As promised I was birdwatching on the coast this time. The building you can see on the picture above is called Torre Flavia, though it seems a bit odd to call it a tower. Nonetheless, I spent two enjoyable hours next to it scanning carefully the horizon time after time. However first things first. The above mentioned site is part of the small town Ladispoli approximately 30 km northwest of Rome and - as you can imagine - easily approachable via train. From the train station you have no other choice but walk the 3 km to the site, since the bus connection that apparently exists according to the several bus stops along the way isn't very helpful (it would take as much time as walking).
At the edge of the town I eventually encountered the first birds of interest: A small group of larks flew up on a field as soon as I approached. According to their calls they were Crested Larks. Along the final kilometer the variety and number of birds significantly increased: Barn Swallows, Yellow-legged Gulls, Sardinian Warblers and Starlings, just to name some of the more prominet representants.
To approach the beach you need to pass the nature reserve "Palude Torre Flavia" which I would have hoped to be a wonderful place for birdwatching. In truth it turned out to be a mostly dry area of bushes intersected by some few channels. Naturally, I couldn't find many birds there and for now I hope that the situation will improve with a higher water level. On the beach my first disappointment was soon forgotten. Within shortest time I could pick up my first italian Sandwich Terns catching fish. Unfortunately, as all other birds afterwards (with the exception of the Yellow Wagtails, but more on that later on), they kept very distant and photographing them was extremly difficult. Of course, I didn't come solely for a rather common tern species. I scanned the horizon for minutes after I finally succeeded in finding my very first shearwaters! The identification took some time due to the limited magnification of my travel scope (a Nikon ED 50), but in the end I could be proud of my first self found and identified Scopoli's Shearwaters. Just after I was about to leave the side two small dull terns flew past very close to the beach. I could hardly believe my eyes, as they turned out to be two White-winged Black Terns. A rather interesting species for seawatching.
The results of my first italian seawatch might seem a bit unexciting after all, but it should be kept in mind that neither the weather conditions nor my position were perfect. Furthermore, it's a completely different thing seawatching along the North Sea and along the Mediterranean Sea. It's definitely worth trying it again and so I was very pleased in the end heading back towards the train station. However, my birding trip wasn't over yet, although I wouldn't have believed it at this point of time. As I passed a field, I got aware of four wagtails running and trying to find food between some horses. Right away it was sure that they were Yellow Wagtails. Italy hosts a "own" subspecies that I haven't yet had the chance to see. The main features of the Ashy headed Wagtail (so the official name of Motacilla flava cinereocapilla) are the grey head lacking a prominent supercillium stripe and the white throat. Yet the birds in front of me didn't show any of these features. To make it short, I couldn't find any trace of them not being Blue-headed Wagtails (Motacilla flava flava) which is the race of Continental Europe I'm naturally very familiar with. For Italy it's truly not a bad find, but for me it's slightly ironic that the first Yellow Wagtail I get to see I could have observed as well on the fields next to my home.
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