon, saying that he had seen a green parrot in Torrevieja. He asked what it was and he had attached a
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I always thought that the phrase “one swallow does not a summer make” was one of those wise old British sayings which came from the fact that if you see a single swallow in late March, you can expect a similar chilly weather period to the “Beast From The East” which we went through recently
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What’s in that Clot? One of the many things I have been unable to fathom throughout my life is why the makers of a very popular video game felt the need to make the opponents of Angry Birds a bunch of green pigs. There are plenty of reasons why birds get angry, but green pigs
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It can be a frustrating business at times, this birdwatching. One of the worst things you can hear when entering a hide on the lookout for a particular species is “Oh, there was one here just five minutes ago, but it’s gone now.” I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard that, the annoyance
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Everybody knows the House Sparrow, you probably have them around your house or you encounter them when your are having a meal at an open air restaurant, where they attempt to look as cute as possible in order to attract a stray crumb, or recklessly dive-bomb your table at the risk of a good swatting.
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WHAT’S THAT IN THE CLOT? It’s that time of the year again – or at least it has been since the beginning of last month. Shops full of shiny bright things ready for you to put on your Xmas tree, and spend a fortune in doing so. Nature, of course, has its own bright shiny
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WHAT’S THAT IN THE CLOT? There’s a killer on the loose. Actually, there’s more than one, there are several, and they’re all in our area. The Costa Blanca is one of the best areas in Europe to see a wide variety of avian raptors during the winter season. The wetlands around us, which include the
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October – the best month for finding interesting birds as migration is well under way. You are likely to see many species, from departing summer visitors such as Bee-eaters, to arriving specialities like Bluethroats and Black Redstarts. Then there is always the possibility of finding some sort of vagrant – one of those waifs and
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What’s that in a Clot? It looks a bit nasty, doesn’t it? It’s bright red, which means danger, it flies about in a threatening manner, it’s got a sharp tail which will probably sting you, and right now there are lots of them about, so why doesn’t somebody do something about them? Only one of
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WHAT’S THAT IN THE CLOT? You are probably feeling very sorry for the poor little sparrow in my photo this month – cut down in the prime of its life by a vicious predator. Wouldn’t it be nicer if everything just got along, live and let live? Why does nature have to be so cruel,
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WHAT’S THAT IN THE CLOT? Oh No! I can hear the howls of anguish and fear already. “If he’s about to tell us there are snakes in the Clot, then I’m not going in there, ever!” This is a perfectly understandable reaction. About a third of adult humans are frightened of snakes (ophidiophobia, if you
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WHAT’S THAT IN THE CLOT? Sit tight because I’ve got a personal story to tell you. It might seem a little self-indulgent, but it explains why I find Spain and its birds so fascinating. Older British readers might remember the small “Observer’s” books published in the 1950’s. These were pocket-sized, and covered many different subjects,
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WHAT’S THAT IN THE CLOT? I will hold my hands up and admit to my guilt. What am I talking about? It is the use of the traditional British birders’ greeting everywhere, even here in Gran Alacant, where the words “Hello, anything about?” is always met by the usual “Hi there, no, just the usual
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WHAT’S THAT IN THE CLOT? March is the month when British birdwatchers start to look out for the first of the summer arrivals – but here in Gran Alacant, the spring migration is well under way, and many species have already arrived. Some of these will just be passing through on their way northwards, and
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WHAT’S THAT IN THE CLOT? Do you own, or are you staying in, a nice house in Gran Alacant? Of course you keep it clean and tidy (or at least I hope you do) and you wouldn’t put up with rubble and other mess. You’d keep the roof watertight, you’d repair holes in the walls
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So that’s the summer over, many visitors both human and avian are disappearing, and life settles down to the mellow fruitfulness of autumn. You might think that all the colourful animals are now gone and all you might see from now on are a few drab-looking birds in their winter plumages – but you’d be
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Over the last two months I have told you about two of the most colourful birds which can be found in Spain but are not usually found back in the UK, the Hoopoe and the Bee-eater. Most British birdwatchers coming to Spain for the first time have those two on his three “most wanted” list,
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Last month I told you about the spectacular Hoopoe, one of the most distinctive birds of our area. This time, we’ll look at what is undoubtedly our most colourful bird, and it’s right here in the Clot right now. This is the explosion in a paintbox that is the Bee-eater. They don’t occur in the
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For nearly the whole of May, without fail at six-thirty in the morning, I was woken up by an insistent call coming from my roof in Monte y Mar. It was impossible to sleep through, because as soon as one started, another one would join in. I knew exactly what they were, and although I
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I have been coming to Gran Alacant for nearly ten years now, and in that time there have been several changes, not least in the Clot itself. Improved conservation measures have increased the biodiversity, particularly in the last two or three years, and we are seeing species which have previously been rare or completely absent
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WHAT’S THAT IN THE CLOT? There is a good reason why all the pathways in the Clot are set out so clearly, and the wild areas are barriered off – these places contain some of the most vulnerable and endangered species in our corner of Spain. The reserve owners (Elche Council) have to carefully balance
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  Older readers may remember an author in the 1950’s called Stephen Potter who invented the notion of “One-upmanship” whereby the use of a little extra knowledge could be used to your advantage in social, sporting and career matters; this idea was continued in the 1970’s with the “Bluff Your Way In…” series of books
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If it looks like a duck and floats like a duck and quacks like a duck, it probably is a duck – and the one species that everyone knows (or should do if they have the slightest interest in birds) is the Mallard . You know it, it’s the one which has the iridescent green
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If you happen to be chatting to a birder, either socially or out in the field, and you ask him about the best birds he’s ever seen, he may at some point look wistfully into the distance and mumble something about a Bogey Bird. You might wonder what sort of bird this is, and rush
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