Birding in Lanzarote 14-28 January 2025

As is often the case, January saw us taking a break in order to get some winter sun and, whilst birding wasn’t our main purpose, we still managed to fit some casual birding in. The coastal and desert envirnments gave us good opportunities to find some interesting birds.

As usual we saw a good group of Turnstones and a Common Sandpiper at Marina Rubicon. There were also Yellow-legged Gulls, Collared Doves and Spanish Sparow which are fairly common everywhere. We also got Whimbrel and Sandpiper at Caleta de Famara.

At Salinas de Janubio we found that the site we usually walk through was totally roped off and they are obviously serious about no entry now with lots of warnings and explanatory boards. From the roped off area we could see a large number of Black-necked Grebes (about 100) and a couple of Ruddy Shelduck sat on one of the strips of land – they probably appreciate the quiet now. There were also lots of Black-winged Stilts. We had to walk round the edge of the reserve along the edge of the black sand which was exhausting for me as my lungs weren’t getting any better as I would have expected after a few days. Very hard work on the black sand. Also Yellow-legged gulls, Berthelot’s Pipit, Common Redshank, Ruddy Turnstone, Kentish Plover, Canarian Raven and Common Sandpiper. We couldn’t access the bit where we have often seen Trumpeter Finches.
On another occasion we went to the overview of the Salinas but this was also partly roped off limiting our views. We did get a pair of Canarian Ravens here though.

We had three attempts to find Houbara Bustards at El Jable but we had no luck on any of the three attempts. On the first we only got a single Cream-coloured Coarser; The second time we went we got two Egyptian Vultures which we thought might have been life-ticks but later I looked it up and found that we had seen a pair – probably at the same spot – on 11 February 2015 and also a few days later on Fuerteventura from the car park overlooking Las Penitas at 28.3870N, 14.0924W. However, I am absolutely sure that we hadn’t had closer or better views previously; we had a good five minutes to look at them as they circled around and flew over our heads quite low.

Also at El Jable we got two Lesser Short-toed Larks, a few Berthelot’s Pipits and a pair of Cream-coloured Coarsers. We got caught in a heavy (for Lanzarote) downfall of rain and had to dry off in the car until the rain stopped before driving down to Caleta de Famara for lunch. En route Anne stopped for what turned out to be seven Stone Curlews in a field next to a farm. Also two Partridges which could well have been Barbary Partridges rather than Red-legged Partridges. I read in Collins that they do not overlap in territory but other sources suggested that RLP are also to found on Lanzrote so I suppose that was what these were – they were a bit distant and beyond the Stone Curlew. The exact location was the field of the last farmhouse on the right as you leave Soo. The exact location was C. San Juan Evangelista 10,35558,500. See 29°06’02.6″N 13°36’45.5″W. On our way back we passed a field full of Cattle Egrets.

Bird Sightings : Lanzarote January 2025

Species	No
Berthelot’s Pipit	4
Black-necked Grebe	100
Black-winged Stilt	12
Canarian Raven	2
Cattle Egret	30
Collared Dove	6
Common Kestrel	1
Common Sandpiper	1
Common Swift	2
Cream-coloured Courser	2
Egyptian Vulture	2
Feral Pigeon	6
Kentish Plover	1
Lesser Short-toed Lark	2
Red-legged Partridge	2
Redshank	1
Ruddy Shelduck	2
Ruddy Turnstone	10
Sandwich Tern	1
Spanish Sparrow	10
Stone Curlew	7
Whimbrel	2
Yellow-legged Gull	6