Lots of thrushes

I had hoped to get back to Hegurajima this week but it wasn't to be. I set off on the off-chance the sea might calm sufficiently to allow the ferry to sail. As I continued to check the marine forecast while heading north it became clear this wasn't going to happen so I didn't waste my time driving up the Noto Peninsular to Wajima.


I had left home the afternoon before yesterday allowing time for a quick stop in the hills on the way up, even if the ferry had been running. No sign of Copper Pheasant, display has tailed off somewhat but this showy Japanese Woodpecker was nice.

Ashy Minivets were frequently overhead but none came within decent camera range and this pair was the best I could manage.

I was disappointed I wasn't going to make it out to the island, the weather looked promising but it meant when I arrived in Kanazawa there was time to grab a little sleep before dawn. When I did clamber out of the van I had this snowy reminder that some parts of Japan get real winter, unlike Kansai.

To be honest the winter scene was the second surprise, the first was before I even clambered out of the van. There were Eyebrowed, Brown-headed and Dusky Thrushes running round on the short grass next to where I'd parked. Dusky I could understand but the other two are often no more than a fleeting tail breaking from the undergrowth before vanishing through the canopy. Unfortunately in the early light they required a very high ISO to capture them so the results aren't as impressive as they might have been.

Almost a nice grouping: male and female Eyebrowed Thrushes but the Blue and White Flycatcher (tail just visible behind a branch on the left) chose to move before I could get the shot.

A stunning male, they don't even look this good in field guides.

Brown-headed Thrush.

There were plenty of other migrants around, the place was teaming with phylloscs, Eastern Crowned were everywhere, very vocal, very active, and Sakhalin Leaf were fairly numerous too. A couple of Chestnut-cheeked Starlings became half a dozen as the morning wore on and an Ashy Minivet heard only once probably passed straight through. Two or three Japanese Robins were singing and there was at least one Siberian Rubythroat as well. Several Narcissus, Asian Brown and Blue and White Flycatchers were dotted around the park but I came across just a single Japanese Yellow Bunting. Also represented by a lone individual, Oriental and Northern Hawk Cuckoo sand intermittently throughout the day but I only saw the former. Another invisible songster was an Oriental Reed Warbler, quite what it was doing in woodland I don't know but there were several in more expected habitat nearby. Just as good for me was an Azure-winged Magpie so I'll mention it with the migrants. I don't see them in Kansai and this is the closest to home I can find them, great looking birds.   

Chestnut-cheeked Starlings is a passage migrant in my region.

My drive up to Hegurajima is my only chance to see Azure-winged Magpie, if I have the time to stop and look.

Asian Brown Flycatcher.

Because the park had a good selection of migrants it was easy to the feel things were on the move and something could really good turn up. Unfortunately it didn't and by day's end I was wishing I'd been on Hegura. The marine forecast didn't look any better for today so I stayed overnight but this morning seemed much quieter. In fact the same birds were present but less vocal, the periods of drizzle perhaps dampened the birds' exuberance, making everything seem harder work. I'd walked for 11 hours yesterday but there was no way I could muster the enthusiasm to repeat that even if I'd had the time. Someone saw a Japanese Paradise Flycatcher early in the morning in an area I'd spent a lot of time yesterday so that may have been newly arrived.

Female Meadow Bunting caught in a rare sunny moment.

A few bits and pieces from the April trip

My three-day trip last week, taking in The Tsu city / Matsusaka (Mie), Hegurajima and adjacent coast (Ishikawa), and on the final day a morning at Kenmin Kaihin Park Kanazawa (Ishikawa) and evening near Yogo (Shiga), was great fun birding across such a wide range of habitats and a great success birdwise recording 131 species. Well above my usual week-long off-shore island totals at this time of year.

Mergansers and boats; an early morning fishing competition in Mie.

Mie provided a few spring arrivals such as Cattle Egret and Chestnut-cheeked Starling...

 

 

As well as the usual suspects, Chestnut-eared Bunting and Green Pheasant...

 

On Hegurajima Pale Thrushes are still quite common but I was surprised to find a Long-tailed Rosefinch. Most have already left and I'm more accustomed to finding the scarce Common Rosefinch at this time of year.

Along with Buff-bellied and Red-throated Pipits, I had two Olive-backed. The very fine flank streaking on the bird below suggests it could be yunnanensis. I've posted previously on two birds I believed were yunnanensis on Hegura.

The northern Ishikawa coast was a little disappointing but one spectacular sight was thousands of Black-tailed Gulls flying up wooded valleys onto fields in the process of being flooded prior to planting rice.

The following morning I was at Kenmin Kaihin Park in Kanazawa. There were lots of thrushes around, especially Japanese, Dusky and Pale. Even with very high ISO it was difficult to get a shot of this Brown-headed in the very early morning when thrushes still venture into the open.

Blue and White Flycatchers had been more common on Hegura, I only saw three here.

In the hills several newly arrived Oriental Cuckoos were singing but Copper Pheasants and Japanese Scops Owls had fallen silent, though the weather wasn't the best when I was there. It was probably still too early for Grey Nightjars and the other cuckoos, either that or the weather didn't encourage song.


There were a couple of Ashy Minivets in Kanazawa but they were quite common near Yogo, about 15 was the largest group I saw. Both places had lingering Rustic Buntings, it was a little surprising I didn't see any on Hegura though time on the island was brief.

Ruddy-breasted Crakes and waders

Continuing from the previous post, I'd managed 44 species in the hills yesterday I was hopeful of seeing over 100 species for the weekend. A modest total for many places perhaps, even in a day, but I've never even hit 90 over two days in Kansai.

I'd driven out of the hills to the nearest convenience store on the approach to Lake Biwa and at 22:30, after an hour sleep and more importantly a long anticipated coffee, I set off for Mie prefecture and the second largely sleepless night. Being a Saturday the roads were still quite busy until cutting across the Kii Peninsular towards Mie. At about 02:00 I began to meet groups of cyclists heading in the opposite direction, presumably a long distance event as they were strung out over many kilometres, the first and last on either side of the central mountains. It's reassuring to know there are others of questionable sanity out there and when friends double check and exchange those knowing glances "You spent... two nights... in the mountains or driving... with no sleep... just to look for birds?" it's a relief to at least imagine diluting the doubt behind the smiles by redirecting their misgivings towards the obvious 'real' nutters. My favourite was two or three years ago birding during a typhoon in northern Okinawa. Every few metres I'd have to stop to drag a fallen tree limb from the road, the only other vehicles I saw all day were two police cars and a highway maintenance truck, but when I came down to the coast road at one point a fisherman was braced against the parapet casting out into the boiling East China Sea. I felt so incredibly normal!

These trips are usually punctuated by convenience store stops and I grabbed another hour of sleep and a coffee fix before driving the final kilometre to my planned starting point. It still wasn't light when I pulled up onto the Kumozu River levee to finish my coffee and switching off the engine I heard a singing Ruddy Crake close to the van. Then another... and another. Brilliant, this is something I never hear around Kyoto, what a great start to the day. Surely I could make 100 today.

Just as I'd been surprised by the number of summer visitors already singing in the mountains yesterday, several Oriental Reed Warblers were in full song where there had been none last weekend. But it wasn't just the birds that were changing, large expanses of fields had been flooded through the week and farmers were already planting rice at sun-up. This could potentially attract more waders or just make finding them more difficult.

Persistent drizzle and occasional heavier showers fulfilled the promise of the slow leaden dawn and while one benefit was low-flying Pacific Swifts, the great views of Dusky Thrushes and Chestnut-cheeked Starlings didn't result in the kind of photographs I'd have liked.

Another advantage with wet weather is that Green Pheasants, suddenly common, come into the open more and for longer, but not so the Chinese Bamboo Partridges that remain heard but not seen. For some reason they are far more cooperative in some other parts of Japan.

Just as there had been last week, there were eight Spotted Redshanks on a nearby coastal pool. But unlike last week most were now coming into breeding plumage, unfortunately good shots were impossible through the morning murk. Waders generally were more abundant than last week with large numbers of Lesser Sandplover, Grey Plover, Dunlin and Bar-tailed Godwits. There were also big numbers of Whimbrel all along the coast, this a species which hadn't present at all last week but a single Great Knot was the only other new species.

The very dull conditions meant afternoon birding was curtailed not allowing time to visit some areas which would have guaranteed a few additional species such as Sanderling. Frustratingly Common Reed Buntings which had been common last week were nowhere to be found. Perhaps they've all left but were the Blue Rock Thrushes, they aren't winter visitors. Why are there always some certainties that can't be found? Common Goldeneye seem to vanish long before the other ducks. Nevertheless, my weekend tally came to a record-breaking and extremely satisfying 110 species.

Bar-tailed Godwits.

List of species
Chinese Bamboo Partridge   several heard
Green Pheasant  
Gadwall
Falcated Duck
Eurasian Wigeon
Mallard
Eastern Spot-billed Duck
Northern Shoveler
Northern Pintail
Eurasian Teal
Common Pochard
Tufted Duck
Greater Scaup
Red-breasted Merganser
Streaked Shearwater
Little Grebe
Great Crested Grebe
Grey Heron
Great White Egret
Little Egret
Great Cormorant
Osprey   1
Black kite
accipiter sp   1
Ruddy-breasted Crake   3 heard
Common Moorhen   2
Common Coot
Eurasian Oystercatcher   c30
Grey-headed Lapwing   5-6
Grey plover   c25
Little Ringed Plover   2
Kentish Plover
Lesser Sandplover
Common Snipe
Long-billed Dowitcher   1
Bar-tailed Godwit
Whimbrel
Eurasian Curlew   5
Far Eastern Curlew   2
Spotted Redshank   8
Common Greenshank   3
Wood Sandpiper   1
Common Sandpiper   5
Great Knot   1
Dunlin   c1000
Black-tailed Gull
Common Gull   sev
Vega Gull
Mongolian Gull   1-2
Slaty-backed Gull   2-3
Vega x taimyrensis intergrades   more common than Vega
Black-headed Gull
Saunder's Gull   2
Feral Rock Dove
Oriental Turtle Dove
Pacific Swift   30-40
Japanese Pygmy Woodpecker   1 heard
Bull-headed Shrike
Jay   1 A big surprise in some coastal pines.
Carrion Crow
Large-billed Crow
Great Tit   2
Barn Swallow
Skylark
Zitting Cisticola   several
Brown-eared Bulul
Japanese Bush Warbler   several
Oriental Reed Warbler   fairly common
Japanese White-eye   several
Chestnut-cheeked Starling   c40
White-cheeked Starling
Dusky Thrush
Eurasian Tree Sparrow
White Wagtail
Japanese Wagtail   1
Buff-bellied Pipit   several
Oriental Greenfinch
Meadow Bunting
Chestnut-eared Bunting   1
Black-faced Bunting