Wednesday 30 November 2016

Pennington Marshes - 30th November and 1st December

I spent a couple of lovely mornings at Pennington Marsh on 30th November and 1st December, the weather was superb with clear blue skies and not a breath of wind. The marshes were frozen and so the birds were gathered around areas of water free of ice. It was the usual range of species with high numbers of Brent Goose, Wigeon, Pintail and Teal. Six Ruff were scattered around the Efford Lagoon, Butts Lagoon and Jetty Lagoon area. Offshore numbers of duck appear to be very low with only six Red-breasted Merganser and 11 Eider recorded. Numbers of Knot and Bar-tailed Godwit seem particularly high at the site this winter with over 300 of the former and 120 of the latter - these numbers are approximately double the numbers usually recorded at the site. Conversely, numbers of Black-tailed Godwit are currently very low at the site with only 10 recorded on both days, normally there are several hundred birds here.


Brent Goose - Pennington Marsh


Brent Goose - Pennington Marsh


Lapwing - Pennington Marsh


Canada Goose - Pennington Marsh

Teal - Pennington Marsh

Pintail - Pennington Marsh

Canada Goose - Pennington Marsh

Teal, Wigeon and Pintail - Pennington Marsh

Turnstone - Pennington Marsh

Wigeon - Pennington Marsh

Wigeon - Pennington Marsh

A short visit to Denny Wood on the 1st December produced large numbers of Redwing plus Raven and Marsh Tit but it was remarkably quiet in the frosty conditions.

New Forest Pony - Denny Wood

Bishop's Dyke

Friday 18 November 2016

China Wetlands (Birdquest) Tour - 18th November (Day 15)

Today was going to be a long travel day. Much of the group left for the extension to the tour at 06:00 while Rienk and I had a few extra hours and so headed to Nanshan Park in Changle, Fuzhou from 08:00-10:00. We were hoping for Fork-tailed Sunbird but this was not to be, apparently it is common in the park in the spring. We recorded a few common species including Common Tailorbird, Pallas’s Warbler, Yellow-browed Warbler, Olive-backed Pipit, Plain Thrush, Japanese White-eye, Oriental Magpie-robin and Brambling and spent some time looking at the butterflies which until this site had been a bit thin on the ground. It was soon time to head back to the hotel to pack and head for the airport. I said goodbye to Rienk and flew Fuzhou to Shanghai at 13:20-14:50.

Olive-backed Pipit - Nanshan Park, Fuzhou

Common Bluebottle Graphium sarpedom - Nanshan Park, Fuzhou

Colour Sergeant Athyma nefte - Nanshan Park, Fuzhou

I think this is a Byasa species- Nanshan Park, Fuzhou

On landing in Shanghai a sickening site greeted me. Lining the grassy areas of the runways were probably thousands of metres of mist-net strung to capture and kill birds using the grasslands. There were hundreds of birds strung up dead in these nets, they mainly appeared to be Chinese Bulbul but there we also Pipits, lots of White Wagtail, several Crake/Rail and many other smaller passerines that I could not identify from the plane. Apparently this practice also occurs at Beijing Airport. To me this is a completely unjustified approach to reducing the risk of bird-strike, one that I am not aware that occurs elsewhere (although probably does) and indicates to me the scant regard that the Chinese, in general, give to wildlife. I am not aware of any movement to stop this practice at China’s airports but I am sure this must kill thousands of birds every year. There is a good write-up on the Birding Beijing website here.

I had a long stopover of almost 11 hours in Shanghai Airport which I filled with editing photographs, catching up with my notes and drinking beer!  I flew British Airways from Shanghai to London 01:55-06:50 (12.55-hour flight) but I was upgraded to first class – bonus! In hindsight I am sure there would have been a better option for my domestic and international flights, there appeared to be several flights a day to Beijing from Fuzhou and surely a better connection and shorter stopover in Beijing as British Airways fly from Beijing to London twice a day – maybe I should have looked into this in more detail.

All in all I thoroughly enjoyed my first Birdquest experience, we had a good small group all of whom were good travel companions and the birding in this part of China was fantastic. For me the highlights were the cranes and in particular White-naped Crane, Siberian Crane and Red-crowned Crane, Brazilian Merganser and White’s Thrush. But the sheer numbers of wildfowl was fantastic to see as were all those eastern species that are rare vagrants to Britain.

Links to Other Days of the Trip (Click to View)

Thursday 17 November 2016

China Wetlands (Birdquest) Tour - 17th November (Day 14)

It was a relative lay-in today and we were up for a 06:30 breakfast. This had potential to be a milestone in my birding, I was on 5,999 species for my world list and needed one more for the 6,000, I had hoped that this would be Cabot’s Tragopan at Emei Feng Mountain but it was not to be.

Today we were heading on a short boat trip to Shanyutan Island which was planned to leave at 09:00 on the rising tide. We started by birding the wetland reserve and agricultural area on the mainland opposite the island at Xinyuantou. This produced good numbers of common bird species including Richard’s Pipit, Eastern Yellow Wagtail, Oriental Skylark, Yellow-bellied Prinia, Plain PriniaYellow-browed Warbler, Dusky Warbler, Japanese White-eye, Daurian Redstart, Sand Martin, Barn Swallow and a single Black-browed Reed Warbler. Our local guides had got the tide time a little wrong and it was not until 10:00 that we boarded the small handmade boat to take us to the island. The journey was through tall reeds and we were soon at the island, a journey of no more than 500m or so, the island being separated from the mainland by reedbeds and a channel. In the reedbeds we recorded a single Oriental Reed Warbler and 15 Oriental Penduline Tit. The island had been planted with pines and was being utilised as a duck-farm. Apparently, this is a military area and was the reason why we had needed permits to visit but there was little evidence of a military presence and no-one checked our permits.

Japanese White-eye - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

 Black-crowned Night-heron - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-shouldered Kite - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

 Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Chinese Pond-heron - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Bunting - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Bunting - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

 Daurian Redstart - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Daurian Redstart - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Oriental Greenfinch - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Plain Prinia - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Spoonbill - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Eastern Buzzard - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Eastern Buzzard - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Dusky Warbler - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Richard's Pipit - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

The main reason for visiting the island was for its wader roost and on arrival there was evidently a large roost already gathered on the sandbar. We waded across a channel and positioned ourselves a few hundred metres from the roost and began scanning. The bulk of the roost was made up of Dunlin with smaller numbers of Kentish Plover, White-faced Plover, Sanderling, Grey Plover and Curlew. Amongst the waders were also a small number of Red-necked Stint (five), Great Knot (12), Red Knot (20), Turnstone (one), Greater Sandplover (five), Lesser Sandplover (five), Whimbrel (one) and Oystercatcher (three). And then Hannu spotted our main goal, a Spoon-billed Sandpiper, a winter plumaged bird amongst the Dunlin. We enjoyed views of this exquisite little wader with its peculiar spoon-shaped bill but at a range a little more distant than we had hoped. Also on the island were 51 Black-faced Spoonbill, some of which showed very well, two Saunder’s Gull, Black-tailed Gull, Mongolian Herring Gull, Heuglin’s Gull and Whiskered Tern.

Black-faced Spoonbill - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Spoonbill - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Spoonbill - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Spoonbill - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Spoonbill - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Spoonbill - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Spoonbill - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Spoonbill - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Spoonbill - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Spoonbill - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Mixed waders (mainly Dunlin and Sanderling with White-faced Plover, Kentish Plover and Red-necked Stint) - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Mixed waders (mainly Dunlin and Sanderling with White-faced Plover, Kentish Plover and Red-necked Stint) - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Mixed waders (mainly Dunlin and Sanderling with Oystercatcher and Red-necked Stint) - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

White-faced Plover (2nd from left) and Kentish Plover  - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Greater Sandplover (nominate subspecies), Dunlin and Sanderling - 
Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

White-faced Plover 
Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Saunder's Gull  Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Saunder's Gull - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Saunder's Gull - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Saunder's Gull - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Lesser Black-backed Gull of subspecies heuglini - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Lesser Black-backed Gull of subspecies heuglini - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Caspian Tern - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Caspian Tern - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Arctic Herring Gull of subspecies mongolicus - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Arctic Herring Gull of subspecies mongolicus - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Arctic Herring Gull of subspecies mongolicus - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Spoon-billed Sandpiper - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Red-necked Stint - Shanyutan Island, Changle, Fuzhou

Back to ‘shore’ we then birded the agricultural area once again, here we added, Siberian Rubythroat, Osprey, Scaly-breasted Munia and White-breasted Waterhen to our daylist. Perhaps most notable was a Pacific Swallow, a vagrant to China

Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Asian Brown Flycatcher - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

 Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

 Cattle Egret - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Light-vented Bulbul - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Long-tailed Shrike - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Long-tailed Shrike - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Pacific Swallow - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Pacific Swallow - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Chinese Penduline-tit - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Scaly-breasted Munia - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Scaly-breasted Munia - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-faced Bunting - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Black-browed Reed-warbler- Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Yellow-browed Warbler - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Osprey - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Osprey - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

Yellow Wagtail of race taivana - Xinyuantou, Changle, Fuzhou

So, I had reached 6001 species during the course of the day number 6,000 was White-faced Plover and 6,001 was Spoon-billed Sandpiper.

After beers and final trip round-up in a local restaurant and some packing I crashed at around 22:00 at Jinfeng Guohui Hotel, Changle.

Links to Other Days of the Trip (Click to View)