A night away

We went camping a few days ago.................

Some late waders............

A Bar-tailed Godwit and a Grey Plover near town this afternoon................

Another batch of common waders...........

There were quite a few waders on the beach near Yakumo on Monday..................

2015 Best of #4

A last batch of shots from the past year..............

Some strays...................

We were out in Sawara and Shikabe this afternoon........................

A quiet birthday weekend...............

The end of the wader season saw us up at Yakumo and Oshamanbe yesterday, my 47th birthday in fact.............

A night away

A Grey Plover on the beach at Oshamanbe today.............

OMG Sunshine

Well well well, we finally got some sunshine this morning and early afternoon (followed by a really heavy thunderstorm though).

We were at Shikabe and I was trying to get some Japanese Green Pigeon shots. BIF shots are tough for such fast flying birds and the 100-400 perhaps isn't the best BIF lens anyway (and of course I'm no expert either). When they fly against the sea it was often impossible to AF but luckily there was a patch of blue sky with the light behind me.

One problem with setting the camera up for BIF shots is when you're suddenly confronted with a bird doing something else your settings are all wrong, I can change them in slightly more than a split second but often that's not enough.

The white background was the surf, there was a big swell after yet another typhoon. The birds had to deal with big waves.......

Next year I'll approach this more seriously and sit near the rocks hidden and camouflaged. Today it was mainly BIF shots...........

Not much else around here, a few Common Sandpiper and Grey Tailed Tattler on the rocks, nothing else.

The day started early in Kamiiso with the last waders of the season (probably).

A Bar Tailed Godwit and a Grey Plover. Other waders included 1 Dunlin, 4 Red Necked Stint and several Common Sandpiper. Lots of Black Headed Gulls around now as well as the first Pintail and Teal of the autumn. There were 3 Heron species; Grey Heron, Black Crowned Night Heron and Little Egret. Actually 1 of the egrets had me thinking of Swinhoes again (bill seemed shorter and yellowish) but it probably wasn't. Here's a lousy heavy crop of 2 egrets, the one on the left seems to have a shorter lighter bill and shorter legs...........or is it just my imagination?

When I went back in the evening there were 3 egrets and they all were clear Little Egrets.

I put an ID request on birdforum anyway, you never know.......

In the ricefields there were lts of Stonechats and hirundines moving south as well as a small flyover flock of Pacific Golden Plover. I was looking for waders here, I flushed a couple of Common Snipe (I could ID them by the white edge to their wings), yet another new bird for my Hakodate list.

Not much in town last week, the weather was terrible most of the time. I did see a few migrants however.

A female Blue and White Flycatcher I think.

The commonest migrant was Asian Brown Flycatcher, they were everywhere. Other stuff included Arctic Warbler, Siberian Stonechat, Grey Wagtail as well as several unidentified thrush type things. Large flocks of Grey Starlings are around as well as the last few Red Cheeked Strarling, here's a male near my apartment.

So it's autumn now, time to get used to wearing socks and jackets again.

Thanks for clicking this link.......

42

A selection of waders from the last few days. I'm 42 today, time marches on..............

I got up early today (my 42nd birthday) and went to Kamiiso. There were 7 species of wader. Most interesting was this Grey Plover.

3 Mongolian Plover, 1 Bar Tailed Godwit, 1 Sanderling, several Common Sandpiper, 1 Whimbrel and lots of Red Necked Stints were the other shorebirds around.

I met Kim a few times recently, he saw a Marsh Sandpiper yesterday to add to Temincks Stint and Curlew Sandpiper, all these would have been local ticks for me. My local list is on 196 now and I'm eyeing the big 200 so three new birds would be nice......

In the afternoon we headed out to Shikabe. Several years ago on this date I saw lots of Common Terns close inshore at a particular spot and have gone back every year in the hope of photographing them. They've never been back needless to say. I did find this tame Grey Tailed Tattler though.

And here's a short handheld video...............

There were also a few Japanese Green pigeon here too..........

We headed to Shikabe to the well known spot for this species but they only came close when I went back to the car for something................I had to be content with dodgy flight shots only.

At Onuma the forest is still dark and full of mosquitoes, I got bitten on the only part of my body not covered with repellent (my index finger joints). Here are a couple of high ISO shots from deep in the greenery..........

Last week there wasn't much around except the inevitable Red Necked Stints.

How cute is this?

And here's a BIF shot.

This may be the last batch of Stint shots of 2010...........

Yesterday was annoying as hell. Liverpool using to Man Utd was bad (oh and f**k right off Fergie, O'Shea should have got sent off). I also tried booking a flight back to the UK using mileage I've accumulated over the years. Without boring you with details suffice to say the airline in question (Delta) make it as tricky as possible to do this, I can't even do it online. That was bad too.

So 42, wasn't that the answer to the question of life, the universe and everything? Wisdom awaits perhaps.

Thanks for clicking this link.

Wader Season #5

Wader season continues in south Hokkaido, this week is usually the peak..............






The Red Necked Stints were still on the same stretch of beach at Kamiso. They are surprisingly difficult to see sometimes and for non birding folk walking on the beach they are probably just about invisible..........













They were pretty tame. As you can see from this pic of my wife.........



There were also quite a few Grey Tailed Tattler around too........





The Tattlers and Stints are by far the commonest passage shorebirds but there are other species around too. Here's a crappy record shot of a Grey Plover, a local tick no less.



The only other wader species today was a Common Sandpiper. A few Harlequin Duck were around, the first of the winter visitors (even though it was a hot sultry day).

I fell asleep during the England game last night. I see Diego Maradonna is proving the rule that great players generally make crap coaches/managers. If I was a French/Portuguese fan I might start looking at alternative plans for next summer. Just watching the 2nd ODI, seems like a real anticlimax after the Ashes...........