As May is the best season for bird watching, Jelleke chartered a tour operator, experienced in bird watching tours, to guide us around Bukhara and Samarkand and along the road to Tashkent to the various spots where we would be able to see the various birds that are passing or breeding in this country. Towards this purpose Rob took up a week holiday, even though this will be substracted from the vacation in the Netherlands this summer.
We visited different areas ( habitats or ecosystems): the Bukhara wetlands, the Kyzyl Kum desert, the Kattakurgan reservoir, the Tachtakaracha Pass (mountains) and the Zerafshan State Reserve (Forest).
Our guide was Katya Filatova, a young Uzbek biologist with a specialization in ecology. Including the ubiquitous common mynahs, magpies and sparrows our birds list included some 60 different species by the time we got home. The images that follow are taken from internet as Jelleke’s camera (Sony Cybershot from the black market in Ethiopia) is not able to provide the required detail.
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Most common here:
1.Common Mynah,the same one that nests under the roof next to our bedroom window, making an lot of noise, usually found in housing areas.
2.European Roller, sitting on electriciy lines everywhere: a beautiful blue flash when seen flying away. We even found them sitting near their nest, a hole in a clay escarpment.
Most unexpected 1:
Rose Coloured Starling (spreeuw in Dutch) ,
Most unexpected 2.
White Winged Woodpecker,
A beautiful sight when flying: all white wings!
Most flashy 2:
Red crested Mallard, in the wetlands,
see next picture.
see next picture.
Most elusive 1: Turkestan Ground Jay (not seen). Living in the desert, feeding on insects.
But we heard many, singing the stars out of the sky in the forest reserve.
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