Mallorca : 20th October 2015 : Salobrar de Campos, Cap de Ses Salines and Portocolom

Mallorca : 20th October 2015 : Salobrar de Campos, Cap de Ses Salines and Portocolom

We hired a car for three days with the intention of visiting some of the birding sites in the south of the island. We had planned on driving straight down to Cap de Ses Salines on the south coast of the island but we reckoned that  we might as well take a second look at the other pools at Salobrar de Campos which was on our way anyway.  When we had been here before with Cristina on our day of guided birding, we had parked up next to the hotel and taken “Eddie ‘s Track” down to the pools there. This time we went past the turning and drove down the road that leads to the salt works. We turned left at the salt world and drove along the road that runs along the edge of the Salinas.

We found  a place to stop and immediately saw two Red Kites in the distance. On the pools we found large numbers of Dunlin and also many Ringed Plover. Scoping round a bit we went on to find a single Avocet and a single Greater Flamingo. There were quite a few Redshanks and a single Shelduck. The Avocet and Dunlin were holiday ticks.

Bird Sightings : Salobrar de Campos

We continued on to Cap de Ses Salines where we had great hopes of good sea watching and lots of birds in the garrigue. We would have been happier had we been entomologists,  however, as most of the wildlife seemed to be biting insects.It is obviously one of the local attractions as there were lots of cars parked at the end of the road but the one thing that all those returning to their cars had in common was the they had been bitten to bits by blood-sucking critters.

We did manage to get distant views of (what we took to be Cory’s) Shearwaters and, in the bushes, Stonechat.  It has to be said that it was a pretty gloomy day for the most part and very windy so a lot of birds preferred to stay hidden in their bushes scolding us as we walked past. Tired of being bitten we drove off to Portocolom  hoping for fewer bites. Interestingly we came across three Carrion Crows in a field – every tick helps our holiday list.

Bird Sightings : Cap de Ses Salines

We went on to another site that is highly regarded in the  birding world – Portocolom.  We parked up in the car park on the road to the lighthouse and then walked down to the rocky shoreline. Again we were attacked by biting insects and this really put us off. By this time I was already nursing thirty mosquito  bites and didn’ t really  want to add to my collection so we didn’t stay for too long. We saw more Shearwaters  and an Audouin’s Gull, a Cormorant and a rising Thekla Lark. As we headed off for the car park, a couple of Stonechats appeared but by now we were keen to get away from the bugs so we headed back home after a good days of birding; perhaps not too many species  but we had got our holiday list up to 90 birds.

Bird Sightings : Portocolom

Route from Port de Polleca

Route back to Port de Polleca

Route back to Port de Polleca continued