Red Knot at Doha Reserve on 18/09/2019

Great Knot at Sulaibikhat Bay!

Yesterday I suspected a bird being a Great Knot. It was too distant to see any detail about it, but its jizz and colour matches Great Knot, although legs appeared dark and couldn’t see any spotting on its flanks or breast. I decided to take photos to I can examine them at computer screen. I took random pictures of the flock (it was very hard to locate it in the camera viewfinder) and suddenly remembered that I could have seen a Ruff instead of Great Knot so left the place.

After downloading the pictures today, I was about to delete the pictures of the ruff, but then decided to check them, to my surprise it did look like a Great Knot, it short legs rules out ruff! Size comparison with the Bar-tailed Godwit seems OK, dark primaries shows well above its tail, short legs, shape and length of bill, also dark breast and chest protruding downwards all suggest it is indeed a Great Knot.

It will be the 8th record for Kuwait if accepted by KORC.