Provence 2008: The Camargue II

As wonderful as the Petite Camargue and the coast at Stes-Maries are, there is always a special excitement in birding that narrow tongue of marsh and farmland between the Etang des Vaccarès and the Rhone. This was the destination for the longest birding day of our tour, thirteen hours that passed like an instant and left us wishing–almost–that the food were not so good and the pillows not so soft back in Arles!

We started the morning at La Capelière, the major visitor center in the eastern Camargue, where a pair of White Storks was already in attendance at their huge nest.

Old nests of this species are notorious for harboring other species, and Western Jackdaws and House Sparrows were busy in their own little apartments in the lower layers, while a Gray Heron spent most of the morning perched nearby in the tree, no doubt envious of the fine structure the storks had inherited from generations of their ancestors.

The walk around the trails was bird-filled and beautiful, and the first blind gave us stunningly close views of Spotted Redshank and the only Green Sandpipers of the tour (Wood Sandpipers were much more abundant, reflecting the late date, I suppose). Oystercatchers are also a feature here, along with an impressive density of obstreperous Black-necked Stilts, rivaled only by the Flamingos in their outlandish proportions.

Water Rails were nearly as noisy, squealing and groaning very near the blind, and the fortunate and the patient among us got close views of a pair moving through the reeds and cattails.

This is also one of the best areas of the Camargue for raptors, and we had our best views here of Western Marsh Harrier, powerful, almost buteo-like wetland predators quite unlike their “long-winged” congeners.

A fine surprise was a Short-toed Snake-Eagle perched on a pole across the marsh, its huge head bringing to mind an outsized owl. This or another bird soared over us later in the morning, too, providing a greatly appreciated lifebird for nearly all the participants. (A French birder we ran into later in the day had had no fewer than 5 individuals of this species in the afternoon!)

The inevitable consequence of birderly exhilaration is birderly hunger, and we enjoyed a fine picnic Provence-style at the shaded tables of the visitor center.

This was, no exaggeration, the best meal I had ever had “in the field,” and not just because of the food and the great company: Common Nightingales and Cetti’s Warblers sang to us from the tangle, Flamingos honked and Black-winged Stilts yapped overhead, and a lovely little male Pied Flycatcher saw to it that no ants disturbed our repast.

A pause for Little Grebe, actively and frustratingly diving on a roadside pond, and then it was off to Salin de Badon, my favorite spot in the eastern Camargue. It had grown warm, and some of us opted to wait in the comfortable chairs at the gites, where they enjoyed more Nightingales and Chiffchaffs while others of us set out along the trails to the justly famous blinds. Sardinian Warblers and Common Nightingales were common in the low shrubs, and a nice variety of herons was in every ditch and weedy pond. We were after shorebirds, though, and the show from the Coot Blind was very good, with several score Black-tailed Godwits loafing and bathing, a flock of 80 or more Ruffs, a dozen Pied Avocet, and the trip’s only Common Snipe all easily seen. In the distance was a surprising gang of some 40 European Spoonbills, making us wonder whether the species, usually so rare in the Camargue and usually found only in winter, wasn’t breeding somewhere in the area. A young French couple who had followed us into the blind pronounced the birds “préhistoriques,” as good a description as any for a bird that always looks like it has stepped out of an overly imaginative museum diorama.

The afternoon was coming to an end, forcing us to turn back towards Arles. We stopped on the way at the Grenouillet, where a distant pair of Little Ringed Plovers played on the drying margins of the lake, and a dashing European Kingfisher, well, dashed past us along the canal. One of the highlights of the trip was a light-morph Booted Eagle perched here on a tall tower while Common Buzzards, Kestrels, and Black Kites passed overhead. Common and Gull-billed Terns were on the nearby rice paddies, but the marsh terns included only (only!) Black and Whiskered.

Our final stop on a long and birdy day was the Mas d’Agon, where we were surprised to encounter two other parties of birders, friendly and helpful. At least 4 Squacco Herons were hunting the edges of the ponds in the fading light, and a Northern Lapwing passed over and landed on a newly plowed field, filling a gap for those who had missed the species earlier in the week. We were tired, we were hungry, we were happy, and we returned to Arles just as the sun of Provence was setting over the rooftops.