Pond at Tallil Airbase (Ali Base) December 2004. The Ziggurat of Ur is in the distance. I watched a pair of Pied Kingfishers, a Kentish (Snowy) Plover, a Grey Heron and a fine Male Black Redstart here. The city of Ur was the traditional home of the prophet Abraham.



Though this blog is focused on Iraqi wildlife I will make a little detour on this entry.

A reader soon to deploy to Afghanistan asked a few questions that I'll try to answer here.

The first is: what resources are there on Afghan birds? I've only found a few references since Afghanistan has been somewhat neglected since the 1979 Russian invasion. A few old British texts describe the wildlife of the region. Birdlife international has a review of the birdlife of Afghanistan which has a mix of palearctic and oriental species and 460 recorded species. There is one Afghan endemic, Afghan Snowfinch (Montifringila theresae). Happily we have one recent trip report of 82 species made by Anssi Kullberg combining the observation of 4 trips through Afghanistan in 2002. Some spectacular birds are to be seen. A birder from Iraq would recognise many of the familiar favorites: Magpies, Hoopoes, Crested Larks, Pied Kingfishers, Indian and European Roller plus many others. They would also be treated to birds of Indian origin like Brahminy Starling, Black Drongo and House Crow. Some truly exotic birds like the Himalayan Monal, a colorful and rare pheasant, are also on the Afghan list. A somewhat pricey two volume guide has been published this year by Lynx in Spain. The Birds of South Asia is the first guide to fully cover the birds of Afghanistan and at slightly less than $100 US is a good investment for someone spending a long time in Afghanistan.

Another question involved digiscoping and blogging from a forward deployed area. Others may want to add their 2 cents here. I did not have a great camera for birds, nor a scope. If I had to do it again I would try to bring both. I missed a lot of birds because they were out of binocular range.

I found that blogging anonymously is the way to go. It simplifies things considerably and makes the command much more comfortable with your blogging in general. My self imposed rules were very strict because of my role in battalion intelligence. I never revealed my name, my unit or my location in the country. We had many incidents that I never wrote about on my other blog because a relatively smart person could identify my location from the incident and perhaps use it for battle damage assessment. When it came to my wildlife watching, any and all my writing was seen as universally innocuous and not an operational security issue.

I've started posting again on HomeRange, my general natural history blog. It started out as my nature observations but I let it slide in back in May. I recently changed the focus to whatever I feel like writing about, from my observations to interesting news items.

Michael Yon, one of my favorite bloggers in Iraq, has a contemplative post with lots of bird pictures he's taken in the last year. These include White-cheeked Bulbuls, Mesopotamian Crow and Spur-winged and White-tailed Plovers. I'm always pleased when I find someone, especially a soldier or former soldier in Michael's case, is interested in birds. It is an indicator to me of a person who can get outside of their immediate personal concerns. I guess it reminds me of the archetypal gentleman soldiers, renaissance men like the some of the British soldiers in the Mesopotamian campaign who compiled their observations of birds, mammals, plants and archeology into reports published by the Bombay Natural History Society. Or General Sir Alan Brooke, Chief of the Imperial General staff, enjoying a short walk watching goldfinch and stonechats on the eve of the Normandy invasion. I'm not sure if its coincidence or not but many of these multidimensional characters that I've met have been Marines. I'm not sure if there is something about the Marines that draws the soldier-scholar. Several I have met have been incredible students of history and culture and impressive intellectuals.

On another note I bought a copy of A Systematic List of the Vertebrates of Iraq by Mahdi and Georg (1969). There are 385 species of birds listed. Its a start to a comprehensive Iraq list. Avibase lists 416 species. It will probably be a few years before there is an Iraq Rare Records Committee and an official Iraq list.

Tigris Salmon or Pike Barb (Barbus esocinus) - Iraq's largest freshwater fish. Reputed to grow up to 6.5 feet long and weigh a few hundred pounds. This picture was taken at Camp Slayer near Baghdad International Airport. Note the palace in the background - Saddam called it Victory over America Palace. When I was at Slayer I saw some huge fish splashing around. I also saw announcements for a fishing contest. I think this would have won it at around 75 pounds.



The weather in Iraq has cooled down considerably. Many of the winter resident birds have returned to Iraq. The huge flocks of rooks, the most social of the crows, have come back as well as the ducks and shorebirds. The nightly spectacle of thousands upon thousands of rooks returning to their roosts after a day of foraging in the surrounding farmland will treat both the residents of the surrounding villages and towns and some of the new troops at LSA Anaconda. Sometimes the rooks would gather in large groups and form a tight spinning column as they rode a thermal.

Last year around this time I gave an interview on NPR about my birding in Iraq.

Mudhafar Salim, an Iraqi ornithologist with the Iraq Nature Conservation Society who has been working with Birdlife International on their surveys of the southern marshes has posted a series of great photographs from some of his fieldwork earlier this year. He has photos of 17 species including the endangered Basrah Reed Warbler, Little Crake, Marbled Teal, Slender-billed Gulls and European Scops Owl.

Included in Mudhafar's other marsh pictures is a shot of 4 fish caught in one of the marshes. I haven't been able to identify the catfish (Possibly an introduced Asian Stinging Catfish), but the other three fish are Mesopotamian Spiny Eels ( Mastacembelus mastacembelus). Other members of this interesting group of fish are kept as aquarium fish, some growing over 3 feet long. Captive fish have a habit of burrowing in the gravel to either hide or look for food. Wild fish most likely do the same hunting for food or hiding from predators.

Brian Coad, a Canadian scientist working with the Canada-Iraq wetlands Initiative is working on a document on the freshwater fish of Iraq. So far he has a checklist and bibliography up. It seems like he has done a lot of work separating out the valid records from records from erroneous reports. Its good to see someone working on a biodiversity project like this. This should be a great resource when completed. Iraq has a number of interesting species including blind cave fish and a large and diverse cyprinid (carp and minnow family) fauna. An added bonus is this document should be a boon to the many coalition troops who enjoy fishing on their off time and catch unusual fish that they can't ID. Perhaps one day there will be fishing outfitters on the Tigris and Euphrates ready to cater to tourists who are after that giant Tigris Salmon. Here's some pictures from a Navy guy in camp victory who brought his flyrod. He also caught a good sized Tigris Salmon as well as some large elongated cyprinids that almost look like a cross between a mullet and a carp. Other species that are being regularly caught is the Asp (Aspius sp.), big-head carp and a large catfish related to the giant wels of Europe and Asia. Some more pictures can be seen at this website. Just scroll down and look for the guys in desert camoflage.

The fourth rotation of US troops is well under way and there are more birders among them. LTC Bob at Camp Victory may be back stateside already. He recently had two more posts. One on the Indian Roller and another on Purple and Grey Herons. Out in Al-Anbar province one of the Marines, Michael Fay has been watching the birds in his spare moments, he also happens to be their artist in residence and has just returned from covering the heavy fighting near the Syrian border. A possible successor to LTC Bob in the Camp Victory Area is Joe H. who is about 1 month into his tour. He posted some of his sighting at birdforum.net

Sunset over Laundry Pond - LSA Anaconda, September 2004

This several acre pond surrounded by reeds is a focus of bird activity on base.

I found that another birder has made it to Anaconda. His main interest is reptiles but he's looking out for the other critters too. His work area is near the other large pond on post. He's got a few photos on his blog of black-winged stilts. I'm looking forward to hearing about his observations.

Birdlife International has put Google Maps links on their IBA (Important Bird Area) pages. I was thinking of doing this myself, but I'm happy for someone else to do the work. What's needed now is all the IBA locations on one interactive map.

I've looked through some satellite photos of IBAs in Iraq using Google Map by typing in the coordinates. This new function on the IBA pages makes it much easier to explore.

Here's a few interesting ones to check out. To view the map click on the map link on the IBA page and then click on satellite View and zoom in.

Bahr al Milh - A large artificial lake created in the late 1970's as a flood control basin for the Euphrates. It has become an important area for waterbirds. In 1979 over 100,000 coot were reported to be wintering on the lake along with tens of thousands of ducks including Smew, Gadwall, Shovelers, and Marbled Teal. Large concentrations of grebes were reported including 600 Great Crested Grebes and over a thousand black-necked grebes. Also present in the area are Dalmatian Pelicans and Greater Flamingos.

Samarra Dam - The Tigris River is dammed at Sammara creating a large wetland next to the city. Almost 150 species have been recorded here. Many raptors migrate through this area in the fall. In the marsh such species as Goliath Heron, Great Bittern, Common Pochard have been seen. Gray Hypocolius, See-See Partridge and Dead Sea Sparrow are breeders. In 1992 a pair of Sociable Plovers was reported from here.

Ser Amadiya - This is a mountain ridge that reaches elevations of up to 2000 meters near the Turkish border in Iraqi Kurdistan. The birdlife of the oak and juniper forests is unlike that of the rest of the country. Eurasian Nightjar, Syrian Woodpecker, Eastern and Western Rock Nuthatch, Ortolan Bunting and the unusual corvids the chough and the alpine chough. 3 Species of vulture are resident in the higher elevations (Lammergier, Egyptian and Griffon). In early spring flocks of snow finch sometimes visit the snowfields.

Khawr al Zubair - A huge tidal mudflat area near the Persian Gulf, apparently never surveyed for birds but likely an important area for wintering waterbirds.

Mesopotamian Crow Calling - LSA Anaconda, January 2005

LTC Bob near Baghdad has only a couple more months until he redeploys back home. He has a few more posts up on Silflay Hraka with some great pictures.

The picture of the male black francolin may actually be one of the 2 individuals I saw at Camp Victory last year. He also has some pictures of francolin chicks and a post on Spur-winged Plover with pictures of plover chicks and a black-winged stilt chick. His latest post is on the Collared Pratincole and an Indian Roller post is forthcoming. Last month LTC Bob wrote about the Golden Jackal.

In other birding news, The Field Guide to the Birds of the Middle East, the guide I used in Iraq is being published in Arabic in February of 2006. This is a very significant event in my opinion. Just as the Peterson Field Guides spawned a generation of birders in the US, I hope that this book will do the same in the Middle East. It would be a great thing if each school in Iraq could have a copy to inspire young naturalists.

On another subject, I've been reading the very interesting journal of Andrew Cote, a guy from Connecticut who just came back from a trip to Iraq in August. He was in Iraq to train farmers in modern techniques of beekeeping. Here's a story about him in a local paper.

Reading through the entries I learned that some of the beekeepers in the Kurdish north have problems with European Bee-eaters for a few weeks during migration when the birds gorge themselves on Honeybees. In one village one of the beekeepers even produced the carcass of a bee-eater. The picture is on the website in his gallery (I can't seem to link to it). There are also interesting pictures of the traditional beehives which are made of straw and mud. In the fall these hives are cracked open like a giant nut to get the honey out.

The whole site is fascinating. I learned that, as in the US, the dreaded Varroa Mite has decimated the honeybee population, decreasing it perhaps 90%. Other problems are the Oriental Hornets, gigantic orange and yellow beasts that can tear up a hive. I dispatched quite a few of them when I was in Iraq. Having an insect net came in handy when it was bug killing time. I just read a story this week about how honeybees sometimes kill one of this hornet's even larger relatives, the Asian Giant Hornet, by cooking it to death. The bees swarm over a hornet and form a ball around the insect. They beat their wings furiously creating enough heat to kill the hornet. They actually come only a few degrees from cooking themselves. Both Oriental and Giant Hornets can destroy a large hive. They crush the honeybees in their mandibles one after another until the bees are all dead. They then take away the juicy larvae in the combs.

After reading through all the entries and thinking about my Father's hive he had while we were growing up I felt like beekeeping might be something I might like to try when I have a little more free time.

Doing a bit of research I found that the clay and straw hives made excellent weapons in the past. A kind of ready-made bee grenade that could be dropped on the enemy. Here's an entry from a book called Robbing Bees: A biography of honey by Holley Bishop published earlier this year describing such a use in the battle of Hatra in Iraq.

Before sophisticated box hives were invented, bees kept in twig, straw or clay vessels of various sizes were adapted as weapons. Bee grenades could be hurled through the air or dropped on enemies. By the time they reached their target, the projected bees were
outraged, ready to explode in a fury of stings. In book III of his History
Herodian describes the second century seige of Hatra, in modern-day Iraq, and
the use of bees as weapons.

Every kind of seige engine was used against the walls (of the city) and no technique of seige operation was left untried. But the people of Hatra rigorously defended themselves by firing down missles and stones onto the army of Severus below and causing them a good deal of damage. They made clay containers filled with little flying insects that had poisonous
stings, which were then fired off. When the missiles fell onto Severus’ army, the insects crawled into the eyes and exposed parts of the skin of the soldiers and stung them causing severe injuries.