Clamorous Reed-warbler - Acrocephalus stentoreous
I haven only been out in the field a couple of times in the last few weeks - I feel a bit daunted by grinding out life photo ticks in Dubai. It is hard work. One of my favourite places, the Pivot fields has had all its turf ripped up to be re-seeded. A drive around that site, otherwise known as the Plant Souk turned up very slim pickings. Another favourite site was hard work as well - the lake at Warsan. There were a couple of Marsh Harriers floating about which was good to see but very few ducks and just the odd egret way off in the distance. I wondering if numbers of birds at the site are higher in the Winter. I expect the Marsh Harriers are going to breed - they are certainly a pair and there is sufficient habitat.
I could make out the sounds of some type of noisy warbler coming out of the thick, and quite dry reed beds all around the sides of both lakes. If you have tried to watch birds in a reed bed then you already know what a thankless task it is. The birds can sing from half way up a reed stem right in the middle of the bed - unless they shimmy up and make themselves seen you haven't got a chance. I really wanted that picture. After about forty minutes of trying different angles and views from the sloping sandy edges of the lake I pretty much gave up. I then had one view of a bird flying up the wall edge and disappearing off to the other smaller lake close to the break in the security fence.
Another stake out for perhaps 10 minutes eventually paid dividends. One bird was clearly singing to attract a mate and in plain view stuck out on a broken over reed hanging across the water.
A great big stocky Acrocephalus type warbler with a long rounded off tail and a long hatchet-like bill. A little bit of book work in the Handbook of the Birds of the World Online - especially the loud scratchy song confirmed the identification. I would estimate there are 4 or 5 singing males at the Warsan lake complex at the moment.
A Little Grebe was fishing close to where I was staking out the Clamorous Reed-warbler. This is a male coming into breeding plumage. I am not sure how fish get into the pond (which is really a lake on an old building site which has become overgrown) but clearly there are small fish as Cormorants, Herons and Egrets all seem to love the place. Photo evidence here. Fish can as I understand it stock a new body of water through their eggs being carried in mud sticking to the feet of wading or swimming birds. It make sense - how else does a new body of water get colonised ?
I expect at some point this site will be torn apart, bulldozed of concreted over (I note the building works going on right next to Ras al Khor to make a few luxury homes with a view of the flamingoes. For now though it is a beautiful oasis of nature - butterflies were on the wing - I could have been in France rather than in Dubai or perhaps next to the Nile where there are tens of thousands of these chunky warblers inhabiting the stands of Papyrus. They probably woke up the Pharoes in their palaces.
Clamorous Reed-warbler, Acrocephalus stentoreous
Warsan Lake, Dubai
1 March 2014
