Spanish Birding 4 - Not birds at all!

The last little section dealing with my trip to Spain and focussing as the title suggests on non birdy matters. Mammals as is normal were as elusive as ever with only a single Rabbit being seen in the hilly country near the Fuengirola Hippodrome. Malaga Bay, as seen from the Guadahorce reserve, provided several brief views of the only other mammal, several large dolphins with rather tall sickle shaped dorsal fins. My meagre experience of cetaceans leads me to think that they were Bottle-nosed.

European Pond and Stripe-necked Terrapins.

Reptiles too were rather scarce and it was two species of terrapin that provided all of the records. At the Rio Fuengirola (near the large Dunnes store) both European Pond and Stripe-necked were seen while the former was also seen at the Guadahorce reserve. Their habit of hauling themselves out onto banksides or any other sort of suitable site makes them fairly easy to find. Also in the same area of the Rio Fuengirola there were rather a lot of frogs present, possibly Marsh and Pool frogs but my froggy ID skills are rudimentary at best. They were basking on a range of things, from the bloated bodies of rats drowned in the storm, fish corpses or even floating rubbish. On the subject of fishes there were many here which seemed to be struggling to breathe after the storm and unfortunately subsequently many died. I think they may have been Barbel or a similar species but if they're not in a Bird's Eye box I'm useless with fishes.

Barbels?

Marsh and Pool Frogs (?)

When the sun finally decided to shine for the last three and a half days a few dragonflies appeared. At the Rio Fuengirola a few Emperors and Blue-tailed Damsels were active. A large puddle near El Pinillo was attracting many Red-veined Darters which as well as fighting amongst themselves had to contend with a few Common Darters and also what I take to have been Epaulette Skimmers. While all this argy bargy was going on several Migrant Hawkers were sweeping through trying to catch something unawares and grab themselves a meal.

Red-veined and Common Darters, Epaulette Skimmer.

Finally time to mention the butterflies and while the numbers of species were fairly low the quality was high. Least impressive of them all perhaps were the African Grass Blues and Lang's Short-tailed Blues which were fairly common though also rather dull. Small numbers of both Speckled Wood and Wall were recorded and higher numbers of Small Whites. Other whites included an example of a Bath White and several Clouded Yellows while I also saw two female Brimstones. A single Small Copper was as welcome as ever though had to concede bragging rites to a Swallowtail, always an impressive sight. Also welcome were at least three Spanish Festoons, I always thought that they were a Spring species but I have seen them at least once in the Autumn before. Either way they're a cracking species to watch. It's not been a vintage year in the UK for Painted Ladies but at least three were on view here.

Spanish Festoon, Swallowtail, Bath White and Clouded Yellow.

That brings us to the end of my report, if nothing else it may provide some hope for any wildlife watchers finding themselves stuck on the Costa Del Sol, oh and another important point, you can toast any good sightings with any amount of cheap plonk, cheers!