Spending a day with colleagues from Asociación Ulula taught me a good deal about owl ecology while monitoring nests and driving Saladares de Guadalentín for little bustards and black-bellied sandgrouse.

Southern Cádiz ensures top-class birding. Local specialties such as house swift and northern bald ibis were combined with migratory birds such as ortolan bunting in La Janda or puffins and poms in Tarifa.

April in Spain calls for the steppe. Little and great bustards are busy with their spectacular displays, a must-see show which ensures views of larks, shrikes or orchids in awesome green-and-red landscapes.

A long drought is especially evident by June. Rufous-tailed rock thrush, tawny pipit, pin-tailed sandgrouse, stone martens, and Lataste’s vipers are some specialties found with friends and family.