Avocet in Mie

I've finally caught up with Avocet in Japan, a gaping gap on the list plugged at last! The last birds (I'm aware of) in Mie were a couple of winters ago. I heard about them while I was in Hokkaido but they didn't stick long enough for me to catch up with them. The most galling thing was my return ferry had to sail past where they were. No such  problems  yesterday though, this went smoothly, so smoothly it was beyond smooth and into the realm of the ridiculously easy. 

This was a twitch plain and simple. I hadn't bothered checking the weather forecast or tide tables, no point really, it was what it was. On arrival, at about 2:30am, I had a quick peek to see how wide the river was at the mouth in the reflected lights of the industrial area opposite. I'd been told the bird was usually rather distant on the far shore but that it sometimes came across to the near side. It was wide; it was also hide tide.

After going for a coffee then grabbing a little sleep light was creeping into the sky as I drove back to the concrete wall at the river mouth. The wind had been picking up and things weren't looking good for digiscoping a distant bird. But hey, seeing it was the important thing, anything else a bonus.

When it was light enough to make out the ducks mid-stream I scanned through and there was the Avocet swimming round with them. I couldn't believe it. By the time I'd put on layer after layer to keep out the wing and unpacked the rest of my gear the Avocet was nowhere to be seen. Then the second guessing began, could it have been a Black-headed Gull? ...slightly oiled?

I walked along the top of the retaining wall about 50 metres and scoped the far bank. The water was still very high but there were inlets across there, it could be lurking somewhere out of sight. Just as I was toying with the idea of going for coffee and coming back when the water was lower, there it was! Not distantly on the far shore but right in front of me at the water's edge. It was pure luck that the tide and water levels were just right pushing it in close at dawn. Pure luck that I'd stopped at that exact spot. The sun hadn't risen yet and the light wasn't great, the wind wasn't helping either so getting any decent images was next to impossible and as you might guess the few sharp ones were when its head was turned away. Flight shots weren't possible at all. That'll teach me for leaving the camera in the van while going on a recce.

I could have waited till the light improved to increase shutter speed but I expected the bird would never have been as close again so I decided to leave. It's great to get a Japan tick but I've seen plenty of Avocets before and the fields and estuaries further south were more enticing than trying to get a few better shots.

The following images are the best I could manage.

1stw Vega, Mongolian and Taimyr Gulls; February 8th

One really good thing about looking for gulls at Tsu city is many of them can be approached quite closely, certainly far better views can be had than in Osaka. There are large numbers of very distant gulls out on off-shore sand bars too but there are always enough birds close at hand to sustain interest. A group on the beach is worth a flock on a sand bar, as the saying ought to go.

As an aside, one thing I really like about first winter gulls (apart from their appearance) is that they're always willing to stand up to the crows. While to gulls loafing time means just that, bathe, preen, take a nap, to crows loafing time seems to be all about seeing how many gulls they can disturb. Normally I'm very pro-crow but when it comes to gulling in Osaka they can irritate the hell out of me, I've seen the whole gull flock prematurely head out into the bay too often... leaving me with hours of daylight and nothing to look at. At risk of sounding anthropomorphic, it's as if with age gulls would rather just move out of the way than play the crows silly games. But it's not anthropomorphising to say this does seem to be a form of play to the crows, they're focused on food in the morning but from mid-afternoon there's a real shift in behaviour and a small number of birds will drop into the gull flock and walk directly at the nearest sleeping or preening gull and peck it to get a response if it hadn't already moved out of the way, then on to the next, then another. There's no obvious benefit for the crow. When there's a dead fish involved the difference is striking and a single gull is more than a match for two or three crows. The only way the crows win is by a few birds forming a circle and taking turns to rush in from opposite sides preventing the gull from feeding until it eventually concedes and leaves the fish to the crows. And that's when crow cooperation goes out the window. But first winter gulls don't back down, not even when there's nothing to defend.

This Taimyr is a good example.

The least common of the regular large gulls here is Mongolian. Last weekend I saw one first winter, seeing more than a single first winter is fairly unusual and I don't think I've ever had more than three in a day.

First winter Mongolians invariably stand out even at very long range because of their very pale rather uniform appearance. The largely white coverts and pale grey to whitish saddle with narrow dark centre line and sub-terminal bar produce an over all appearance usually only matched by very worn individuals of other taxa.

Vega is by far the commonest of the Herring-type gulls here so unsurprisingly this is where I see the widest range of plumage variation on a regular basis and I'm far less likely to want to invoke the dreaded H-word. Whereas seeing far fewer of the others, it's less easy to know just how odd an odd individual might be and whether it is or is not within the normal range of variation.

I saw three first winter Vegas at close range that day and these are shots of the three.

Vega 1: A basically brown bird with boldly chequered coverts and tertials. The underparts are typical, dark but mottled rather than smooth.

Vega 2: A greyer version of the previous bird and more the norm. This tertial pattern also occurs more often. 

Vega 3: An even paler bird, particularly the underparts.

Two Taimyr Gulls, closer views below.

Taimyr 1 (left-hand of the upper two): On many birds the paler areas in the coverts, especially the medians, can be dull and lack contrast creating a darker-looking wing.

Taimyr 2 (right-hand of the upper two): Slightly more variegated outer greater coverts on this bird and much paler-centred medians.

Vega 2: Prominent inner primary window. Underwing mainly dark with distinctly barred axillaries.

Vega 3: The palest bird.

Taimyr 1: The axillaries are usually subtly marked like this.

Taimyr 1: Lack of obvious primary window and dark-based greater coverts create a darker and more uniform upper wing in flight.

Taimyr 2.

I've previously posted images of juvenile and first winter Taimy Gulls here.

Dusky Thrush or Naumann's intergrade?

As a preamble I have to say that on a visit to Mie two weeks after this post I was able to see a number of Duskys at close range on a recently ploughed field. I further posted on Dusky Thrush variation and concluded that though it isn't possible to know whether historical introgression is responsible for some of the features I had though might have been suggestive, these features are widespread in the Dusky population and are for practical purposes normal.

I don't see many Dusky x Naumann's intergrades in Kyoto; no more than two or three ever in fact. Those I have come across were fairly obvious, or perhaps I ought to say the ones I've noticed were fairly obvious. A first winter male I saw at the weekend got me wondering whether I might be overlooking less obvious birds. After all I don't look that closely at the thousands of Duskys I see. But is it even an intergrade at all? I certainly don't think it's an F1 hybrid as any bright individual such as this would have far more red and less black by comparison, however I suspect there must be some Naumann's influence in its ancestry.

Below are a couple shots of the last intergrade I found here, at Ogura five years ago. The red in the rump and scapulars is clearly different to any Dusky and the sides of the breast and rear flanks are strongly flushed reddish. There's no doubt about this one.

Dusky x Naumann's intergrade, Kyoto 2011.

Dusky Thrush is a very common species throughout Kansai, especially in late winter, and there were quite a few on the beach were I found this bird. Until it flew a little it looked no different to all the others along the tideline but as soon as it did there appeared to be too much red towards the back end and this caught my attention. Looking more closely I felt there was too much red in the uppertail coverts, even the rump (which can be quite rusty on some) was redder than most birds, as was the base of the tail. However to an extent this depended on the angle and at times it could look darker. Occasionally the side of the neck or upper breast seemed to hint at orange-red very slightly, though this too depended on the angle and light. But the rear flanks undoubtedly had a small but obvious amount of red, something I would never expect to see on a Dusky.

Going on first impressions this was a run-of-the-mill male Dusky.

Running along the base of the seawall in a brief spell of brighter light I could confirm my suspicion that the uppertail coverts and tail base were redder than I'm used to seeing. 

Not only are the rump and uppertail coverts redder than I'd expect from Dusky but the rear flanks also have a few distinctly reddish feathers.

The median coverts are far brighter and more uniform than the blackish-centred feathers of adult males. Here (and the following images) there's a faint rusty wash across the proximal half of all but the central tail feather, this presumably accounts for it giving the impression of being redder-tailed in the field even though I was never able to explain why at the time, I could never see more than the rusty fringe to the bases that any Dusky will show. 

In this view, I wouldn't have given it a second glance; this looks a straight forward Dusky. On close inspection some of the small feathers in the breast and at the base of the whitish gorget seem slightly reddish. I'm unsure whether this is an artifact but it may explain why the neck sides and upper breast sometimes seemed to subtly flush orange-reddish.