Heat wave and Gazelle's midnight munchies.

Images hubby took of the young individual the shepherds accidentally spooked towards us through the grove.

(23rd June about 11 p.m. noticed gazelle under the pines just a few score feet from the valley road)

5.40 pm 30.9 down from 37 peak, 25% humidity, ~6kt NW

Gazelles -3 to east of orchard amongst many old dry stone walls. right up by security barbed wire fence, moving south, small group led by female..no horns, then young and a little way behind individual with short thin horns. We stayed in a stand of cypress and observed quietly at a distance of 75 to 100 feet so that we wouldn't spook them. Not the usual place we see them but hubby had glimpsed one through the orchard so we had to go check them out.

In the evening we took a walk on the valley road..at about five minutes to *midnight* we both saw a gazelle break cover on the *west* side of the valley road (slopes between the road and the lowest buildings) - crossed the road and retreated under the pines about the same place as hubby saw it previous evening. They can seem smaller and paler under the trees at this time of night but that's because in low light we mainly see the white underbelly. This is not the first time we've seen gazelles venture up to the neighbourhood at night.. On occasion in the past we've seen up to three gazelles graze those slopes and several times startled a beautiful buck that had ventured almost all the way up valley road to the buildings between 10 p.m. and 11 p.m. There's some water run- off there that gives good grazing.

(more gazelles later in this entry>>> )

Turtle doves: cooing.. pair in top of doubled cypress

Bee-eaters: 4 over orchard

Black-eared Wheatears: around cistern

cicadas v active and noisy

Nice close view of agama lizards by creek trail.. one dark/grey, other greyish brown.. Darker one had more distinct black and white mottlng on chin. This would be very prominent when they do the chin bob. I'm assuming that one was the male of the pair.

House sparrows: foraging around cistern, dry stone walls by grove, pretty much everywhere,
Senegal doves: in built up area.. I got close to a very nice pair on a fence.. could clearly tell the male by his neck, relatively much thicker than that of his mate.
Hooded crows: pine grove, a few up on windsurfin hill.. Jays: quite a few foraging woods, gazelle field as usual.
Feral pigeons: around built up areas, passing over valley in ones, twos, small flocks.

Greenfinches: twittering, busy foraging.. much less song and 'chee' today.
Blackbirds: some lovely song along creek trail not far from sapling field. We saw the male singer, he chose to perch low. Curious how sometimes they'll choose a TV antenna or the very top of a cypress in the evening but in the heat of the day I've often seen them launch into full song on a tree stump. Probably just prefer the shade.
Chukar partidges: family with 5 chicks on dirt track just past pumping station, chicks gangly scrawny stage but can fly quite well, all got up in unison from bank on our approach. Collared doves: on line over sapling field, foraging around, generally quiet today

Stone curlews: hubby heard. Sunbirds: song and calls by look-out corner and calls in our garden Bauhinia

Graceful warblers: some song in grasses by north valley. Syrian woodpeckers: calls and alarms

Falcon perching half way up the pylon in the gazelle field, preening. Looking very brown, and when in flight very pale underwing mottled with brown and underparts, but clearly a falcon, probably an immature.

Shepherds brought about a hundred brown and white loppy eared goats into the gazelle field today which is always quite a pleasant sight, and sound with all their goat bells cunkling away. I call them shepherds because most of them own sheep too and sometimes bring them. In Hebrew they're called 'ro'eh tzon' which means 'herder of flocks'.. which can mean either. (famous in psalm 23- the Lord is my shepherd.. there the word is ro'i which actually has the same root as the word for 'companion'.

June 25th Too funny.. My 'globals' for 'hobbies' took me 105 seconds because a male and female sunbird were interacting so cutely in the Bauhinia just three feet to my left.. total distraction! Who wants to do a quiz when 'his sapphireness' is sitting there looking flash and whispering sweet nothings into his lady's ear right by me?

by 6.20 p.m. temps had dropped to 33.6 degrees C, (about 92 degrees F) 22% humidity, 7.8 kt WNW, clear skies

Awesome gazelle sightings today! A family group of four individuals were grazing as usual just to the east of the north valley trees over on the field. We were speculating whether they might be the same group we saw up by the security fence to the east when events proved that theory happily wrong. A shepherd calling to his friend on the other side of the fence spooked the eastern group and sent them in our direction. We sat very still in the bunker ruins while a young individual came bouncing towards us through the eucalyptus grove and came within fifty yards of us before turning south toward lookout corner and disappearing in the trees by the creek path. The top of his head was quite knobbly, as if horns would emerge there but hadn't started yet.. young male? I believe hes was the individual we'd seen in the centre of the group over there yesterday, assuming the groups were staying at the same grazing grounds. Those two matched. He'll probably eventually make his way back east to his mom via the orchard or woods to the south.

Meanwhile the horned member of the group- thin horns, broke out toward the north east of the field near the cistern, was then spooked by noticing us and continued north, sproinging and running part of the way and eventually just strolling along. After a little while it made its way up the lower slopes to the north directly toward the first family group we had been watching, which was all this time grazing, moving slowly east.

We watched to see what would happen when the thin horned individual met the others.. would they accept it? Would they greet in some way? It was interesting to see so sat down, steadied my elbows on my knees to hold binos with minimum tire and wobble, and watched. The thin horned individual did not push himself on the group in any way but waited for them to move in his direction. He grazed in place, facing them (facing west), just munching on the other edge of an expanse of low cushiony foliage between them. Soon a young gazelle was just below him on the slope but we so no visual greeting at all.. perhaps he was making conciliatory snorts or something but we couldn't tell at this distance. Gradually the family group made its way east till he was simply one of the grazers. At that point the youngest gazelle, who had gone ahead and below a little, sproinged back to join his mom. Likely the thin horned individual was related, part of the extended family and perhaps they recognized him, but I found it interesting that he didn't just stroll into group but waited for them to arrive where he was at their own pace and then was simply one of the group automatically.

Seemed all the group were females and partly grown young, no adult bucks visible at all.

Otherwise, the common residents pretty much as described earlier in this entry. 2 hoopoes near the bunker, a third not far from look-out point foraging on the dirt path. At the cistern, a pair of turtle doves, a collared dove, a pair of jays. A great spotted cuckoo crossed part of the field and landed in tree near middle.. an immature I believe this time, probably the one I called Malfoy the other day or his bro. (or sis) Greenfinches very active and were tuning up for dusk chorus by the time we had to leave. Immature great tits around the cistern. Immature wheatears around cistern and pomegranate trees, they seem much shyer of the bunker now. Bee-eaters heard to west