First Western Palearctic Grasshopper Buzzard found in Mauritania

The Western Palearctic's first Grasshopper Buzzard has recently been found in Mauritania by a group of Polish birders.

The bird was discovered in gardens on the outskirts of Nouadhibou – a town on the Atlantic coast of the West African country, close to the southern border of the Western Palearctic – on Friday 8 March. It was still present the following day, but has not been reported since.

Grasshopper Buzzard is an Afrotropical species, found from Senegal and The Gambia in the west east to Ethiopia, migrating south to Sierra Leone, Cameroon, north-eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya and Tanzania.

The Grasshopper Buzzard in Nouadhibou (Zbigniew Kajzer).

A new species for the Western Palearctic

The Sahel region blocks its range from expanding into the southern parts of the Western Palearctic, and this bird is a notable regional first as a result.

The group of Polish birders also found an Abyssinian Roller in the same gardens – the 15th known regional record and in the same locale as a bird in 2018. Three Red-billed Firefinches and, perhaps most remarkably, three Eurasian Siskins, were also present, with the latter birds representing a national second.

The discovery of the buzzard, as well as the other finds, further underline the potential of the southern extremities of the Western Palearctic (such as Algeria) as likely happy hunting grounds for rarity finders.

The Polish birders also found this Abyssinian Roller (Zbigniew Kajzer).