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The beautiful Ortolan Bunting Emberiza hortulana is a fairly scarce summer visitor to southern Europe (parts of the Iberian Peninsula, southern France, and the Balkans), north into Scandinavia and Germany, and east as far as Mongolia. As much as 50% of the global population is found in Europe, and the entire population apparently winters south [...]

Crag Martins and Rock Martins Ptyonoprogne rupestris and P. fuligula
21 April 2006, Doha, Qatar
 
After a morning’s birding in Doha, Qatar I found a small flock of Martins flying around the outside of the hotel I was staying at.

At first glance - while I raced to get the camera settings set for photographing rapidly flying birds [...]