We left the lake early in the afternoon. This was because I wanted to make a stop in Thessaloniki at the Gallikos River Delta. The reason was that a Red-throated Loon, a Horned Grebe and a Red-necked Grebe were spotted there just a few days ago. These species are not common for Greece and I had not seen them yet. When I arrived at the Gallikos River I had only 1 to 1.5 hours of decent light for photography. Unfortunately we only saw the Red-throated Loon and it was quite far for a decent photo. However I did saw a male Merlin feeding on something which looked like a Water Pipit. We stayed at that point for a while and I was able to get some photos, as it seemed that the Merlin didn’t care much for our presence (we weren’t very close anyway).
Not far from that point we came across a female Red-breasted Merganser which was fishing near the coast. The light was not enough and the bird moved away as soon as it saw us, but I did manage to get some pictures.
Just before we leave the coast I saw a large group of 15 Red-breasted Mergansers. They were quite far away and it seemed that they were socializing more than feeding. We stayed at the point and watch them until it started to getting dark and we had to start our journey back to Athens…
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