Drainage canal, S'albufera Natural Park
A short family holiday to Mallorca in October brought us to our favourite spot in Puerto Pollensa, within easy striking distance of S'Albufera Natural Park. Although too late for return bird migration and with most summer visitors gone, the park always impresses me. It's big, uncrowded and always something to occupy the naturalist with the residents.Having visited several times before, I was particularly interested in the re-introduction of crested (red-knobbed) coot which seems to be going well so far. Birds have now bred outside the fenced captive area and are showing well as the saying goes, well enough to get a few decent photo's with the Lumix. Past re-introductions have also been relatively successful with purple gallinule and red-crested pochard in good numbers across the park. White-headed duck seems to have been a failure, however. I couldn't find any this trip.
Crested Coot (Fulica cristata)
The only other site I visited was the Boquer Valley. Access is now across a large road and urbanisation is still eating into the remaining habitat at the mouth of the valley bit by bit. I recognised an old knarled olive tree surrounded by building rubble. Once a quiet favoured nesting site for a wryneck, its cracked branches seem unlikely to hear it's falcon-like calls again. The valley seems alot busier and more disturbed than it used to be due to the wide advertising of the site as a walk. Sitting quietly in the maquis and garrigue at the end of the Boquer, eventually I heared the house-sparrow like calls of what I was looking for. Male and female marmora's warbler. Black redstart, cirl bunting and hoopoe were present, but the area was raptor-free.
A pleasant suprise was the increase in numbers of audouin's gull at the beach in Puerto Pollensa. Not sure if this is a result of local breeding or from increased numbers at the Ebro delta. They are not at all shy now, as they once seemed. At the end of a beach day, they can be found searching for scraps left by holiday makers on the beach, flying over your head and landing down to 5 meters away. I remember getting excited about seeing them as specks on onshore islands!. It does provide an interesting break from sand castle building. The man-made rock breakwaters just offshore from the main beach are also a favoured resting place for both audouin's gull, egrets and the mediterranean subspecies of shag. I recommend snorkelling out to the breakwaters. The fish numbers and species were quite stunning and you get amazingly close views of the birds which seem unafraid of you and remain undisturbed, probably due to habituation to vast numbers of holiday makers.
audouin's gull, Puerto Pollensa beach
