Thursday, 19 July 2012

Marchamalo Salinas – Where there’s water there’s life


It seems that the protest carried out on Saturday morning by some members of ANSE (Asociación de Naturalistas del Sur Este) at the Marchamalo Salinas (where a pump was brought along to the Salinas and approx. 240,000 litres of water pumped in from the Mar Menor, before it was stopped by the Guardia Civil), may have borne fruit.

Over the last couple of days, the pump being used by the owners of the salinas has been changed, resulting in the amount of water being pumped has changed from being just a dribble to being a full river.

The result of this is that as of last night (Wednesday 18th July) at least the first two lagoons are almost full of water, and this morning (Thursday 19th July) a third lagoon is half covered by water.

As a result of this, last night a small number of birds could be seen on the lagoons and the wall separating them, including 5 Shelduck, 4 Black Winged Stilts, a single Curlew Sandpiper in breeding plumage, several Kentish Plover, 2 Sandwich Terns, 6 Mediterranean Gulls, a Slender-billed Gull, 15 Black-headed Gulls and a single juvenile Audouin’s Gull, and this morning a Grey Heron, 2 Little Egrets and 2 Greenshank were there, and a couple of Gull-billed Terns flew over.

 How the salinas were looking last night (Wednesday 12th July)

 A record shot of the 'mota' (dividing wall) with Black-headed, Slender-billed, Mediterranean and Audouin's Gulls

 Another record shot, this time including a couple of Sandwich Terns

 Slightly further along the 'mota', a group of Mediterranean Gulls

And in the first lagoon, a single Curlew Sandpiper
 
Too late for the breeding season, but at least passage birds may have somewhere to feed en-route.

Long may this continue!


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