Birding the coast around Shanghai (1 Viewer)

Yangshan island and Nanhui coast

Started at Yangshan Island, walked with Stephan and Xueping from the yellow “temple mount” area across to the rubbish dump valley and back. Overall rather quiet, best were the first Daurian redstarts and bluetails and some nice rubythroats. Then drove to Nanhui and checked all the clumps along the sea wall. The highlight was good views of a male davisoni sibe thrush. We also spent a short time being suffocated by passing dirt trucks whilst scoping distant BF spoonbill and dal pel at the main pool. This main pool, an important wintering site for the endangered BF spoonbill has been allowed (deliberately?) to become degraded, it is due for complete destruction in a few years. The wind today was a light westerly, I am sure that what we need is a good northerly.

Complete list, Saturday 10th October 2015, Yangshan island and Nanhui coast

Pintail, 2 on the mudflats
Dabchick, few
Black-faced spoonbill,6 on big pool at Dongtan
BC Night heron, few
CPH, 1
Cattle egret, few
Grey Heron, common
Great white egret, 40+ on dowitcher pool
Intermediate egret, 20+
Little egret, 100+
Dalmatian pelican, usual individual asleep near the BF spoonbills
Kestrel, 1
Amur falcon, 1 male over YI early and a female/imm cavorting with a kestrel on YI
Black-eared kite, 1 over YI
Moorhen, few
BW stilt, few
Pied avocet, 8
Black-tailed godwit, 10+
Spotted redshank, 15+
Greenshank, 25+
No gulls or terns noted today
Red turtle dove, 1 female
Spotted dove, few
OTD, few
Common kingfisher, 1
Bull-headed shrike, 2 imms
Brown shrike, 1
LT shrike, few
HC drongo, one imm on YI
Magpie, few
Eastern great tit, 2
Yellow-bellied tit, 1 male on YI
Barn swallow, 30+
Plain prinia, few
Chinese bulbul, few
BF Bush warbler, 1
Dusky warbler, 1
Radde’s warbler, 2
Pallas’s warbler, 5+
YB warbler, 15+
Arctic warbler, 4+
Eastern crowned warbler, 1
Crested myna, few
Siberian thrush, the birds a few weeks ago on the Jiangsu coast were sibirica (on the basis of their strong vent markings). Today excellent views of a male in clump 1 that matched davisoni in Brazil
White’s thrush, 2+
Siberian rubythroat, 2 males on YI
RF bluetail, the first of the autumn, 4+ today
Daurian redstart, the first of the autumn, everywhere, 30+ today
Swinhoe’s robin, 3+ today
Stejneger’s stonechat, 3+
Blue rock thrush, 6+
WT rock thrush, 2
Grey-streaked fly, 1
Asian brown fly, 7+
Mugimaki fly, 3+
Taiga fly, 4+
Blue and white fly, 12+
Scaly-breasted munia, small flock on YI
Eastern yellow wag, 3+
Grey wagtail, 2
Leucopsis white wag, 6+
Meadow bunting, a male singing with a female on YI, presumed resident birds
BF bunting, 1+
Out again next weekend, here’s hoping for a northerly blow and an arrival of thrushes and buntings.

Nice list of migrants there! Looks to be the place for coastal Shanghai.

Another good day at Nanhui/Yangshan

Thank you Tom, indeed it is clearly the place for migrants.

The micro-forests along the sea wall are great magnets for migrants and bird photographers. It may be helpful if we were to develop a system of naming the clumps. After much discussion about what constitutes a separate clump and at what point a lone tree becomes a clump (we decided it doesn’t; a lone tree is like a dwarf planet and relegated to “lone tree” status).
I would like to show a map but the satellite imagery is just not good enough so here is a verbal explanation:
The clumps are numbered from the spoonbill lake going north.

Clump 1 the best of all the clumps, this is the best site for migrants and photographers. This autumn the clump has been “tidied” by photographers, ie hacked to pieces, but at least it is a lot more airy and easier to move around in. Last Saturday afternoon the place was almost deserted by photographers and we got gripping views of bluetail, swinhoe’s robin at our feet, pale, whites and grey-backed thrush, pallas’s warbler and prolonged views of a strong candidate for non-borealis Arctic type.

Clump 2. 100m north of clump 1 and half the size but usually holds birds.
Then several km north of clump 2 you pass LT1 and LT2 (lone trees set back from the road and easily missed). Then you get to LT3 a decent sized tree just by the road.

200m north of LT3 you meet the small clump3 then a short gap then clump4, possibly the largest, most open of all the micro-forests. Another 200m north you reach clump 5 which is similar in size to clump4 but is subdivided into 5a a few metres of hedging then 5b.

After this there are three more small clumps, clump6, clump7 and finally clump8.
A fortnight ago I took a cab out to clump8 and walked the 8km south to the southern end of the grandstand. A long walk but can be rewarding.
So last Saturday, 17th October I was again out with the usual group of dedicated people to Yangshan island then Nanhui. A long day list but the best were a group of Japanese Grosbeak at the temple mount on Yangshan. We did the full walk early in the morning then returned for another look at the temple mount, given that the wind was in the north-east, these Grosbeak clearly had just arrived, they gave good views and after fifteen minutes were gone.
I have spent the last 2 years checking for Japanese Grosbeak and they are so different that I am sure I never missed one in Jiangxi.
Here are a list of distinguishing features, in order of practical use, from Chinese.
1. A much larger bird, there were a few Chinese grosbeak in with the Japanese when we first spotted them, I would say Japanese is at least a third bigger.
2. Much larger bill than Chinese
3. Black on head is a mask, not a hood, the black running almost vertically just behind the eye.
4. The back is a soft dove grey, this extends all the way down with only the black primaries contrasting.
5. Much less warm underneath than Chinese
6. The primary tips are clearly black not white.
7. Japanese are not sexually dimorphic: Male and female are very similar. cf the very different Chinese.

Highlights 17th October 2015, Yangshan island and Nanhui
Amur falcon, 2
Japanese sparrowhawk, 2
Flycatchers: few brown, 1 b+w, 2 taiga
Warblers: Many pallas’s, YB and 2 putative non-borealis artcic type
Thrushes: The first pale of the winter, few white’s and grey-backed
Large numbers of OBP, the first of the winter, few bluetail and swinhoe’s robin.
Buntings: 3Tristram’s, 1 bf
(WT) Japanese Grosbeak, 6+ on Yangshan island

Out again next weekend. Let the North wind blow!

Lesser Yangshan and Nanhui on 30 Oct

Great day out with the Team.
Highlights of the day have been Long-eared Owl and Collared Scops Owl plus Yellow-breasted Bunting, Goldcrest and Japanese Thrush as add-on.

Halloween: two owls and lots of duck

Firstly thanks to Stephan who has kindly shared his photos, above, from yesterday. Note that the date is wrong, yesterday was Sat 31 October

Last weekend was unseasonably warm, still no sign of an arrival of thrushes and buntings.
Highlights for Sat 24 October.
(CT) Eurasian sparrowhawk, one on Yangshan
Northern boobok, three together on Yangshan
Red-throated thrush, first winter female at Nanhui clump1

During the week the temperature finally dropped along with some heavy rain. We got out yesterday, Sat 31st October to Yangshan island at dawn. The most obvious arrivals were at least 4 eastern buzzard. Plenty of daurian reds and bluetails and a few tristram’s bunts but otherwise quiet.
We drove back to the mainland and found a long-eared owl at the southern end of the grandstand in the tiny grove of trees by the large cylindrical GPS marker. We shall call this great migrant trap the GPS grove. Stephan has posted a superb flight shot of this bird above. Eye-browed, grey-backed and white’s thrush were all here as well along with quite a few yellow-throated buntings, for which I much prefer Brazil’s name of elegant bunting.
We then got news of an owl roosting in clump1. On arrival we found many photographers at the foot of a tree with a resting Japanese scops owl. Stephan has posted a photo above. There has been a recent split on Collared scops owl with the NE Asian races going into O semitorques, Japanese Scops Owl, I think this individual belongs to the nominate form, grateful for advice from someone familiar with this species. We then noticed large numbers of duck gathering on the sea, a very unusual sight to see so many duck and with the high tide they were easily ‘scopable. Spent some time checking through the hundreds of spotbill with mallard, pintail, wigeon and teal. The best duck was a lone male greater scaup.
We then decided to check out the nearby Binhai forest park which I visited in the pouring rain back on 23 August. Plenty of habitat but no sign of migrants; just too far back from the coast. It is as true here as it is on the English east coast; if you want to see coastal migrants you need to be as close to the sea as possible.
We then drove back to the coast on the road running east-west just north of clump 8. This road passes through a lot of good reedy habitat. We were fortunate in getting great views of no less than 6 harriers passing by, 3 hen and 3 eastern marsh. At one point a male hen harrier engaged in a skirmish with a peregrine. It was here that I finally caught up with pallas’s reed bunting. A short walk to the incongruous dormitory building stuck in the middle of the reed bed produced views of flying Jack snipe. This species now means I have seen as many species in China in just over two years as a lifetime in Britain.
The light was failing fast, we returned to clump 1 so that Craig could get better shots of the owl, Japanese thrush was here as well (see photo above). We checked out the dongtang pool, rapidly draining. A total of 62 black-faced spoonbill and the same Dalmatian pelican as usual plus many distant duck in poor light. We finished back at the GPS grove.

Highlights, Yangshan Island and Nanhui, Sat 31st October 2015
Greater white-fronted goose 20+
Ruddy shelduck, 5
Wigeon, 30+
Mallard 50+
Chinese spotbill, 1000+ today
Northern shoveler, 30+
Pintail, 30+
Teal, 100+
(CT) Greater scaup, 1 male on the sea, Nanhui
Black-faced spoonbill, 62, given the rate of drainage of the main pool and the destruction of the nearby areas, I expect they will have to move away in the next few weeks. Another huge success for nature conservation in China!
Eurasian spoonbill, 6+ over
Dalmatian pelican, presumed same individual first seen on 17 August
Peregine, 2
Eastern buzzard, 4 on YI
Eastern marsh harrier, 3
Hen harrier, 2 male one female, superb views of a superb species
(CT) Jack snipe, 3+
(WT) Japanese scops owl. One in clump 1, Nanhui
(CT) Long-eared owl , one around the GPS grove/jetty
Bull headed shrike, 1 on Yangshan
HC drongo, one in the CP at holiday Inn
Pallas’s and YBW ; few of each, only leaf warblers today
VT parrotbill, big flock in the reeds mobbing the resting LEO
Goldcrest, 1 in clump 5
White’s thrush, few
GB thrush, few
Japanese thrush, great views of a male in clump 1
Eye-browed thrush, 2 in the GPS grove
Pale thrush, a few today, cracking views of a smart male
Red-flanked bluetail, many
Swinhoe’s robin, one in clump 1
Daurian redstart, very common today
Blue rock thrush, 1
Mugimaki fly, the latest of the flycatchers, one female today
Brambling, big flocks today
Siskin, one flock on Yangshan
Meadow bunting, one on Yangshan
Tristram’s bunting, 8+ today
Chestnut-eared, 1 distantly at the jetty
Elegant bunting, some great views of this superb species. The chestnut streaking on the breast is shared with only rustic.
Yellow-breasted bunting, one in the reedbed near the dormitory, see the photo above. My first-ever adult male.
BF bunting, few today
(WT) Pallas’s reed bunting, few in the dormitory reedbed

Two world ticks today plus two armchair ticks due to the split on Asian paradise flycatcher (the species here is Amur paradise fly, cf Indian Paradise fly in the subcontinent) and Collared kingfisher.

Overall the best day’s birding I have had around Shanghai. Next week we are planning a trip to Dongtai.

Great shots of both Owls!

Jack Snipe is a very good China bird, which we don't often hear about...A great record and a very good sighting.Probably overlooked elsewhere in China...

Congratulations on the owls! Both great sightings, and lovely photos to boot.

The Jack Snipe is actually a great record as well (if even more so than at least the Long-eared in terms of rarity). I believe this is the first time it has been recorded in Shanghai since 1921

Long-eared is rare anywhere in China except for one communal roosting tree in the Temple of Heaven, Beijing as far as I know. They do band them annually at the Laotieshan banding station here on the tip of the peninsula of Liaoning.

I agree with Jonathan than Jack Snipe is overlooked. I had one drop right out of the sky and land basically right in front of me once. Easy to overlook indeed.

Yangshan island and Nanhui coast, 7 November 2015

Firstly thanks for all your comments re Jack snipe. In my view there are probably dozens wintering around Nanhui, we were lucky to have them arriving last week, hence the views. They are not at all difficult to ID given a decent flight view.

Yesterday I was out again with the team. After last week’s cool northerly the wind had changed round to a south-easterly feeding in warm moist air from the sea. It peaked at a very unseasonal 28 degrees. We had a nice dry day with sunny intervals, we visited Yangshan first, rather quiet. We then concentrated on the micro forests and the reedy area around the blue-roofed dormitory (BRD) inland of clump8.
Overall rather quiet with none of the ducks from a week ago. The most noticeable movement was of thrushes, a big day count of eye-browed and Japanese. One of the oddest incidents was a pale thrush that was seen crashing into the glass of the “fencing” at the southern end of the grandstand. It was a great-looking male, I thought it had no heartbeat and left it on a flower bed next to a much decayed carcass of a black-capped kingfisher which had met the same end. When we returned a few hours later the pale thrush had vanished! Clearly my diagnosis of a fatal accident was too pessimistic. Lucky we decided not to bury it!

Highlights, Yangshan and Nanhui, Saturday 7 November 2015
8 BF and 2 eurasian spoonbill feeding in a pool just north of the holiday inn.
Dalmatian pelican, 1 still holding on at the spoonbill pool, the water fast dwindling away.
Hen harrier, 1
Eastern marsh harrier, 2
Reed parrotbill, pleasing to see 3+ birds in the reeds behind clump 1, with a small flock of VTP.
Mugimaki flycatcher, one
Japanese bush warbler, canturians, 1 on Yangshan, presumed pair at clump 1
Thrushes 20+ eyebrowed, 35+ Japanese, 10+ pale. Clearly Japanese moves through at this time, generally in flocks.
Buntings: Just 4 species today: BF, few. Little, common around BRD. Elegant, 5. Pallas’s reed, few around BRD.

Out again next weekend

There is also a LEO roost at Dongting Hu.

Cheers
Mike

Yangcheng and Dongtai

Very busy and rather unwell recently so no time to write.
Last Saturday drove up to the Yangcheng area with Stephan and Xueping. We arrived just after dawn and explored the area around the “Crane paradise”, a Chinese-style “nature park” with lots of birds in cages. The map attached shows the “crane paradise” a liitle away from the true location (circled). It also shows a “RC crane reserve to the North. We headed south to a previous site where wild RC cranes had been seen but not today. We had some close views of waders in roadside pools, feeding with a black-faced spoonbill. Plenty of ducks around but despite much driving never got a crane. We drove south along what both my mobile map app and the car GPS claimed to be the “coast road”. In reality it was the old coastal dyke road long since detached from the real coastline by reclamation. Surprising that even after what must be 20 years the map is still out-of-date. The drive south gave us some large duck flocks and a male hen harrier. We arrived at the Dongtai coastal wall and the first birds we saw were a large flock of pelicans flying in. Craig raced up from the southern end to join us and we had great scope views of a total of 80 Dalmatian pelicans, a great count for such a scarce bird.
Waders in front of the rising tide were dominated by four wintering species: Eurasian curlew, grey plover, dunlin and Kentish plover. We had flocks of various ducks the best being a flock of falcated duck.
On driving out at the northern end of the loop I had what may well have been bird of the day. A female ring-tail harrier flew across in front of us. At the time I mused as to why the bird seemed so small and slim with clearly orangey underparts. After it had passed I realised it was almost certainly a female Monty’s (I am familiar with Monty’s and Pallid), however no picture was taken so it will have to remain a probable.
It does seem that the long drive from Yangcheng down to Dongtai is so unproductive that we should give it a full day at Yangcheng.
Highlights, Saturday 14 November 2015, Yangcheng and Dongtai
(CT) Common shelduck, 1 at Dongtai in front of the pelicans
Falcated duck, 20+ Dongtai
Mallard, several hundred seen today
Shoveler, many
Teal, few
Tufted duck, 20+ at Dongtai
Pochard, many at Yangchen
Goosander, 3 past Dongtai
Dalmatian pelican 80 at Dongtai, seemed to be one large extended flock, mixture of adults and immatures.
Black-eared kite, one close over at Dongtai
Hen harrier, 1 male
Eastern buzzard, 4 today
Avocet, 300 + Dongtai
Grey plover, 2000+ Dongtai
Woodcock, 1 flushed
Eurasian curlew, 1200+ Dongtai
Saunders’s gull, 200+ Dongtai
Caspian tern, 15+ Dongtai
A variety of long-distance white-headed gulls including black-tailed, Mongolian, heuglins-type and vega-type. But no sign of the wanted slaty-backed.
Whiskered tern, large localised gathering by the road
Hoopoe, at least 5 today
Eye-browed thrush, 2 at Yangcheng
Buntings, many calling in the undergrowth but no decent views today
Brambling, several large flocks today.

Great to hear about a flock of 80 Dalmatian Pelicans - must have been some sight!

Cheers
Mike

MKinHK said:

Great to hear about a flock of 80 Dalmatian Pelicans - must have been some sight!

Cheers
Mike

Click to expand...

Shame there's no pictures of them too

Another good day at Nanhui/Lesser Yangshan

Sunday morning at the temple mount, LYS, the rain finally stopped and it was very mild. We walked up past the temple and then down and across to the garbage dump. Main birds were pale thrush, dusky thrush and elegant bunting. We headed off to Nanhui. Our first stop was at the GPS grove which held quite a few good birds all in a very small area. A single tree, at one time held: stunning male eye-browed thrush, male pale thrush, two bluetails, pallas’s warbler, an ashy minivet, an immature verditer flycatcher and a putative red-breasted flycatcher. Photos of these hopefully posted here soon. Last week’s pelicans can be seen at http://www.shanghaibirding.com/2015/11/17/80-dalmatian-pelican-at-dongtai/

We worked all the clumps, mostly pale thrush. The remnants of the spoonbill pond held 35+ Eurasian spoonbill, the black-faced appear to have departed for a less degraded site.
Some great views of pallas’s reed bunting at two different places in the reeds.
Best bird was a presumed sub-adult female pied harrier quartering the reeds to the south west of the grandstand.

Highlights, LYS and Nanhui, Sunday 22 November 2015
Spotbill duck, 50+ on spoonbill pond
Bean goose, 15+ in a flock over
Eurasian spoonbill, 40+ widely spread
(WT) Pied harrier, a bird matching photos of immature female hunting over reeds. I now realise that I have seen this bird before at Poyang Hu but put it down as male eastern marsh harrier. I have never seen the very grey male eastern marsh. Would very much like to see a male pied.
Eastern buzzard, 2+
Japanese sparrowhawk, 1 on LYS
Ashy minivet, one at GPS grove
Barn swallow, 15+
Richard’s pipit, 3+
Blue rock thrush, 1 on LYS
Pallas’s warbler, 5+
YB warbler, 2+
Red-billed starling, 10+ on LYS
White’s thrush 5+
Chinese blackbird, 3+
Eye-browed thrush, 8+
Pale thrush, 40+ today, big arrival
Dusky thrush, 20+
Bluetail, 10+
Daurian redstart, 15+
(CT- pending) Red-breasted flycatcher, one at the GPS grove, pictures coming. A very buffy bird, perhaps a hint of a pale lower mandible, uppertail coverts not black, brown. Call distinctly slower than taiga.
Asian verditer flycatcher, 1 in the GPS grove
Eastern yellow wagtail, 20+ taivana
White wag, few leucopsis and my first smart male lugens today
Olive-backed pipit, common today
Brambling a couple of small flocks
Siskin, fantastic views of a small flock in the GPS grove
Elegant bunting, the commonest bunting today, 15+
Black-faced bunting, I am very familiar with spodocephala females but today we had on LYS a female showing much yellow below which was probably a sordida or possibly a personata, need to do more work on these.
Pallas’s reed bunting, several great views of a range of sexes and ages.

Some photos from yesterday

Attached:
The ashy minivet, first year?
Distant shots of presumed imm female pied harrier, comments welcome.
The verditer fly, comments on aging/sexing welcome

Putative red-breasted flycatcher yesterday at Nanhui

Please see the attached photos.

The small feathers covering the top of the retrices (presumed the uppertail coverts) are brown not black. The bill shows a hint of paleness, the call was distinctly composed of individual (able to count) elements.

Comments welcome

Pale thrush and pelicans

Thanks to Xueping for the attached photos of last week's dalpals at Dongtai coast and yesterday's pale thrush

Thanks for the pelican shots Michael.

We haven't had a sight like this in HK for 20 years, but it's very good to hear that they are present somewhere!

The flycatcher looks interesting. My gut says you're probably right about ti being Red-breasted, but its not a straightforward individual IMHO. It may be with posting into the ID section.

Cheers
Mike

Nanhui and LYS

Another trip out on Saturday to Lesser Yangshan island and Nanhui area.

Far more detail, including photos of us birding at Dishui lake can be perused at

http://www.shanghaibirding.com/2015/12/02/98-species-at-top-shanghai-sites/

Highlights Sat 28 Nov 2015
Thrushes: Dusky, Naumann's, Red-throated, eye-browed, White's, pale and Chinese blackbird.
Buntings: Mostly elegant, few little, black-faced and Pallas's reed

Ducks: Big flock in north east corner of Dishui lake
Falcated duck, 350+
Tufted duck, 20+
Scaup, 10+
Also a few gadwall and wigeon.

At least 15 BN grebe on the lake, looking to pick out a slav but no luck.

We had a group of 2 drake and 3 female mandarin duck in the canal behind clump 1. Unusual to get so close to these wonderful birds.

(CT) Merlin, a female hunting through a large flock of barn swallow over the reeds at Nanhui.

Barn swallow, one flock of 100+