Mallorca Day 1: getting to know the locals

I've just returned from a fortnight's family holiday in Mallorca - my first visit to the island - and was sufficiently impressed by its beauty, birds and butterflies to resuscitate this comatose corner of the internet with a few posts on our time there. Stand by then, dear reader, for a day-by-day write-up, recorded not just for posterity, but also in the hope that the up-to-date gen might be of some interest to would-be visitors to the island.

Audouin's Gull - one of the special birds of Mallorca. This one photographed in early morning light on the beach at Port de Pollenca 

First the basics. The self-imposed family flying ban, which held for 17 years but for the occasional short-hop to offshore islands of the UK, had to be breached to get there - suffice to say, this was a necessary hit to the household carbon budget taken in the interests of marital harmony. We booked flights and accommodation via a local travel agent, who negotiated her way through our conflicting aspirations with the skill of a relationship guidance counsellor (thanks Jackie!). Her recommendation to base ourselves in Port de Pollenca in the north of the island was spot on, and aligned with the advice of birding friends who had been previously.

A male Blue Rock Thrush was the first bird I saw in the famous Boquer Valley

Getting to, through and out of Bournemouth airport from home in Wareham was a breeze and we arrived in an uncomfortably warm Palma late on the evening of 1 August. After some tetchy queuing for the hire car (organised independently at a fraction of the price offered by the travel agent, with insurance waiver cover procured separately at a fraction of the price offered by the car hire company) we made the 45 minute journey to Port de Pollenca before hoisting luggage and tired bodies up several flights of stairs to our apartment. This, we were relieved to find, housed a small air-conditioning unit to take the sting out of the Mallorcan night's humidity.

The greyer female Blue Rock Thrush

Day one was largely spent exploring every corner of the swimming pool, but by late afternoon I was feeling the need to explore a more natural habitat, and with the entrance to the famous Boquer Valley just a couple of hundred yards from the apartment, that was the obvious place to start. I had borrowed a copy of Graham Hearl's excellent 'Birdwatching Guide to Mallorca' (2nd edition) but this being printed in 1999, I did wonder whether the advice within it, which warned of constantly changing access arrangements, would still stand. It seemed not when I arrived at the large metal gates at the entrance to the valley as described in the book only to find them padlocked. Uttering some ill-tempered magic words (which did not include 'abracadabra') did the trick when I realised to my embarrassment that there was a small 'gate within the gate' through which the traveller could freely pass.

I soon tuned in to the rattling call of the local Sardinian Warblers, seemingly the most abundant warbler on Mallorca - more often heard than seen, this female was an exception to the rule 

With this hurdle overcome, the warning in Graham's book about needing to brave barking dogs proved out of date (the finca which they previously guarded appeared to have been abandoned, at least temporarily) and from then on the obvious path led up past olive and almond groves to two huge boulders just as described in the text. Passing through these was like entering a hidden world as the majesty of the ridges either side of the valley became apparent. The first birds to be seen just past this point - a pair of Blue Rock Thrush - also appeared as a good omen.

Male Sardinian Warbler is a smart bird - the last one I saw before this trip was in sea buckthorn on the north Norfolk coast!

It being August, the valley was not dripping with the migrants which can reportedly be seen in spring, but it was still a good introduction to the local avifauna: in addition to several more Blue Rock Thrush, the walk to the Cala Boquer at the seaward end of the valley provided an opportunity to familiarise myself with the calls of the seemingly ubiquitous Sardinian Warbler and the more elusive Balearic Warbler (a recent 'split' from Marmora's Warbler). Otherwise, Spotted Flycatcher and Goldfinch appeared to be the most numerous passerines.

The seaward end of the Boquer Valley

Mammalian movement invariably turned out to be one of the goats which roam wild throughout the island, and of raptors, for which the Valley is famous, there was unfortunately no sign but for a calling Kestrel. That said, I was only carrying bins and it became clear that the decision to squeeze the telescope and tripod into the suitcase was probably a good one for the purposes of the rest of the trip.

Spotted Flycatchers darted around the finca at the entrance to Boquer Valley

As well as introducing me to the local wildlife and habitats, the walk to the end of the valley also provided my first view of the Formentor peninsular. I was sufficiently impressed by this to plan an early morning visit there the next day, not least as local signage suggested that the road to the end of the peninsular would be closed to traffic from 1000-1900, a sensible policy to manage visitor pressure to this stunning area. Come back soon for a report on how that went.

Hummingbird Hawkmoth feeding on flowers at the apartment in Port de Pollenca

Memory Lane, Dungeness

Yesterday's post reminded me that while there may be precious little time in my life right now for wildlife watching, let along blogging, I can still take a quick trip down memory lane in the hour between finishing work and falling asleep on the sofa. A timely reminder, dear reader, that this blog is not all about you. It is, of course, mainly about therapy for the author, and after a few weeks of not posting much at all I have decided I need a bit more of that.

Today's metaphorical trip was brought on by the discovery late yesterday of an Audouin's Gull at Dungeness. With a five-meeting day ahead, and a to-do list which would rate highly on Bubo, twitching it would have been impossible. Happily, it was also unnecessary: I was fortunate enough to see the first British record of this species back in May 2003. Claire was big with child at the time - about 7 months worth - and had spent most of her later pregnancy sleeping and doing nothing more eccentric than eating a minimum of 5 whole cucumbers per day.

It was an embarrassing time to be doing the supermarket run, but as Sainsbury's didn't open until 1000, I was free to head out early on the morning of Sunday 5th May to travel the hour from home to the legendary Dungeness peninsular in the hope of seeing migrants and passing seabirds. Having seen not many of either (my dog-eared birdspotter's logbook, making its second appearance this week, records the highlights as Black Tern and Glaucous Gull), I returned home as promised to attend to antenatal duties. These principally involved decorating the nursery, making copious cups of tea as a displacement activity to avoid decorating the nursery, and stocking up on Cucumis sativus*.

The pager then alerted me to the presence of the Audouin's Gull - at Dungeness, from where I had just returned. Had I been the pregnant one, this would have resulted in the immediate onset of labour, but as it was I had to settle for the palpitations, chest pains and cold sweats which, to this day, accompany news of an accessible 'first for Britain'.

Audouin's Gull, Dungeness, 5th May 2003 - first record for Britain

Claire had been so glowing and mellow in recent weeks that I casually suggested I might pop back down to Dunge with some confidence that this would be agreeable, only to find her go all Gandalf on me (click link and watch the first 7 seconds for an explanation). Perhaps I was already coming to terms with the reality of my twitching style being cramped by having a child, but for whatever reason I was uncharacteristically sanguine about it, and after some deep breathing exercises managed to fall asleep on the sofa. On waking an hour later the pager was still persistently reporting the presence of the Audouin's Gull, which had by now been pinned down to the shingle behind the famous fishing boats. Refreshed, I subjected Claire to a barrage of pester power which I like to think stood her in good stead for impending parenthood, and was eventually granted the opportunity to tick and run. This I duly took, and after a mad dash to Dunge and a bit of fuzzy digiscoping (see above), I was good to my word and back in time for dinner. Which was salad, naturally.

* I really wanted to say 'legumes' here as it amused me. Unfortunately, cucumbers are not legumes, but members of the gourd family, which, I am sure you agree, lack the comic potential of the legumes. Hence the resort to the birding blog smart-Alec staple of the Linnean classification for cucumber. Sometimes deference to science and accuracy is just a curse.