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Introduction
Twelve enthusiastic birders gathered at the crack of dawn at Gatwick on Easter Monday in anticipation of our first organised Greater Peterborough Ornithological Group (GPOG) trip to South West Turkey.
We flew with Thomas Cook, staying at the excellent Garden Pension in Dalyan run by Catherine and Ercan and hired two minibuses from Car Dalaman. The total cost of the trip was less than £400 each.
Birding in this part of Turkey is never easy. Despite the vast tracts of seemingly attractive habitat, birds can be thin on the ground. We have found that Dalyan makes a good base for birding this area, with plenty on offer within a 25k radius of the town. If you can do it, then two longer trips are well worth making and add considerably to the species list. The Menderes Delta/Bafa Golu is three hours to the north and an exploration of the mountain areas around Seki is highly recommended. Time taken to explore areas away from the regular sites undoubtedly yields its rewards but ‘first timers’ or those with limited time/transport couldn’t do better than take a holiday in Dalyan.
Literature and websites
Birding information for Turkey is relatively sparse and we found only a couple of trip reports relevant to this time of year, Bob Swann 6th – 19th April 2003 and Nature Trek 20th – 28th April 2006. Gosney’s Finding Birds in Western Turkey remains the standard site guide and is referred to in this trip report. Ian Green and Nigel Moorhouse’s A Birdwatchers Guide to Turkey doesn’t give masses of detail on sites, but nevertheless gives useful information on what to bring and expect on the trip to Turkey. A couple of us had been to South West Turkey on previous occasions so had reasonable knowledge of the area and selected sites, but this was very much a ‘find it yourself’ kind of trip.
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