Wednesday, 24 August 2011

Not as good for raptors as the Pyrenees, but birds such as Wallcreeper and Snow Finch are usually easier here. There’s Middle-spotted and Black Woodpeckers too and a unique population of No-spotted Bluethroat.

All the sites in this section are treated, in detail and with precise maps and directions, in my book ‘Finding Birds in North Spain’

If you have any information which you feel would help to update the book, please email me at dave@easybirder.co.uk and I’ll add your observations to these pages

To view more sites in North Spain click here

Picos de Europa

Those yellow bushes at the top of the Valle de Bobias are the haunt of ‘No-spotted Bluethroats - a form of White-spotted Bluethroat but showing little or no white in the throat.

This site for Middle-spotted Woodpecker was actually outside the national park.

We were lucky to be shown around the area by Luis Frechilla of www.cauquen.es. Many of the posters and leaflets you see in the area feature his paintings of local wildlife - these were his sketches of the young Middle Spotted Woodpeckers we saw.

The scree in this photo is a site for both Wallcreeper and Rock Thrush (site 6, page 4)

Here’s another site for Rock Thrush (and Rock Bunting), by the football pitch at Portilla de la Reina

To find the football pitch, follow the track that leads to the left of that white building to the right of the picture.

The scenery in this area is as good as any in Spain