Mount Davis 14 Oct 2018 - 9 species of raptors

Mount Davis is one of our favorite birding spots in HK Island: easy walking and good for watching raptors.Wing Tung and I haven't seen any real rarities here before but making regular visit can be fun.

The highlights of today were 9 species of raptors, include 2 Oriental Honey Buzzard, 2 Japanese Sparrowhawk, 1 Crested Goshawk, 1 Eastern Buzzard, 1 Eastern Marsh Harrier, Black-eared Kite, 1 Peregrine Falcon, 1 Common Kestrel and 2 Eurasian Hobby.

Eastern Buzzard and Black-eared Kite

Eastern Marsh Harrier - our first in HK Island too

immature Japanese Sparrowhawk

another Japanese Sparrowhawk with Oriental Honey Buzzard

Common Kestrel - the very short P10 separated from Lesser

Peregrine Falcon - the largest falcon in HK

Eurasian Hobby - note the long pointed wing

Birds were actively migrating as we saw at least 7 Black-naped Oriole, a single Dollarbird, and two Blue-winged Minla (first for us in HK Island?). An Eastern Crowned Warbler and Japanese Paradise Flycatcher are my first for this season too.

12 birds in one tree: 10 Black Drongo, 1 Ashy Drongo and 1 Dollarbird

Dollarbird in flight

Japanese Paradise Flycatcher

Asian Brown Flycatcher

Asian Brown Flycatcher - simple is beauty

checklist as here: https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S49177654

HK Wetland Park 10-12 Oct 2018 - dipping another warbler

Recently a Buff-throated Warbler was trapped in my place, which would be a first record in HK. So in the last three days I tried to relocate the bird but failed: again birds in my patch never stay for long.

In this cooler week, some noticeable migrants were recorded, include my 195th species - two Swinhoe's Minivet and 196th - two Oriental Honey Buzzard in different days.

Swinhoe's Minivet - also called Brown-rumped Minivet

Oriental Honey Buzzard

Warblers are my another favorite other than waders, plenty Black-browed Reed Warbler, Pale-legged and Sakhalin Leaf Warbler were here, also two Lanceolated Warbler with the one of the same individual as last week were seen well.

first Sakhalin

https://www.hbw.com/ibc/sound/sakhalin-leaf-warbler-phylloscopus-borealoides/call-1

second Sakhalin

https://www.hbw.com/ibc/sound/sakhalin-leaf-warbler-phylloscopus-borealoides/call-2

Furthermore, more Blue-tailed Bee-eater, both Hobby and Amur Falcon were seen in this week as expected, and also 15 Collared Crow which is my highest count in my local patch.

Eurasian Hobby - my first time to see Hobby hunting swallows

Amur Falcon - a very distant bird, but the wing shape can tell from Hobby

Besides Aves, one mongoose and one turtle were two surprised found during my dipping time.

Mongoose

a turtle - Chinese Stripe-necked Turtle?

this is alive!

I forget how many times Wing Tung and I dipped our targets but sometimes we could see and learn much more in this process than what we expected.

sunset of today

Mai Po 9 Oct 2018 - Manchurian Reed Warbler

Manchurian Reed Warbler is always one of our top Acrocephalus dream-ticks in HK, Tung and I missed several times. Twitching one is always difficult and limited in Autumn only.

Yesterday we got news of a twitchable Man Reed in Mai Po so today's target is very clear and specific. And we were very lucky enough to see the bird as soon as we just arrived the spot!

Thanks to David and Graham for finding the bird out!

Manchurian Reed Warbler - bird was already showing when we arrived. The weak 'black brow' told us this was our target!

the crown pattern is different to Black-browed Reed Warbler. For Manchurian, the lateral crown stripes are brownish rather than black, and showing scaled effect which can be difficult to see in poor light and angle

Manchurian Reed Warbler - the tail and bill are also longer than Black-browed

Manchurian Reed Warbler - eye stripe is more poorly marked than Black-browed too

Manchurian Reed Warbler - the long tail with distinctive head pattern

We are impressed with the Nikon autofocus system, slow but at least accurate in such condition

Manchurian Reed Warbler - the ginger tone of rump and uppertail coverts are hard to see under strong light

as see here the white-brow is quite distinctive so it is also called White-browed Reed Warbler

this bird was showing very well but taking good shots was another problem... Anyway, we are happy for twitching this bird 

Beside the Reed Warbler, we also saw Lanceolated and Pallas's Grasshopper Warbler, an Emerald Dove (our first in MP), a hepatic Oriental Cuckoo and we found a Long-billed Dowitcher in our Great Knot photo (!!). A good day indeed.

haven't been to here for long time

Oriental Reed Warbler - many showing but none photoable

Great Knot, and we found a Long-billed Dowitcher inside after checking the photos....

Chinese Pond Heron

One Sakhalin Leaf Warbler was calling too but not showing, a recording can be checked here (below 5k Hz in average):

https://www.hbw.com/ibc/sound/sakhalin-leaf-warbler-phylloscopus-borealoides/call-0

The full checklist of today: https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S49068663

HK Wetland Park 7 Oct 2018 - raptors and bee-eaters

Clear, sunny sky continuing with Northeasterly moonsoon, I expect there will be lots of active migrants in my patch.

Turning out not many ‘land birds’ were seen but clearly there was an influx of both Dusky Warbler and Black-browed Reed Warbler here and some other unidentified calling Acrocephalus in the reed, probably still Black-browed (I did try to play Manchurian Reed for long, when can we tick one?).

Black Drongo

On the sky, 7 raptors were recorded, including Black-eared Kite, Western Osprey, Eastern Buzzard, Crested Serpent Eagle, Besra, Japanese Sparrowhawk and Peregrine Falcon.

Japanese Sparrowhawk

Eastern Buzzard

Peregrine Falcon

Western Osprey

Surprised species of the day should be Blue-tailed Bee-eater, a flock of 15 continued migrating in lunchtime.

4/5 of the bee-eater flock

Blue-tailed Bee-eater

probably the best lunchtime in my working life here, not about the birds but food

Chai Wan 6 Oct 2018 - October Big Day

Today was the Oct Big Day, another eBird event, so tried to bird after class.

Chai Wan is my home place and this local place is always our first priority if we wanna bird but are tired, even Tung and I usually saw nothing special here, like today did. For some moment, we could see unexpected species like Woodcock, different flycatchers etc.

When no target, watching common birds can be fun and meaningful, and never forget why we started our birding life and how excited when we saw our first Common Emerald Dove.

The full checklist on Oct Big Day: https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S48968106

our usual route in Chai Wan

usual sleeping dog - Cookie

HK Wetland Park 5 Oct 2018 - Lanceolated Warbler

Weather looked perfect for watching raptor migration, so my targets in the first birding day in Oct are falcon, harrier or buzzard.

Some raptors were seen, but none exciting. Three falco species flew fast and high remain unidentified, probably Amur Falcon; and a single Crested Serpent Eagle and Western Osprey.

Taiga Flycatcher

Western Osprey

a full crop

Best bird of the day was no doubt the Lanceolated Warbler, not a rare bird but always good to see one.

Lancy!