Beach clean-up Doha, Kuwait, January 27th 2012

My 3rd time at Doha beach.
I went a bit exploring this time, further up the northern stretch, where I surprisingly got access to the, from the outside, fenced off salt marshes.
I think they should be a protected area (which they maybe are?) without car wrecks, cupboards and whatever huge and small trash littering it.
Doha beach itself looks better, thanks to our efforts. If only the residents and campers would take care a little more.
The stretch at Doha entertainment city looks devastating.
More trash than ever and the mangroves seem to be finally dead.
That stretch, K's path got no permission to clean (yes, you need permission to clean beaches). The folks from entertainment city declared they take care of it themselves.



Birdcount:

1 Curlew
1 Lesser spotted Eagle
5 Reef Egret
3 Crested Lark
1 Desert Wheatear
1 Ringed Plover
1 Graceful Prinia
a bunch of Waders and Gulls, too far out to be ID-ed
(Gulls were most likely Black-headed Gulls and some Caspian Gulls)
+ 180 Flamingos
3 Barn Swallows


1 dead Shelduck
3 dead Juv. Cormorant


I am trying to ID the plants and AbdrulRahman Al-Sirhan's page was of great help again.
I still have quite a few to go :(


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Past clean-ups (that I've been to - K's path has been out every weekend):

• Beach Clean-up Sulaibikhat 3, Kuwait, January 13th 2012


• Qaru island, Kuwait - Beach clean-up Dec 23rd 2011

• Um Al Maradin, Island beach clean-up, Dec 9th 2011

• Beach clean-up Sulaibikhat, July 23rd 2011

• Beach clean-up Maternity Hospital, July 8th 2011

• Beach clean-up Sulaibikhat (2), June 11th 2011

• Beach clean-up, Doha, Kuwait, May 28th 2011

• Beach clean-up, Sulaibikhat, Kuwait, May 13th 2011

• Beach clean-up, Doha, July 16th

Beach Clean-up Sulaibikhat 3, Kuwait, January 13th 2012

Behind the Black mangroves on this stretch of Sulaibikhat beach years of dumped plastic has piled up, one layer on top of each other.
Currently we are cleaning up the top layer. Give the mangroves and plants a bit of breathing room.
It's tedious work since a lot of the styrofoam has broken up into tiny pieces and all we can do is shovel it into bags.

For approx. 10sqm it took 4 hours and we got 24 bags as a result.




(You can also check the single photos in the album)

Birdcount:

30 Black-headed Gull (most likely with some Slender-billed Gulls, Caspian and Heuglin's Gulls)
5 White Wagtail
4 Barn Swallow
5 Water Pipit
20 House Sparrow
25 Greater Flamingo
3 Grey Heron
20 Pallid Swift White-eared Bulbul

Thanks to K's path for organizing the clean-ups every week!


January schedule: Friday 20th - Sulaibikhat beach / Friday 27th - Doha beach
Clean-ups start at 8am
Email: angelique@k's path.org for maps

Past clean-ups (that I've been to - K's path has been out every weekend):

• Qaru island, Kuwait - Beach clean-up Dec 23rd 2011

• Um Al Maradin, Island beach clean-up, Dec 9th 2011

• Beach clean-up Sulaibikhat, July 23rd 2011

• Beach clean-up Maternity Hospital, July 8th 2011

• Beach clean-up Sulaibikhat (2), June 11th 2011

• Beach clean-up, Doha, Kuwait, May 28th 2011

• Beach clean-up, Sulaibikhat, Kuwait, May 13th 2011

• Beach clean-up, Doha, July 16th

Qaru island, Kuwait - Beach clean-up Dec 23rd 2011

A small island off the coast of Kuwait, near the Saudi border. The Coast guard is stationed there and birds use it as a resting ground during migration and breeding there during summer. It is also important for the ongoing turtle conservation program. Any help on IDs of the (mostly dead) animals is welcome! Bird count of the day: Approx 5 Black-headed Gulls, 1 or 2 Caspian or Heuglin's Gulls (one oiled), 1 Ringed Plover, 8 House Sparrows
For the ones interested, some Info on the Turtle Conservation project

Um Al Maradin, Island beach clean-up, Dec 9th 2011

First clean-up for me since I am back and I lucked out to get a place on the island trip to Um al Maradim (uhoh, there's even an entry on wiki :)). A tiny speck of land in the middle of nowhere, serving as a Coastguard post and can be visited only with a special permission. That doesn't stop a bunch of fishing boats from circling the island, there were at least 15 of them.


The island is quite important for migrating birds as a stopover and for some birds as a breeding ground.


This was the second clean-up on this island. Due to the currents (I guess) and the visiting boats, a lot of trash gets on the beaches with the tide. Including dead sheep, 7 of them. Dumped, most likely, by big animal transports who don't want to have sick or dead sheep aboard when they reach port. It's scary to think of all the trash floating in our oceans... We also found 3 dead birds. Two in a state of decay beyond ID-ing and 1 a possible Steppe Buzzard.


We collected altogether 33 big black trash bags full of plastic bottles, Styrofoam, cans and other plastics, household stuff, fishing lines and hooks, kids balloons (I know why I don't like those things), ropes and half a rubber boat. There's also tires and a big pile of pallets that we couldn't remove.


The Kuwait Dive team took us to the island. They helped burying some of the sheep above the tide line. The team of K's Path, including John the manager whom I met for the first time, was there and the girls did a good job organizing the whole trip. Thanks for doing this! A big thanks also to the chief (?) of the Coastguards who had a big, yummy Lunch prepped for us when we were finished with the clean-up :)

Birdcount:


At the Marina


8 Cormorant, 2 Slender-billed Gull, 4 Black-headed Gull, 3 White-eared Bulbul




Um al-Maradim island


1 Northern Wheatear (1st wt), 3 Greater Sand Plover Plover, 6 Kentish Plover, 15 (Great) Cormorant (6 Juv.) - flying over, 9+ House Sparrow, 1 1st wt Caspian Gull (possibly more), 4 Black-headed Gull, 1 White-eared Bulbul (voice)

Beach clean-up Sulaibikhat, July 23rd 2011

Again another successful beach clean-up at Sulaibikhat, for the third time at that long stretch of beach. One group of people (official trash picker – uppers?) must have been there the day before. There were about 18 plastic bags along the fence line.
But no worries, there was still enough left for all of us. We had 4 new Volunteers, one even from Saudi Arabia 
We collected around 16 bags and approx. 200kg of mainly plastic bottles.

It seems that the numbers of birds are picking up already. I don’t know if this is a sign of migration, or just summer visitors.

Birdcount:

Reef Egret 28 (24 dark form & 4 white form), White-cheeked Tern 2, Caspian Tern 1, Little Tern 2

Cream-coloured Courser 2, Slender-billed Gull 3, Sanderling 5, Barn Swallow 3

Terek Sandpiper 4, Curlew Sandpiper 35, Greater Sand Plover 5 (1 oiled)

Kentish Plover 3, Ruddy Turnstone 2, Curlew 1, White-eared Bulbul 2, Gull-billed Tern 1

Flamingos 310

Species Total: 17

Beach clean-up Maternity Hospital, July 8th 2011

We collected around 60kg of waste (which will be recycled) at the clean-up yesterday.

We only had a few Volunteers, but we can call it a successful day.

There’s still more rubbish around, mainly small bottle caps and such – I call this beach now bottle-cap beach.

There were still some birds around. Some are 1st year birds which come for the summer and some are breeding here in Kuwait. Greater Flamingos among them.

 The guy in the last few pics was an official trash picker-upper that came along to do his morning chores (I suppose) and who was obviously flustered at what happened.
The family in one of the shots thanked us whole heartedly and seemed a little embarrassed that we were doing this.

 

 Bird count: White-cheeked Tern (1st summer) – 5 House Sparrow – 26 Common Myna – 2 Greater Sand Plover (1st summer) – 4 Slender-billed Gull (1st summer) – 1 (Eastern) Reef Egret (dark form) – 3 Greater Flamingo – 29 Bar-tailed Godwit – 1 Kentish Plover – 3 Species Total: 9

Beach clean-up Sulaibikhat (2), June 11th 2011

Saturday’s beach clean-up – a collection of around 3oo kg of rubbish went to recycling instead of rotting at the beach. And that was only another small stretch of that area. The beach you see somewhere close to the end is the next one in line waiting for being cleaned, worse than the first two put together. :/

 

 Bird count: (35) Slender-billed Gulls, (1) Grey Plover, (5) Caspian Tern, (4) Night Heron, (2) Gull billed Tern, (5) House Sparrow, (2 dark & 2 white) Reef Heron, (2) Collared Dove), (12 – 1 immature) Flamingos, (4) Little Tern, (2) Grey Heron), (10) Terek Sandpiper), (7) Kentish Plover, (1) Graceful Prinia, (5) Curlew (1) with shot wing feathers, (1) Black-headed Gull, (4) Cream-coloured Courser, (1) fem. Pied Wheatear

Beach clean-up, Doha, Kuwait, May 28th 2011

After a break of one week (due to the weather our island trip had to be cancelled – twice), we were ready for another adventure.

This week we went to Doha beach (one of them) near Entertainment city.

‘We’ is a group of Volunteers (12 this time) with two employees from K’s Path. 
This was the second clean-up at this beach. The first one was approx. 2 months ago.

 At first glance the beach looked fairly clean, except for a few corners where the plastic gathers from the wind.
 But as soon as we started the cleaning, we saw that a lot of plastic had been collected underneath the bushes.
Right next to this beach is a beach that belongs to ‘Entertainment city’.
Angelique told me that they offered them to clean up that stretch of beach, but the company refused.
Nobody is allowed to enter there either.
Well, it was low tide and I had a peek.
They should take up that offer, or clean it up themselves.
In the photos it’s the stretch with the beautiful, small mangroves and the pics before and after show the trash gathered there.

 Some morons did drive their vehicles around at the beach, not realizing how much damage they are doing to the plant Life and the structure of the beach.

One one of the photos you see a factory that’s close by. It’s blowing something nasty in the air.
We actually saw that haze all the way from Mangaf and I thought it’s dust rolling in.
Nah, the wind was blowing that pollution all the way (almost 45min drive) down south.

Today I saw my first Lizard (not sure which type), a Grasshopper (my first around here), some sort of desert rodent, a bunch of varied coloured Dragonflies and a dead beetle that looked almost like the ones I usually see, but this one had hooks all around his ‘armor’.

 

 As far as the birds go, migration is pretty much over. Here’s what I found: Bulbul (4), House sparrow (13), Dunlin (7), Basra Reed Warbler (1), (possible) Graceful Prinia (2), House Martin (12), Kentish Plover (8), Collared Dove (2), European Bee-eater (2), Little Egret (1), Namaqua Dove (1) 11 species Sadly enough I saw a lot of empty shells from ‘hunters’ too Overall it was a great day and a successful one (exact count will come when we get the numbers from the recycling company). It was hot of course (around 100F/40c – today it will be around 110f/43C), but unlike the last time it wasn’t humid and we had some nice wind that was cool for a change and not the hot furnace we usually get.

Beach clean-up, Sulaibikhat, Kuwait, May 13th 2011

Another successful Clean-up with 16 Volunteers.
Sulabaikhat beach is a long stretch of small beaches, this one was near the Health Ministry.
The area you see alongside the fence is a nature preserve / or protected area. Really?

This week’s event was sponsored by Dow and organized by K’s Path in collaboration with en.V.
The beach clean-ups are and ongoing project over the summer months (one every week) to clean up some of the beaches along the migratory bird route.
 We were 16 people today and I think the group photo with the garbage bags says it all Outcome: 216.5 kgs of waste (40% plastic bottles, 37% misc., 18% general plastic, 5% metal cans) collected in under 3 hours!



Bird count of the day: Slender-billed Gull (85), Barn swallow (5), Curlew Sandpiper (66), Little Stint (34), Curlew (4), Gull-billed Tern (5), Dunlin (4), Sandwich Tern (4), Red-backed Shrike (7 male & 3 female), Willow Warbler (1), Little Tern (2), Yellow Wagtail (1), Ruddy Turnstone (9), Blue-cheeked Bee-eater (3), European Bee-eater (1), Sanderling (1), House Sparrow (12), Common Tern (1) 18 species

Beach clean-up, Doha, July 16th

Back from the beach clean-up.
Boy, the wind helped, but it was HOT. (120F/50C)
We had 15 people/Volunteers, not bad.
And collected around 250-300kg of trash, a lot of it will be recycled.

We have been at Doha beach for the 3rd time now and got finally one nasty corner at the fence cleaned up (thanks, Andy and Robert - hope I am not mixing up names). One more clean-up to go next weekend, then's Ramadan break (not allowed to drink water in public = no clean-ups).

Bird count for the day (some more will come tomorrow, when my head works again and I'll be able to look at my books without my head spinning): 1 Cormorant 7 House Sparrows 1 Graceful Prinia (sound) 6 White-eared Bulbuls 4 Kentish Plover 1 Namaqua Dove (1 possible Curlew Sandpiper?)
The tide was out very far & I didn't get very close without getting stuck or chase them away