Sunday, 18th May 2008
Malta's birding potential
Dolphins and shearwaters feeding. Photo: John J. Borg
Hadoram Shirihai is fresh off a boat trip to photograph European storm-petrels in Malta and he is excited.
"We had a pod of common dolphins, 25 of them, circling close to us and fishing with the shearwaters. The birds were feeding among the dolphins and picking off the fish they missed.
We could have watched them all day, they were so close... but we had to go on to find the storm-petrels."
When a man like Shirihai is excited about birding in Malta, you know it's serious. Shirihai is a heavyweight ornithologist from Israel, widely acknowledged as the foremost middle-eastern authority on birds. His published works include The Birds of Israel which was awarded the Best Bird Book of the Year by British Birds and Birdwatch.
He also won awards for A Complete Guide to Antarctic Wildlife, while The Macmillan Birder's Guide to European and Middle Eastern Birds is a summary of 30 years of field research. Among these achievements, he recently rediscovered Beck's Petrel which was believed to be extinct for around 80 years.
Last week, he flew to Malta specifically to meet John J. Borg of Heritage Malta and the EU LIFE Yelkouan Shearwater Project so that he could be shown the very special storm-petrels that breed on Filfla. His enthusiasm for the seabird population here in the islands was infectious.
"What a trip!" he enthused. "We left port at 4.30 a.m. and headed straight out beyond Filfla. Mr Borg has a secret recipe which he puts into the water to tempt the birds in and we spent a lot of time bobbing on the sea with the birds just out of range of the camera. The Cory's and Yelkouan Shearwaters came close to the boat, but the storm-petrels were more wary."
Mr Borg said: "Every time we swung round to get close, they backed away, 'running' on the waves before take off, as if they were teasing us. These birds are camera shy that is why getting a good photo of them at sea is such a prize."
Having seen just a little bit of what Malta has to offer, Shirihai feels that the islands have the potential to be one of the top birding destinations in Europe in terms of migration.
"I can see the parallels in Malta with the birding situation in Eilat in Israel in the 1970s," he says. At that time, birding tourism was just about to start its meteoric rise up the economic agenda. Could birdwatching in Malta see a similar explosion in popularity in the coming years?
The renowned ornithologist and author of a number of bird and wildlife guides has no doubt that birding and eco-tourism could take off in Malta in a big way if correctly managed.
"I set up the first birdwatching centre in Israel. At its peak, we had 10,000 birders coming in spring from all over the world. We employed 40 workers and bird-watchers were among the biggest customers of one of the world's top car hire firms."
Shirihai feels that there is no reason why we could not have the same situation in Malta. For a number of people it means a good amount of revenue - especially when people are willing to pay top dollar to guides and hotels in order to find the birds they want to see.
Shirihai is already planning his next trip to Malta, hoping to arrive next month to finally snap those elusive storm-petrels so that they can feature in his current work, a handbook on seabirds which is still a work in progress.
And where Shirihai goes, other birders are sure to follow - the future of eco-tourism in Malta just got rosier.
Ms Raine is EU LIFE, Project Manager
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Comments
First of all I never mentioned thousands and secondly I was always referring to what birds you can see at the main migratory routes at Messina, Gibraltar and the rest. And not what birds are present throughout the respective countries. I am sorry you didnt fully understand my previous comment. Ofcourse all those birds mentioned and many others are maybe more commoner for example in Sicily but definitly not at Messina where the Honey Buzzards concentrate. That was my point. I think its obvious that some countries have more bird species and numbers than other countries including Malta but that does not make Malta unattractive to birdwatchers. Again, many birdwatchers are not necessarily impressed by numbers. I wonder how many birdwatchers have you met in your lifetime. And oh......i thought a pigeon was an eagle. Thanks for pointing it out.
May I ask you one simple question? Where do the "thousands" of migrating birds go after passing over Malta in Spring? I am really curious about your views because claiming that you can hardly see any turtle doves, Rollers, Golden Orioles, Ferruginous Ducks, Purple Herons and Collared Flycatchers in Sicily is completely hilarious. If this is your knowledge about bird migration, I wonder if you can distinguish between a pigeon and an eagle.
The aim of finally observing a few of the smallest birds in Europe gives pleasure just the same as watching hundreds of birds migrating over one of the migration hotspots in the world. Numberwise the Canary Islands offer less than the Maltese Islands because they hardly have any migration but still they are one of the many places which birdwatchers from all over Europe, especially Britain, choose to go birdwatching. The reason is that there you can watch birds that are not found in Britain. Likewise, most of the resident species in the Maltese Islands are not found in Britain including Spectacled and Sardinian Warbler, Zitting Cisticola, Blue Rock Thrush and last but not least the Spanish Sparrow. And besides that in the Maltese Islands we have a good selection of bird species that migrate through that originate from both sides of the Western palearctic which any birdwatcher especially from Northern Europe would dream of watching. Thes include Roller, Bee-eater, Golden Oriole, Red-footed Falcon, Alpine Swifts, Hoopoe, Black-winged Stilts, Purple Herons, Ferruginous Duck and Cory's shearwaters. You can rest assured that many birdwatchers are willing to come here and enjoy a few days birdwatching just to see these birds. If they want to see thousands of Honey Buzzards migrating they know were to go but to enjoy a few relaxing days watching some birds and enjoying our climate with their families Malta is one of the ideal places.
Regarding migration of birds and numbers and so on. First of all most birds that migrate do so by flying on a broadfront. For them the crossing of over long distances of sea does not matter. The bottlenecks of Gibraltar, Sicily-Tunisia, Bosphorus and Eilat in Israel are mostly used by most birds of prey, storks, eagles and pelicans. But again not all birds of prey do so. For example over the Maltese Islands the Hobby, Marsh Harrier, Kestrel and Eleonora's Falcon migrate in larger numbers than at any of these sites and these are all birds of prey. You would hardly see any Rollers, Golden Orioles, Ferruginous Ducks, Purple Herons and Collared Flycatchers. If you go over to Sicily to watch Honey Buzzards migrating in spring you would hardly see Turtle Doves and any of the above species mentioned.
I hope this has cleared up all the mistaken ideas hunters have of bird migration and birdwatching.
Israel's unique location at the junction of three continents, Europe, Asia and Africa, makes it a site for an extraordinary phenomena: some 500 million migrating birds cross its skies twice a year.
Taken from:
http://www.birds.org.il/show_item.asp?itemId=1700&levelId=457
Just one example:
Migration in 2003 - Station: TIRAT ZVI, 61 km. from the seashore
Black Stork 655
Honey Buzzard 22651
Lesser-spotted Eagle 280
Levant Sparrowhawk 449
White Stork 181798
Pull the other one BIRDLIES. You are now really living up to your recently acquired reputation.
Please get real and at least be honest . I wonder how many readers here are seeing all these birds .but i have an idea ,maybe we can work something out with the italians .We get the tourist and then ship them out to Sicily,maybe we give them there monies worth ........MTA PLEASE NOTE .
Could birdwatching in Malta see a similar explosion in popularity in the coming years?"
You have got the reply at hand, just ask Mr Winston Zahra Jr if he would be willing to invest in birdwatching tourism for Malta.
Maybe, Birdlife Malta is now trying to disguise the "bad name" it has given to Malta.
This is another futile attempt by Birdlife to picture a totally different situation from reality. You are trying to depict the Maltese Islands as a bird haven when from time immemorial, ornithological records show this is a far cry from the truth. Time will prove you wrong I'm sure Ms Raine however in the meantime you are to be applauded for bringing a top Israeli birdwatcher who was " excited" to see nonetheless than ..... Hear it coming.. Shearwaters feeding on a secret recipe off Filfla !!!!! Now gosh, isn't that an extraordinary feat.
I wonder who could believe your article....just browse here an you will have the answer why Malta cannot be compared to Israel. Please stop this bull... once and for all!
http://www.birdingisrael.com/birdsOfIsrael/byMonth/index.htm