We were treated to a later start and breakfast in the Demirkazik hotel. After which we departed for a coastal site called Tuz Golu, relatively close to the city of Adana. Not to be confused with a large lake called Tuz Golu to the North West of Demirkazik. We arrived at Tuz Golu after an uneventful couple of hours or so of driving. In my view, this wasn't a great site and was purely there as a padder site on the last morning of the tour for the others. However, it was about forty-five minutes away from Adana airport, where the others were flying out of and it may have been the best location available. We quickly stopped for this Squacco Heron just before reached the estuary.
Squacco Heron: This monotypic species occurs in the Southern part of the Western Palearctic, Africa & Madagascar
There were a few Waders on the estuary with the highlight being a lone Greater Sandplover, along with about thirty Kentish Plovers.
The coastal Tuz Golu was an a large coastal estuary
Black-winged Stilt: This monotypic species occurs in the Mediterranean & Sub-Saharan Africa to South East Asia & Taiwan
Black-winged Stilt: They are a very elegant species
Greater Sandplover with a closer Kentish Plover: This is the columbinus subspecies which breeds from Turkey to South Afghanistan and winters in the South East Mediterranean & Red Sea
Greater Sandplover: Taken with my Canon 7D Mark II
Greater Sandplover: Another example of the crap colour balance with the Canon SX60, compared to the previous photos taken with my Canon 7D Mark II. Although the SX60 had a more powerful zoom, the quality was poor at a high zoom and the higher zoom was generally too grainy to be worth using
After having a good look at the estuary, we headed off to a small restaurant on the edge of the estuary for an early lunch.
The local accommodation in these habitats always looks very basic and rundown
After an early lunch it was off to Adana airport to drop the others as the tour had ended. There were a few common species to photograph as the others were grabbing their bags.
Laughing Dove: This is the nominate senegalensis subspecies which occurs from some of the Greek islands, to Turkey, Israel, West Arabia, Socotra & Sub-Saharan Africa
When I was looking into the potential Ticks for this trip, I was interested to see that Iraq Babbler had expanded into the Birecik area in the previous decade. This was a species that wasn't around in Turkey on my first trip in 1986 and I was keen to look for it, given there are no other realistic locations where it would be possible to safely see it in its range. I was nervous about travelling to Birecik, which was my most favourite location that we visited on the first trip, as it was only twenty miles North of where there had been an ongoing major battle with ISIS around Kobani. By the time the trip happened, it was a few months after ISIS had been pushed out of Kobani. When I checked with Soner's colleague, he assured me that Birecik town was safe to visit, albeit I wasn't going to carry on further East, as that province had a UK Government Essential Travel Only warning.
House Sparrow: This is the balearoibericus subspecies which occurs from Mediterranean Spain, the Balearic Islands & France, to the Balkans & Turkey
To be on the safe side, I had asked Soner if he would stay on for an extra day of private guiding with a hired car to go looking for the Iraq Babblers. He was happy to do that and so I arranged to fly back one day later than the others. I had invited Nigel, Simon and Bob to join me. Unfortunately, they had already booked their flights and it was very expensive to change them. I was happy to go on my own with Soner, who knew the best areas for the Iraq Babblers and more importantly, he would be able to check the local conditions on the day, in case, security in the area had suddenly become more dangerous. Fortunately, there were no risks in visiting and I will cover the Birecik extension in the next Blog Posts.
