The UAE - 150% in the Western Palearctic

[HobbyBoy]

The reason the UAE is not 'officially' in the WP is because Stanley Cramp had not made it to the Trucial States, as it was then, when he started the BWP series. There was also very little information to be had.

Only the SAS were active in the area and not many of them had much time for birding and each of the separate sheikdoms/emirates were waving fists at each other, over the loss of their favourite goats and/or camels. The unofficial UAE recorder, was Effie Warr, based at the BTO/OSME and until Colin Richardson, Adrian Chapman, Gerry Ricks, Bish Brown, Peter Hellyer et al, came along in the late 70s/ early 80s, there was nobody to push for the UAE's rightful Western Pally status.

By this time the BWP juggernaut had started rolling and the UAE was excluded. However other excellent publications such as the definitive 'Atlas of the Birds of the Western Palearctic' HAD always included the UAE and most of Oman. No less an authority than Eric Hirschfeldt, ex-Abu Dhabi airport ATC, then Bahrain and current author of the annual Rare Birds Yearbook, also considers the UAE to be so, and has argued for many years for its due re-instatement.

Most FennoScandians and Europeans DO consider the UAE to be part of the Western Palearctic, which of course it is. But we Brits obviously still rule the faunal/zoogeographical boundaries roost and until a new BWP is commissioned, in probably 50 years time, the UAE is 'beyond the pale.'

So any of you colonials, native wallahs and/or troublesome expats will 'jolly well have to get used to it ... old boys!'

Now I've started posting I can't stop !

Go Well

John K Bannon

[Sandman]

It is GREAT having you with us John! An UAE birding legend!!
Hurried greeting from Seattle

[Peter Hellyer]

John,

only just seen this...

The reason the UAE is not 'officially' in the WP is because Stanley Cramp had not made it to the Trucial States, as it was then, when he started the BWP series. There was also very little information to be had.

Only the SAS were active in the area and not many of them had much time for birding and each of the separate sheikdoms/emirates were waving fists at each other, over the loss of their favourite goats and/or camels. The unofficial UAE recorder, was Effie Warr, based at the BTO/OSME and until Colin Richardson, Adrian Chapman, Gerry Ricks, Bish Brown, Peter Hellyer et al, came along in the late 70s/ early 80s, there was nobody to push for the UAE's rightful Western Pally status.

Well, it wasn't only the SAS - don't forget Michael Gallagher, who was here with other bits of the British armed forces, and ran his 'Operation Tuyur' (Operation Birds) for a bunch of military birders as the British presence was being wound down. And Effie was here too, of course, then followed by people like Mike Crumbie, John Stewart-Smith, Mark and Jenny Hollingworth in the mid-1970s, who supplied lots of the data on which basis Effie compiled the unofficial UAE checklist until Colin, Adrian, myself and others effectively said: "Right, we can do it now". You were part of the process too, as I recall.

The real problem, as I remember, was that when Cramp was starting BWP, there was very little data from ANYWHERE in Arabia, apart from places like Kuwait and Aden - so there was nothing on which to base an assessment. Not until Erik Hirschfeld, with a bit of help from you, me, Colin, Michael Gallagher and others, started pulling together all of the records from throughout the Arabian peninsula, was it possible to show that, with the exception of Dhofar, the peninsula's avifauna was most closely related to the Western Palaearctic.

All history now, of course - somebody ought to write it up one day, to explain to the newcomers who only been here for ten or twenty years ....

[Clive]

And no-one had bins... we just used two toilet rolls taped together. ;)

[Peter Hellyer]

Clive,

And no-one had bins... we just used two toilet rolls taped together. ;)

Not quite ! Though no digiscoping, of course.

Mind you, it was MUCH easier to find what were then rarities (even if most are now recognised as being actually pretty regular/common. It was nice to be on a 'new frontier', though - finding the First Moorhen breeding record or the First Black-winged Stilt breeding record for the UAE. Both as recently as 1989, I think.