Four of the Bishops Stortford Crew headed to Southern Morocco for a weeks birding,

we had a good trip and only really missed the desert specialties as we spent little time there.

We flew from Gatwick out to Marrakech and back from Agadir saving a return drive

to Marrakech. The trip was a little more relaxed than most and all the accommodation

was booked in advance, we had local drivers for all of the trip.

Saturday 10^th March Our late afternoon departure from London to Marrakech was uneventful apart from the taxi drive to our city centre hotel. We explored the old city in the evening and sampled the cusine. Sunday 11^th March Our hotel in the centre of town had a roof terrace, this provided us with our first birds of the trip, a few confiding house buntings, and large numbers of little and pallid swifts. We also found a pair of long legged buzzards nest building. Heading south into the high Atlas, only a couple of stops with nothing of real note. On arrival to Oukaimeden we quickly connected with African chaffinch and African blue tit and lots of choughs both alpine and red billed. A black wheatear and long legged buzzard showed well eying up the Barbary ground squirrels, a Dutch birder put us onto Horned larks above the old village. It took a little while to find the crimson winged finches near the ski lifts as being Sunday lots of visitors were present. Rock bunting and great spotted woodpecker were of note on the return journey, we again overnighted in Marrakech. Monday 12^th March This mornings roof watching was almost identical to the previous morning, we headed off towards Ouzarzazate over the Tizi n Tichka pass. We birded all the way stopping in prime habitat. The first was mixed mid level forest, where we had coal tit and great tit. Several stops were made for the dramatic scenery although the birds were quite common species. We made a stop on the descent by a small village, where a large group of mixed hirundines mainly crag martins with a couple of plain martins, a green woodpecker call focussed our attention and a female Levalliants woodpecker was found on one of the few trees. Several other stops were made without anything of interest. One stop had black wheatear and moussiers redstart as well as blue rock thrush and crested lark. A further stop a few miles further with laughing dove and white crowned black wheatear. We stopped in a rather nice hotel in Skoura. Tuesday 13^th March Pick of the pre breakfast birds were black wheatear and trumpeter finches. Today would be our furthest west and a little journey into the desert on the Tagit track. But our first stop was within sight of Skoura for a lovely Lanner Falcon, we had several excellent stops for desert lark, desert wheatear, water pipit and thekla lark. We reached the Tagit track and quickly found large numbers of short toed larks and a flock of lesser short toed larks before finding one of out targets, temminck’s horned larks. Fat sand rats entertained by the side of the road and we picked up several red rumped wheatears and black eared wheatears. The area around the dump had desert larks, stone curlews and an excellent Montague’s harrier. Wednesday 14^th March Blue rock thrush and red rumped swallow were this morning’s pre breakfast highlights. This morning was to be the search for mourning wheatear. We stopped at several sites along the main road to Agadir, no mourning wheatear but the stops produced desert larks, wc black wheatears, cirl buntings, black wheatears, several cream coloured coursers and an isabelline wheatear(which another group also got). The birding was excellent with every stop having excellent birds. Still no mourning wheatear but we still had one good area, the road from the N10 to Amerzgane, and 6km from the main rd (near a ruined building) in a wadi we picked up a mourning wheatear. Our first camels of the trip and more cream coloured coursers on the journey west. At Aoulouz we encountered the first water and from the bridge we had the birds to match, the pick was water rail. We arrived to an excellent meal at our city centre in Taroudannt. Thursday 15^th March The rooftop terrace provided all the usual city birds, house buntings came into the hotel. We headed into the Oued sous valley and birded the irrigated areas. Abundant fan tailed warblers, a selection of wagtails, meadow and tawny pipits and some flythrough black bellied sandgrouse. Our next stop was a drier area abundant with shrikes and warblers, stone curlews and bee eaters showed well and a black shouldered kite was present. We headed to Tioute where a lush oasis awaited us. Our only tortoises of the trip two moorish tortoises were here and the whole area was a migrant trap, common redstarts supplemented the moussier’s. Large numbera of Chiffchaffs amongst other warblers, a barbary falcon, was all to brief. Back to the irrigated area, where we finally picked up fulvous babblers and black crowned tchagra. Friday 16^th March Today we headed up to the Tizi n test pass, hoping for raptors and tristram’s warblers. The first stop gave up barbary partridge, sparrowhawk, lanner falcon and Levallant’s woodpecker, our second a female tritams warbler and our third bonelli’s and golden eagle. Almost at the top a male tristram’s warbler and rock bunting were found, but the real prize was just below the summit where displaying booted eagles were found – awesome, almost as good was at the top of the pass was a sparrowhawk hunting the swallows coming over the pass. The descent had similar birds apart from displaying barbary falcons. Onto Igador, where a search of the riverbed only had the common birds. Saturday 17^th March Another glorious day, and we headed to the Oued massa the first stop was the bridge (Gosney Oued massa site 8) and it held several ducks, little grebes a showy ashy headed wagtail and a black crowned tchagra, black shouldered kite, beeeaters and good numbers of the common species. There were several damsel and dragonflys including emperor and lesser emperor. We picked up a couple of little owls on the stone walls in the village along with blue rock thrush and black eared wheatear. The track to the reserve had an all too brief butterfly (probably plain tiger), squacco heron and laughing dove, here were several groups of birders, the first we had seen this trip, some were more polite than others! And some claiming rarer species than were present! A brief lunch in the picnic area and we took the long walk through the reserve, whitethroat and the rather elegant race of stonechat were quickly picked up along with a large group of alpine swifts and mixed hirundines. We had an excellent purple heron fly in and a good selection of ducks including marbled duck. A couple of Fringe toed lizards were fighting and oblivious of our presence. The water currently does not flow into the sea and on the sandbank a large flock of sandwich terns and a selection of gulls were present with a few sanderling. The return walk was excellent, a drinking site brought in lots of birds and gave us time to study the races of greenfinch a remarkable bird and goldfinch (not so clear cut) as well as the common birds showing very well. Squacco herons, godwits, stilts, spoonbills were all present along with a curlew sandpiper and a couple of little stints along the waters edge. The highlight was a showy moussiers redstart that was photogenic. Sunday 18^th March Our final day and our last look at the local birds, house buntings, little and pallid swifts, as well as the commoner species. Our journey produced several black shouldered kites, the first stop was Tamri estuary. Here we picked up osprey, ruddy shelduck, Kentish plover and southern grey shrike. We searched further a field and stumbled upon 40 bald ibis just above the breeding colony (cannot disclose its location). After having had our fill of ibis we headed south for a couple of hours at the Oued sous. After a quick lunch we had a look round and found several osprey, both godwits, shelduck, Circa 100 greater flamingo’s, grey, Kentish, ringed and little ringed plovers, gull billed terns were picked out amongst the sandwich terns and audoins gulls from the mixed gull flock. Our look at the drainage ditch (well rubbish filled ditch) by the palace guards hut held no Moroccan wagtails, lucky as the guards were not happy by my camera, so we headed back, picking up a couple of barbary partridges on the way back. Almost back at the car when another British birder (thanks) told us the moroccan wagtails were back. We picked them up along with two turtle doves and a green sandpiper and I sneaked a few pics trying not to get arrested. Back to the airport and our delayed flight, 3 hours sleep and I was back in work – still not a bad trip. Greenfinch and Fringe Toed Lizards Black Shouldered Kite and Southern Grey Shrike

House Bunting Spotless Starling Dark Collared Dove African Chaffinch Corn Bunting Gecko sp White Crowned Black Wheatear Trumpeter Finch Desert Lark Red Rumped Wheatear Horned Lark Fat Sand Rat Stone Curlew Camels Booted Eagle (light phase) Temminck's Horned Lark Temminck's Horned Lark Tristram's Warbler Tristram's Warbler Black Crowned Tchagra Ashy Headed Wagtail Greater Flamingo Bald Ibis Moroccan Wagtail Moroccan Magpie Moussier's Redstart

Birds – 155

Little Grebe	Cormorant (maroccanus)	Cattle Egret
Little Egret	Squacco Heron	Grey Heron
Purple Heron	White Stork	Bald Ibis
Spoonbill	Greater Flamingo	Shelduck
Ruddy Shelduck	Mallard	Gadwall
Pintail	Shoveler	Marbled Duck
Tufted Duck	Red Brested Merganser	Osprey
Golden Eagle (homeyeri)	Booted Eagle	Bonelli’s Eagle
Black Kite	Marsh Harrier	Black Winger Kite
Montagu’s Harrier	Long Legged Buzzard (cirtensis)	Sparrowhawk (punicus)
Kestrel	Lesser Kestrel	Barbary Falcon
Lanner Falcon	Barbary Partridge	Water Rail
Moorhen	Coot	Oystercatcher
Avocet	Black Winged Stilt	Stone Curlew (saharae)
Cream Coloured Courser	Little Ringed Plover	Ringed Plover
Kentish Plover	Grey Plover	Sanderling
Dunlin	Curlew Sandpiper	Little Stint
Green Sandpiper	Common Sandpiper	Redshank
Greenshank	Bar tailed godwit	Black Tailed godwit
Curlew	Black Headed Gull	Yellow legged Gull (michahellis)
Audouin’s Gull	Lesser Black Backed Gull	Sandwich Tern
Gull Billed Tern	Black Bellied Sandgrouse	Rock Dove
Woodpigeon	Stock Dove	Laughing Dove
Turtle Dove	Little Owl (saharae)	Common Swift
Pallid Swift (brehmorum)	Little Swift (galilejensis)	Hoopoe
European Beeeater	Levaillant’s Green Woodpecker	Great spotted woodpecker (mauritanus)
Crested Lark	Thekla Lark	Short toed lark (rubiginosa)
Lesser Short Toed Lark (minor)	Desert Lark (payni)	Horned Lark (Atlas)
Temminck’s Horned Lark	Sand Martin	Plain Martin (mauritanica)
House Martin	Crag Martin	Barn Swallow
Red Rumped Swallow	Tawny Pipit	Meadow Pipit
Water Pipit	White Wagtail	Moroccan Wagtail
Ashy Headed Wagtail	Yellow Wagtail	Blue Headed Wagtail
Grey Wagtail	Wren (kabylorum)	Common Bulbul
Robin	Redstart	Black Redstart (gibraltariensis)
Moussier’s Redstart	Northern Wheatear	Isabelline Wheatear
Desert Wheatear (homochroa)	Black Eared Wheatear	Mourning Wheatear (halophila)
White Crowned Wheatear	Black Wheatear (syenitica)	Red rumped wheatear
Stonechat (rubicola)	Blue rock thrush	Mistle Thrush (deichleri)
Blackbird (mauritanicus)	Blackcap	Sardinian Warbler
Whitethroat	Spectacled Warbler	Subalpine warbler (inornata)
Tristrams Warbler (maroccana)	Zittling Cisticola	Cetti’s Warbler
Willow Warbler	Chiffchaff	Great Tit (excelsus)
African Blue Tit	Coal Tit (atlas)	Woodchat Shrike
Great Grey Shrike (algeriensis)	Great Grey Shrike (elegans)	Black Crowned Tchagra
Fulvous Babbler	Magpie (mauritanica)	Chough
Alpine Chough	Raven	Spotless Starling
House Sparrow	Spanish Sparrow	Rock Sparrow (barbara)
African Chaffinch	Linnet	Goldfinch (parva)
Greenfinch (voosi)	Serin	Trumpter finch
Cirl Bunting	House Bunting (sahari)	Rock Bunting
Corn Bunting	Alpine Swift

Mammals, Reptiles etc. - 10

Fat Sand Rat	Barbary Ground Squirrel	Moorish Tortoise
Turtle sp	Spanish terrapin	Frog sp
Gecko sp	Fringe Toed Lizard	Lizard sp
Bat sp

Insects – 9

White Legged Damselfly	Lesser Emperor	Emperor
African Orange Tip	Bath White	Large White
Clouded Yellow	Scarce Swallowtail	Wall
Small Blue	Plain Tiger	Painted Lady

Literature.

We used the following books

A birdwatching guide to Morocco, P Combridge and A snook, ISBN 1 900159 65 1 – very brief on each site not of great use.

A Birdwatchers' Guide to Morocco, Patrick Bergier and Fedora Bergier – ISBN 1 871104 09 2 - although slightly out of date the most useful book.

Finding Birds in Southern Morocco, Dave Gosney, ISBN 1 898110 04 2 – A little dated but still of some use

Map - Geo Center Morocco, 1:800,000, ISBN 3 575 03196 7

<	E-Mail Mark Hows