After three days of standby (a frustrating contractual obligation where airline crew sit waiting for the phone to ring and a voice from Operations to tell us which country we’ll be flying off to less than an hour of putting the receiver down) - and with just ten minutes to go before being ’stood-down’ and allowed home for the weekend - I was contacted and told that I was needed for the next day’s early morning flight to Tel Aviv in Israel. Israel in September? Could be far worse, I thought to myself, bound to be migrants around to see…just a darn shame I’ll only be there for 24 hours…

I would imagine that most non-Europeans wouldn’t think of birds when they’re first told about a trip to Israel. Sitting at the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea, the State of Israel is bounded by Lebanon to the north, Syria and Jordan to the east, and Egypt to the southwest and its troubled history is well-known. Place names like ‘the Gaza Strip’, ‘Hebron’, ‘the Golan Heights’, and ‘the West Bank’ would probably leap to mind well before warblers, thrushes, and buntings, and the concept of wandering around with binoculars and a camera would seem as unwise as walking through Tehran draped in the ‘Stars and Stripes’. However, because of its geographical location, Israel is a migration hot-spot with literally hundreds of millions of birds pouring through the area heading from a broad swathe of Europe towards northern and eastern Africa, and - despite what many people think - Israel is largely safe and welcomes tourists (I am fully aware of the tensions and struggles going on in Israel incidentally, but I don’t think this blog is the place to start a political debate and - at the risk of seeming politically naive (which I’m definitely not) - I’m going to concentrate on birds and birding and steer clear of any other comment).

September is a little early for picking up rarities - and Tel Aviv is not the best place in Israel to see birds anyway - but the country’s bird list now stands at around 530, and plenty of European birders have either spent time working on kibbutzes or have been to the internationally-renowned Hula Valley or the International Birding & Research Center in Eilat (a town at the far southern end of Israel located at the tip of the Gulf of Aqaba). A number of the commoner species found in Israel are highly sought after by western Europeans, and I figured that as I’d had no time to make any prior arrangements taking a short taxi ride out to Tel Aviv’s Hayarkon (pronounced ‘high-arkun’) Park would probably be my most hassle-free option (especially as I had effectively just six hours of birding before I would need to get back to the hotel and prepare for the flight home).

Often compared with New York’s Central Park by visiting Americans, Hayarkon Park is similarly a major urban retreat which gets packed on weekends (friday and saturday in Israel) with joggers, cyclists, and families, but the comparison from a birding point-of-view is less favourable. Though Hayarkon is a large area and is in a far less-built up neighbourhood than Manhattan it doesn’t have quite the habitat variety or natural feel to it that Central Park is blessed with.

Most of the trees in the park are introduced eucalypts rather than native species (there are though plenty of Palm Trees) and much of the rest of the park is comprised of flat grassy areas (good for Cattle Egrets, Hooded Crows, Spur-winged Plovers, Hoopoes, and introduced Common Mynas but not much else on this occasion - no pipits or larks for example, surprisingly) and a large lake (that seemed to be almost birdless bar a few Barn Swallows snatching insects over it).

Spur-winged Plover Vanellus spinosus

Hoopoe Upupa epops

Hooded Crow Corone cornix (with Cattle Egret behind)

There is a river winding through Hayarkon (which is most easily accessed in the western part of the park) to the coast but apart from hearing a Cetti’s Warbler singing from a clump of riparian vegetation I found very little on it: maybe more time spent scanning the trees along the river would have brought more species but I didn’t feel convinced at the time!). In the few short hours I spent in Hayarkon I didn’t really find a spot that measured up to eg the superbly ‘wild’ feel of Central Park’s “Ramble” but having said that the northern end is much rougher and more “bird friendly” (with an interesting ‘barbecue’ area with smaller trees where I had a great 45 minutes and found both Masked and Red-backed Shrikes (an adult and two juveniles respectively), Laughing and European Turtle Doves (the latter a species I didn’t see at all in the UK this year), Golden Oriole, Whinchat, Spotted Flycatcher, the pale-faced and striking atricapillus form of Eurasian Jay, and good numbers of the Middle-eastern restricted Yellow-vented/White-spectacled Bulbul - whilst overhead a flock of gorgeous European Bee-eaters and two Alpine Swifts kept me hugely entertained).

Adult male Masked Lanius nubicus (upper)
and Red-backed Shrikes L. collurio

Eurasian Jay Garrulus glandarius atricapilla

The day’s top spot though was what I think is known as the Rock Garden, an enclosed ornamental garden full of cacti, what looked like an olive grove with a shallow pond straight out of historical movie set, a single thick clump of bushes, small patches of grass, and several prominent designs using monoliths - one of which looked surprisingly like a small out-of-place Stonehenge.

Whilst the park outside the Garden was fairly busy with people, I was almost the only person inside (which is much the way I generally prefer things) and there were a surprising number of birds hiding out here.

An excellent site for Palestine Sunbird - the Middle Eastern subspecies oseus breeds from Israel and Jordan in the north, down through western Saudi Arabia to Yemen and Oman in the south - this was also the only area I managed to get reasonable (though not photographable) views of a Thrush Nightingale, a species I’ve only ever seen twice before (I’m fairly sure I saw Common Nightingale here too, but the views were too brief to be certain).

Graceful Prinia Prinia gracilis

Palestine Sunbird Nectarinia osea

White-spectacled/Yellow-vented Bulbul Pycnonotus xanthopygos

I again saw both Masked and Red-backed Shrike, saw my only Graceful Prinia of the morning, three Willow Warblers, a Lesser Whitethroat (not sure which race/species), Great Tit, and - after spooking up a small streaky passerine from underneath a tree - realised I was looking at my first ever Cretzschmar’s Bunting, a young bird but a Cretzschmar’s none the less…

Cretzschmar’s Bunting is probably not a species high on the priority list of most of the North American readers of this blog, but European birders will understand the levels of excitement I suddenly hit when after a few minutes of frantically wondering where the bird had gone, not one but FOUR Cretzschmar’s Buntings appeared from out of nowhere and dropped back into the heavy shadows under the same tree - one of which was a gorgeous male.

Cretzschmar’s Bunting Emberiza caesia

I’m a huge fan of buntings as it is, and have seen most of the Asian species on trips to South Korea and India, but I’d never before made it to either the Greek and Turkish breeding grounds or the wintering areas (which are mainly in Sudan and Eritrea) of the very sought-after Cretzschmar’s Bunting. A beautiful blend of dark-orange-brown underparts and blue-grey head and breast, a male is a superb bird - and far more impressive than the out-of-focus photograph above implies. Why the rubbish photos? I’d be happy to admit that I’d flushed the small group if in fact I had, but no sooner had I had a good look at them through binoculars and taken a few quick images, than the juvenile Red-backed Shrike in the photos below swooped down and scattered them to the four winds. Despite looking for an hour I never saw them again, but even relatively brief views like these made the heat and the effort in getting up so early in the morning completely bearable. Excellent!

Juvenile ‘Cretzschmar’s-Bunting-scaring Red-backed Shrike’ - curses…

After the long negative search for the buntings I was hot and tired and decided to head back, musing on a morning of intriguing misses (was that a Honey Buzzard I saw flying away from me, and what was that acrocephalus I only glimpsed?) and some real highlights (a morning that includes not only Cretzschmar’s Bunting but Thrush Nightingale, Masked Shrike, and Spur-winged Plover can only be said to be successful). Would I go to Hayarkon Park again if rostered another Tel Aviv? If I had no other option open to me then why not, but I have to be honest and say that if any Israeli birder resident in Tel Aviv would like to show me somewhere better I’d be very grateful indeed…

(Incidentally, a final interesting element to the birding in Hayarkon is the number of parrots flying around. I didn’t look too closely but while the majority seemed to be Ring-necked Parakeets I did also see three Monk Parakeets and a couple of Lovebirds (probably Red-headed going by other trip reports). All are as far as I know are escapes.)

Day List:
Black-crowned Night-heron Nycticorax nycticorax 20+; Cattle Egret Bubulcus ibis 20+; Grey Heron Ardea cinerea1-2; Little Egret Egretta garzetta5-10; Common Kestrel Falco tinnunculus 2; (European Honey-buzzard Pernis apivorus 1?); Common Moorhen Gallinula chloropus 4; Spur-winged Plover Vanellus spinosus 10+; Feral Pigeon Columba livia +; European Turtle Dove Streptopelia turtur 3-4; Eurasian Collared Dove Streptopelia decaocto 10+; Laughing Dove Streptopelia senegalensis 10+; Ring-necked Parakeet Psittacula krameri +; Lovebird sp Agapornis sp 1; Monk Parakeet Myiopsitta monachus 3(+); Alpine Swift Apus melba 2; White-throated Kingfisher Halcyon smyrnensis 4; European Bee-eater Merops apiaster 16-20; Eurasian Hoopoe Upupa epops 6; Red-backed Shrike Lanius collurio 5-6; Masked Shrike Lanius nubicus 2; Eurasian Golden Oriole Oriolus oriolus 2; Eurasian Jay Garrulus glandarius 3-4; House Crow Corvus splendens c)10 (along coast only); Hooded Crow Corvus cornix 20+; Great Tit Parus major 2; Barn Swallow Hirundo rustica 20+; Northern House Martin Delichon urbicum c)10; Graceful Prinia Prinia gracilis 1; White-spectacled/Yellow-vented Bulbul Pycnonotus xanthopygos 20+; Cetti’s Warbler Cettia cetti 1 (heard); Willow Warbler Phylloscopus trochilus 6; Lesser Whitethroat Sylvia curruca 2; Common Myna Acridotheres tristis +; Whinchat Saxicola rubetra 1; Eurasian Blackbird Turdus merula 4; Thrush Nightingale Luscinia luscinia 1 (2?); Spotted Flycatcher Muscicapa striata 2; Palestine Sunbird Nectarinia osea c)10; House Sparrow Passer domesticus +; European Greenfinch Carduelis chloris 4; European Goldfinch Carduelis carduelis 1; Cretzschmar’s Bunting Emberiza caesia 4

All photographs © Charlie Moores