The survey was good fun and prepared me perfectly for our annual bird race which was totally trashed by what, with awesome gargantuan MASSIVE understatement, the Observatory called a "Humid easterly front".
So we didn't even get up to Tai Om Shan and instead hid from the rain and had tea at my place, waving goodbye to at least 15 birds we might have seen on a better day - as in the Black & Chestnut Bulbuls, four species of Bush Warbler, minla, mesia . . . self pity misery moan moan moan.
Actually it was OK in the bits we did cover -
Plumbeous Redstart was below the fabric dam, Grey-headed Flycatcher showed in the Golden Triangle, We saw a young Collared Crow begging for food, and had
Rubythroat, Red-flanked Bluetail, Little and
Black-faced Buntings all in a couple of minutes.
The day before was also good - with the briefly pulse-thumping highlight being a
White -capped Redstart found by both Dylan and Martin, a birder who has recently moved in across the river. But as the pic shows it had damaged left primaries and central tail feathers and was almost certainly an escape. Other goodies included my first calling
Large Hawk Cuckoo of the year,
Black-naped Monarchs at Tai Om Shan and the Golden Triangle and a briefly seen
Striated Heron.
Most significantly I also heard the big owl (probably Brown Wood Owl) giving its three note call around midnight, but was glad I didn't drag myself out of bed as it stopped after calling three or four times.
More gen on the outcome of the race and what we saw elsewhere on the day can be found
here.
Cheers
Mike
