Having had a good day out in early October with Carl and Riss it was great to get the chance to take Riss’ parents and their friends out for the morning. Leaving from Emba we headed north to Evretou Dam visiting the ‘deep’ end first. There were three Grey Heron, a Moorhen, a Great Cormorant and some Mallard on the water and we heard a Long-legged Buzzard but couldn’t locate it. We did find a couple of Black Redstart, two male Sardinian Warbler, some Linnet and of course Common Stonechat. We had heard Chukar and one ran in front of the car as we left and headed for the ‘shallow’ end of the dam.

Waiting to greet us as we drove up were a young Bonelli’s Eagle and two Long-legged Buzzard. Great – the eagle flew over our heads and the two buzzards had to put up with being mobbed by Common Kestrel. Good timing – in fact if road works hadn’t made us take a detour our timing would have been different and we may have missed them. At the water’s edge was a Great Egret and as we watched it the Pied Kingfisher that had been present for the last few days flew out from the other side of the dam and hovered over the water. We had great views of that although the Common Kingfisher was only seen briefly. Also in the area were White Wagtail, Meadow Pipit, Common Chaffinch, European Robin, Chiffchaff, Song Thrush and a Woodlark.

As we returned towards Paphos another Long-legged Buzzard flew along the side of the road near Stroumbi. We had a quick visit to Anarita Park where we found the obliging male Finsch’s Wheatear, at least twenty Woodlark and a Little Owl. A juvenile Red-backed Shrike was still around and we had the chance to watch a couple of Black Redstart up close.

We seemed to have packed a lot into a few hours and I returned the group to their holiday home.

Total number of species seen – 38

Great Cormorant, Great Egret, Grey Heron, Mallard, Common Buzzard, Long-legged Buzzard, Bonelli’s Eagle, Common Kestrel, Chukar, Moorhen, Rock Dove, Common Woodpigeon, Eurasian Collared Dove, Little Owl, Pied Kingfisher, Common Kingfisher, Crested Lark, Woodlark, Meadow Pipit, White Wagtail, European Robin, Western Black Redstart, Common Stonechat, Finsch’s Wheatear, Song Thrush, Cetti’s Warbler, Sardinian Warbler, Eurasian Blackcap, Common Chiffchaff, Great Tit, Red-backed Shrike, Eurasian Magpie, Western Jackdaw, Hooded Crow, House Sparrow, Common Chaffinch, European Goldfinch, Common Linnet