Eco Hvar

April Bird Watch, 2016

Steve Jones from Dol continues his study of the island's birds. Anyone who is seeing or hearing anything of interest in the bird world is invited to contact him at: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Wheatear Wheatear Photo: Steve Jones

April 8th 2016: As no doubt most have heard, the Nightingale is singing most of the time now.

I saw another new bird for me - Corn Bunting, once again picked up by its call, as one I wasn't familiar with. It has been in for a couple of weeks but I hadn't been close enough to see it.

Corn Bunting. Photo Steve Jones

Went up to Sv Nikola earlier in the week to see what was about, and very disappointing on the bird front. A solitary Kestrel, a Wheatear and a couple of Chaffinches singing but not seen.

Sveti Nikola, the island's highest point. Photo: Vivian Grisogono
10th April 2016: Just got back from a 90 minute wander ............... heard two Cuckoos - so another arrival - and one Hoopoe calling, although saw neither.
Cuckoo, April 28th 2016. Photo: Steve Jones

Also to be added is Linnet - I thought I had been seeing/hearing them for a while, but needed more confirmation, and I managed to get my telescope on one this morning.

14th April 2016: I have been going to appointments in Jelsa all week. I was a little bit early today and went for a stroll - thought I heard Bee-Eaters, wasn't 100% but am pretty confident so you want to keep your eyes peeled. Heard a Cuckoo in Dol yesterday .... still not seen a Swift which is a surprise to me, I suspect they might be making appearances in the UK anytime now.

15th April 2016:  Just came back from Jelsa and had a definite sighting of Bee-Eaters so my hearing was good yesterday.

Bee-eaters. Photo: Steve Jones

Eco Hvar comment: I also saw the bee-eaters in a little flock above one of Jelsa's back roads a couple of days ago. They seem to have arrived right on cue, to judge by past years. Many are having to find new homes, as a large nesting place just opposite the Bagi petrol station on the main road was dug up a couple of years ago, exposing their warren of nesting holes as pitiful relics of the past.

Bee-eaters nesting holes exposed to predators and the elements, April 2015. Photo: Vivian Grisogono

Bee-eaters' nesting holes ruthlessly exposed to predators and the elements, April 2015. Photo: Vivian Grisogono 

21st April 2016: As I barely visit a town for any period of time I am still not hearing/seeing any Swifts. Are they in in Jelsa now? I was in Split yesterday and they are everywhere, I thought I heard one in Stari Grad this morning, maybe they are just arriving. Interesting, as they would only be arriving just about now in UK, For some reason I assumed things would be earlier here.

Eco Hvar comment: Yes, the swifts have arrived in Jelsa, and just today they were extremely busy renovating their nesting places under the eaves of the buildings on the main square. A diligent and co-operative crowd!

Swifts preparing their nests on Jelsa's square, 21st April 2016. Photo Vivian Grisogono

22nd April 2016. Picked up the Nightjar "churring" last night so another recent arrival.

23rd April 2016. Another long awaited  .................. Vuga/Golden Oriole I hear calling this morning and it certainly wasn't yesterday.

Sunday 24th April.2016: Went out for 90 mins or so early this morning, wondering if the low cloud, mist and rain would have any influence on things. It was very quiet, even the singing had gone quiet apart from the dawn chorus - who can blame them?

Keep hearing Cuckoo, but long distances away and not lucky enough to have seen one here. I still wonder what their host bird would be if they breed.

Anyway, as I was driving along the airport road I chanced upon a Woodchat Shrike, all over in a few seconds. I had seen one here on Hvar a couple of years ago on holiday albeit elsewhere on the island.

Woodchat shrike (c.2013). Photo: Steve Jones

Also saw a good number of Swifts in Stari Grad - so interestingly it wouldn’t be much different to UK arrivals.

Eco Hvar: Saturday and Sunday, 23rd and 24th April 2016 have been very rainy, with some thunder and a lot of low-lying clouds. The birds seem to lie low during the heaviest rains, and then emerge in full song as soon as calm is restored. It's quite a contrast to the previous period of hot sunny weather, but welcome refreshment for gardens and fields - also for dust-covered cars.

Rain clouds hanging heavy over Pitve Church. Photo: Vivian Grisogono

© Steve Jones 2016

For more of Steve's beautiful nature pictures, see his personal pages: Bird Pictures on Hvar 2017, and Butterflies of Hvar 

Related items

back to top
You are here: Home Nature Watch April Bird Watch, 2016

Eco Environment News feeds

  • Solar cuts ‘at least £400 from bills in even the cloudiest British areas’

    Savings grow as energy prices in Great Britain rise and cost of panel installation falls, analysis finds

    Households in Great Britain’s cloudiest regions could still save more than £400 a year on their energy bills by installing rooftop solar panels, research has found.

    Rising wholesale energy prices mean the potential savings from a home solar panel system have climbed in recent years, as the cost of installation has continued to fall, leading to increased demand.

    Continue reading...

  • Cities sweltering and the smell of the middle ages: has the climate crisis killed Instagram’s Euro summer? | Brigid Delaney

    Who dreams of having a Euro summer now when staying in an ancient, uncooled building in the Old Town is like trying to sleep in a wood-fired pizza oven?

    This week the Euro summer comes to an end – and so does a certain type of posting on Instagram.

    Waiting at the bus stop in the grey winter dawn, a slanting rain soaking your trouser leg, you can warm yourself by scrolling your feed and seeing pictures of Australians enjoying a Euro summer. There it is again – azure Greek coves, plates of barbecued sardines, the yachts rented by the hour, and selfies on the balcony of some Paris Airbnb, drinking wine in the long, blue night.

    Continue reading...

  • The Nepal and Tibet flood is a warning: melting snow and ice will bring more disasters around the world | Bill McGuire

    In Alaska, the Himalayas, the Andes, Greenland, and perhaps also the Alps, deadly chain reactions are just waiting to be triggered

    You may not have felt it, but the earth beneath our feet is getting twitchier, and global heating is to blame. As temperatures surge and climate breakdown accelerates, interactions between climate and geology are becoming ever more apparent – as marked by last week’s horrific events in Nepal and Tibet. We still have a bit of a blind spot when it comes to the idea that a changing climate can impact what scientists call the geosphere, but the evidence has long been incontestable.

    In 2021, a similar deluge ripped through a series of mountain valleys in the Indian Himalayan state of Uttarakhand, severely damaging two hydroelectric power plants and taking about 200 lives. In August 2025, a colossal landslide in an Alaskan fjord created a 500-metre-high wave in an area frequented by cruise ships. A few months earlier, the collapse of part of a glacier in Switzerland’s Valais canton caused a debris-laden torrent that destroyed and buried most of the already evacuated village of Blatten.

    Bill McGuire is professor emeritus of geophysical and climate hazards at UCL. His latest book is The Fate of the World – a History and Future of the Climate Crisis

    Continue reading...

  • ‘Breakthrough’ as Turkmenistan starts fixing ‘mindboggling’ methane mega-leaks

    Secretive state begins repairs on ageing facilities after being revealed as worst country for leaks of potent greenhouse gas

    Turkmenistan has started plugging the mega-leaks of methane that spew from its ageing oil and gas facilities, the latest UN data shows, in a move hailed as a breakthrough.

    Methane, also called natural or fossil gas, is a potent greenhouse gas. It traps 80 times more heat than carbon dioxide and causes 25% of global heating today. Stopping leaks can be quick and cheap and, because methane breaks down in the atmosphere far quicker than CO2, this has a rapid impact, with some experts calling it the climate “emergency brake”.

    Continue reading...

  • How a South African town cleaned up its polluted river using stones, wood and sand

    Scientists say system to treat contaminated wastewater offers a model for ensuring food security in a fast-warming climate

    All it took to turn the murky, heavily polluted waters of South Africa’s Stiebeuel River into a resource clean enough for irrigating a community’s vegetable plots was a collection of stones, heat-treated wood and sand.

    Without chemicals and using renewable energy, researchers from the University of Cape Town are cleaning 36,000 litres of water, polluted by sewage, chemicals, and traces of drugs and medication, every day to make it usable for growing food in a fast-expanding informal settlement along the course of the river.

    Continue reading...

  • Bhutan hosts first ‘conscious food summit’ amid threats to global supplies

    Organisers say people must revive spiritual relationship with food amid double threat of climate crisis and conflict

    Mending the broken food system under the threat of climate-driven weather extremes will require more than economic fixes and intensive agriculture, according to the organisers of a pioneering summit this week, who say the world must revive its spiritual relationship with food.

    Delegates from more than 60 countries and the UN will gather for the next five days in Paro in the tiny Himalayan nation of Bhutan for the world’s first “conscious food summit”, which will bring together governments and farmers, mindfulness experts and yoga therapists.

    Continue reading...

  • Weather tracker: Warm Yellow Sea strengthens storms in South Korea

    More than 200mm of rain forecast in parts of South Korea, while parts of southern Europe to be 10C above average

    South Korea’s prime minister, Han Seong-sook, met officials to prepare for heavy rain expected this week, with rainfall totals across central and northern parts of the country forecast to exceed 200mm in some areas.

    South Korea was battered by heavy rainfall earlier this month and some areas were particularly hard hit. Over the weekend further thunderstorms pushed into the region and these are expected to cause disruption through Monday. This heavy rain is caused by a series of severe thunderstorms that developed over the Yellow Sea, on the western side of South Korea, and will slowly push eastwards on Monday before easing on Tuesday. These storms have been strengthened by the very warm Yellow Sea, which now has a surface temperature of 29C, 4C above the climatological average.

    Continue reading...

  • Could this humble sea sponge clean up the world’s ports?

    The chicken liver sponge has sailed through a test of its ability to filter pollutants in a harbour in Spain’s Costa Brava

    In the polluted waters of Marina Palamós on Spain’s Costa Brava, Manuel Maldonado, a sponge biologist, noticed something unusual last month: red starfish had started settling in the area.

    Nearly two years earlier, the Spanish National Research Council scientist and his colleagues had begun transplanting sea sponges into the port to study whether they could survive in its polluted waters.

    Continue reading...

  • ‘The mountains are changing’: What the floods tell us about the future of India’s Himalayas

    As families await news of missing loved ones, the disaster is a stark reminder of how the climate crisis is creating a fast-growing threat. Plus, the town considered India’s ‘Jurassic Park’

    It has been hard not to despair while watching the ruinous floods swallow parts of Nepal, and harder, still knowing that the agony compounds each passing day for dozens of Indian families whose members remain unaccounted for.

    Social media is awash with desperate pleas, photos and details of the young and old, men and women, from Mumbai to Kolkata, posted by families searching for traces of life. The disaster unfolded when a melting glacier slammed into the valley below, unleashing a deadly cascade of rock and ice down the Bhote Kashi River, which flows from Tibet into Nepal.

    Continue reading...

  • Readers reply: If all car tyres were filled with CO2, would this cut atmospheric carbon significantly?

    The long-running series in which readers answer other readers’ questions considers a change that might help the environment

    This week’s question: Would equal pay create a better society?

    If all the vehicles on the planet had their tyres pumped up with CO2, would this lock up enough carbon to lower the amount in the air significantly? Would there be other issues, such as the carbon cost of trapping it all into the tyres? Chris Coldwell, Lancaster

    Send new questions to[email protected].

    Continue reading...

Eco Health News feeds

Eco Nature News feeds

Copyright © 2026 Eco Hvar. All Rights Reserved. Developed by Orion Informatika.