BBC...Blackbirds, Bulbuls and Century Park... Tuesday 3rd April
No birding at the weekend owing to my only having Saturday free. Sunday and Monday were office days while today, Tuesday, and tomorrow are days off. All this by way of combining the needs of the financial quarter end at work with the observance of the Ching Ming festival (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qingming_Festival)
Didn't have any big plans today and woke up feeling a little under the weather so decided on a recce trip to Century Park...not ideal timing to arrive around 1300 and I didn't have high hopes. I didn't disappoint myself at least! The park was busy and there were few quiet corners. Still a few interesting sights made for an enjoyable couple of hours.
Birds seen were mainly old friends:
Blackbirds – males duelling throuhout the park;
Chinese Bulbuls equally visible and vociferous; 2
Moorhen suffering the attentions of camera-toting locals; a couple of singing
Pallas's Warbler put on a great show for me. A gang of
Azure-winged Magpie scolded a cat.
Tree Sparrows were common throughout the park.
Spotted Doves favoured the quieter areas.
The only surprise was a dash of blue and red or was it turquoise and orange that zapped by me...a
Kingfisher zooming through with no intentions of stopping for anyone...but not quite quick enough to avoid me adding him to my Shanghai list...
Not sure what tomorrow will bring...Nanhui again (Jocko having had a posse of
Great Knot down there a few days ago) or somewhere new...
Plans are being made for hit 'n' runs over the coming weeks...more as they develop...