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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Panjin Birding by the Old Fat Man (2 Viewers)

Good stuff again Owen. A Little Curlew would be notable but not questionable in your area. I don't think ebird should have a problem with it but you never know.
 
Jun-6

Howdy Tom,

ebird did list it on the Liaoning rarities list.

I started this morning with hearing the Little Owls about 06:00. They are most certainly nesting just about 50 meters from our patio and I got better photos despite the heavy overcast. This particular decorative cupola was repaired last summer and since then lacks the decorative screening that all the others have, making it an ideal nesting spot for them. I actually observed two owls but could hear a third deeper into the complex. One of those I was watching was slightly smaller and lighter colored and seemed pretty clumsy as it made what was honestly more of a fall into the bushes and thrashed around awhile before it rather clumsily flapped back up to the ledge. It flushed a couple of Chinese Bulbul who paused on the neighbors fence with a look of "That was a close one!". Given three individuals I assume that was a fledgling who hasn't quite gotten the hang of foraging, or even flying. It moved over to the adjacent building later on and sit there giving their wheezy call, apparently begging for breakfast, well into the afternoon.

It was threatening rain, but the weather app said the nearest rain was 50km away so I decided to check out the little wetland area. I wasted about a km of walking as I intended to actually try going out into the wetland on a narrow raised embankment that I used in the past two years, only to find out that the first path was now blocked off where they are preparing a pad for some more new drilling and the road and sidewalk were blocked by related digging that prevented me from reaching a second pathway.

I came back to my regular viewing area, which is quite long range, and did manage some interesting viewing. The Chinese Pond Heron have really congregated on the area. There have always been a few in there, but usually just one or two. I had at least 10 in view today. My little Yellow Bittern made another close-up appearance and I caught it as it stretched it's neck out to finish swallowing some prey. Also verified that the Spot-Billed Duck are nesting in larger numbers than I have ever seen there.

A couple of nice finds was a pair of Grey Heron hiding out in the edge of the reeds and just as I decided to leave a Common Kingfisher flashed along the channel where I was standing, actually below me. The local fire station sits on the edge of the wetland and I often walk out on the embankment around the emergency water supply pond right behind the station. Today ten of the "fire soldiers", as my wife calls them, were out on clean up duty we had a grand time taking pictures and with them trying to understand my Chinese and I trying to understand their English. That is at least until their Lieutenant, or at least somebody obviously in charge, noticed they weren't working and broke it up.

Panjin, Dawa County, Liaoning, CN, Liaoning, CN
Jun 6, 2018 8:00 AM - 9:45 AM
Protocol: Traveling
3.0 kilometer(s)
15 species

Ring-necked Pheasant (Phasianus colchicus) 5
Little Grebe (Tachybaptus ruficollis) 1
Yellow Bittern (Ixobrychus sinensis) 1
Gray Heron (Ardea cinerea) 1
Chinese Pond-Heron (Ardeola bacchus) 8
Black-crowned Night-Heron (Nycticorax nycticorax) 10
Eurasian Moorhen (Gallinula chloropus) 2
Black-winged Stilt (Himantopus himantopus) 10
Common Cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) 4
Common Kingfisher (Alcedo atthis) 1
Gray-headed Woodpecker (Picus canus) 1
Barn Swallow (Hirundo rustica) 10
Light-vented Bulbul (Pycnonotus sinensis) 3
Oriental Reed Warbler (Acrocephalus orientalis) 10
Eurasian Tree Sparrow (Passer montanus) 10

View this checklist online at https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S46341365
 

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Little Owls are awesome and fledglings owls are hilarious. I love watching them try to figure out how to do life and the parents are usually nearby with a annoyed look on their face. Nice Bittern picture!
 
Tom,

The out-stretched neck seemed to be a theme yesterday. I initially did the "What is that?" routine on this Pond Heron as it stood there for quite awhile with it's neck stretched out, straight up.

Heavy rain last night with lighter rain off and on today. More heavy rain predicted for tonight. Not good for my arthritis, but a welcome relief for the environment here. Hopefully, I'll be feeling more like exploring tomorrow to see if anything new results.
 

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Hi Owen,
I got my first Pond Heron in Summer Palace in Beijing this morning. My birding trip is coming to the end and I will be flying home tomorrow. I will post a summery later :)
Lancy
 
JUN-8 Shangkouzi Environmental Tourist Area

I tagged along with some acquaintances on a typical Chinese tourism outing yesterday. About what I expected with the vague idea about how to get where they had heard was scenic, getting lost, driving around in circles (me asking why we were driving in circles and my wife telling me to be quite 8-P) as the phone navigation app took us to the wrong places, all with the same or very similar name, etc. We finally did find the Shangkouzi Environmental Tourism area, which is along the Liaohu river, where we were promptly denied entry. As usual, no explanation, just no.

Not to be denied, we took the normal Chinese approach and since we had a Land Cruiser, we found a way through a tiny village to a narrow rutted dirt trail up onto the top of the river dike. That was followed to another narrow trail down to another village from where we found the narrow paved road into another back entry right on the river. Nobody at the gate ticket booth so we admitted ourselves.

What few people were around were obviously surprised to see anyone, much less a laowei. Actually looked like a potentially productive area for birding during migration seasons. There were boat rides for rent during season, but although there were some people lounging about and one of our party members tried to rent a tour, no one was ambitious enough to actually take a boat out on the river. From what I gathered, it was obviously the wrong season.

The area's "hook" is crop art. It was explained to me that the rice was actually planted for the crop art and was to attract tourists in the fall as, there was "Nothing to see" right now. I went up the observation tower anyway and it looked pretty good to me.:t:

Everyone was enjoying themselves and hence being quite loud so birding had to be done around that, but it still produced well for this time of year. Unfortunately, shortly into actual birding, my camera stopped working. I de-mounted the lens, changed lenses, cleaned the contacts, all to no avail. Only just as we were finishing up did I realize the battery door had come unlatched. Close it back up securely and everything was fine again. 3:) It was one of those days as I also had left my binoculars setting on the desk at home, so had to do it the old fashioned way, MK-I eyeball. Good ID practice at least.

The Yellow Bittern were in surprising numbers on one small pond and some Black-Napped Oriole were responding to my whistled call, which overly impressed everyone in the group. Just as we were leaving, the White-Cheeked Starling started congregating in a few trees for their evening roost. I had a couple of interesting calls that I would guess to probably have been thrush, but although I got fairly close to them I never managed to get a visual for an ID.

All in all an interesting area and even my wife said we should try again in the fall.

Shangkouzi Village Ecology Tourism, Liaoning, CN
Jun 8, 2018 3:30 PM - 5:30 PM
Protocol: Traveling
2.0 kilometer(s)
14 species

Ring-necked Pheasant (Phasianus colchicus) 1
Yellow Bittern (Ixobrychus sinensis) 4
Black-crowned Night-Heron (Nycticorax nycticorax) 1
Black-winged Stilt (Himantopus himantopus) 6
Common Cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) 2
Black-naped Oriole (Oriolus chinensis) 3
Eurasian Magpie (Pica pica) 3
Barn Swallow (Hirundo rustica) 10
Red-rumped Swallow (Cecropis daurica) 8
Chinese Penduline-Tit (Remiz consobrinus) 8
Oriental Reed Warbler (Acrocephalus orientalis) 20
White-cheeked Starling (Spodiopsar cineraceus) 26
White Wagtail (Motacilla alba) 4
Eurasian Tree Sparrow (Passer montanus) 10

View this checklist online at https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S46405418
 

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Stretched out CPG always make me goggle - there so little evidence that all that neck is there when they're in the usual hunched up pose.

The crop are is cool indeed - very Chinese!

Cheers
Mike
 
Wait....Is that a.... OR Lancy, you left too soon.

Not sure where else I should post it right off, so here it is in my usual thread.

We were out checking out a shopping mall we hadn't been in before and ran into a friend who announced she had recently been through an area that had "many, many birds". We decided that I would buy gas and she would take us there. Now I'm not going to say exactly where this time, for reasons to be seen.

I had been there only briefly when the first, "Wait...Is that..." moment occurred. While panning across, trying to get a decent shot of a White-Winged Tern something flashed across my field of view. Was that a Pied Avocet? No, it was three. Not a rarity as such, but surprisingly out of normal range for this time of year.

Just a few minutes later I eyeballed an odd looking wader flying across in front of me. Luckily, my instincts in such cases are to pull up the camera and bang away. This was the real prize. Three Black-Faced Spoonbill and in breeding plumage! That is the reason I am being cagey about the exact location other than just Panjin. I made the mistake of reporting one rarity including precise location information once before and it was promptly mobbed by birders considerably less concerned about the bird's welfare than I was. Still not entirely sure what to do with this one since as far as I can tell this would be an extension of the known range. I am reporting to ebird, but just as generic Panjin and with location data stripped. I suppose somebody is bound to want to have a try themselves and since only one person can keep a secret, that will put it our there anyway once I show someone else where to look. Trouble is it goes against my grain as I like to share with other responsible birders but I have seen way too many people harassing a rare find.

An additional bonus in that in the process of snapping away at the BFS I caught one image with a Common Shelduck included. Not a big deal, but it was a species that has managed to elude me up until now. Grey Heron, Purple Heron, Chinese Pond Heron and Black-Crowned Night Heron were found as well as Little Egret and Intermediate Egret.

Panjin, Dawa County, Liaoning, CN, Liaoning, CN
Jun 17, 2018 3:45 PM - 4:45 PM
Protocol: Traveling
4.0 kilometer(s)
16 species

Common Shelduck (Tadorna tadorna) 2
Gray Heron (Ardea cinerea) 1
Purple Heron (Ardea purpurea) 4
Intermediate Egret (Ardea intermedia) 1
Little Egret (Egretta garzetta) 12
Cattle Egret (Eastern) (Bubulcus ibis coromandus) 4
Chinese Pond-Heron (Ardeola bacchus) 2
Black-crowned Night-Heron (Nycticorax nycticorax) 9
Black-faced Spoonbill (Platalea minor) 3 Rust colored breeding plumage patch clearly visable
Pied Avocet (Recurvirostra avosetta) 3
Whiskered Tern (Chlidonias hybrida) 10
Common Tern (Sterna hirundo) 5
Common Cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) 4
Eurasian Magpie (Pica pica) 1
Barn Swallow (Hirundo rustica) 25
Oriental Reed Warbler (Acrocephalus orientalis) X Abundant. Calling loudly from reed beds.

View this checklist online at https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S46605820
 

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Black-Faced Spoonbill images

More shots from today
 

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Wow Owen, great find! Three in one place in mid June... Is there a small island or cliff nearby where they could be breeding? I've never heard of a breeding site in Panjin for Black-faced Spoonbill but this evidence strongly points in that direction. Maybe it is late enough for dispersal from known breeding sites? Yes, sometimes better not to share the exact location.

very cool!
 
Tom,

Very flat, as is Panjin in general, so nothing like cliffs and although very shallow, there were no islands. Occasional mud bars but those would be transient according to water levels. Much rain this year which is keeping waters up to normal levels not seen for years. There are areas along the bank where birds are keeping reeds flattened down and are nesting. Unfortunately, as one photo shows, this critical part of the Shuangtai Estuary Ramsar site is endangered by continuing destruction of the wetlands.

Fairly well protected from public in general just because the road, narrow with no shoulders or pullouts but paved and in good shape, does not show on the digital maps.
 

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From a YouTube video from the Hong Kong Wetland Park, the Black-Faced Spoonbill should be right in the middle of incubating eggs which will not hatch until late June or early July. Therefore it makes the case for probable breeding pairs in Panjin higher. They take shifts with one bird always on the nest. That would mean a possible three active nests at least. Thunderstorms tonight and tomorrow but clearing off with warmer temperatures for three days after that, so I will try to get back to survey further this week.

I'm working more areas this year that make me wish I had a spotting scope. I've scored the easy stuff and now am working more at longer ranges and areas that are difficult to access.
 
Black-faced Spoonbill incubation times

Hi Owen, this photo I took from May 23, 2009 in Zhuanghe would disagree with the youtube video's timeline. It's hard to say for sure but is certainly noteworthy and very interesting. I know there was one seen in Beijing some years ago but I'm not sure what time of year that was so they do get around. Panjin is very much in their historical breeding range with most of them breeding in the DMZ between North and South Korea these days. If these are nesting birds in the area, it is certainly a big deal in my humble opinion. There is so much still unknown about this specie in northern China. Is there a nesting location in the Panjin area? Three adult birds feeding in a coastal area in mid-June really suggests they are breeding there somewhere. Interesting. Much of the research and surveys are done in Korea and on the wintering grounds in Taiwan and Hong Kong.
 

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Hi Tom,

Interesting informational photo. There is absolutely nothing like this in Panjin for nesting areas, but I have observed that heron and egrets, for an example, seem to prefer nesting in trees but will also commonly nest on patches of marginally higher ground in reed fields by trampling down an area. Black-Headed Gull are also doing this in the area in question.

I just had a discussion with the person that led me to the area. She had no idea about why I was excited about what I was seeing but she has taken an interest now and promised to help with access to try and get a better handle on just what is here.

Our Little Owl have been quite active this week with my being able to spot at least the two parents and two good sized young at their nesting spot this morning. I think there may have been more young not visible, judging from the behavior of the parents as they brought food back. Clearly visible from our patio. Our daughter told us that at the (monthly, I think) condo association tenets meeting there were some people complaining about the noise and wanting the owls killed. Our daughter spoke up and defended the owls as good pest control, especially for rats and mice, that didn't cost the condo management anything. Free worked to convince the management and people were told to leave the owls alone. A victory! Little Owls are not very loud anyway in reality making a lot less noise than is normal everyday background in China anyway.

Well, off to check out the local wetland patch. It has been raining so much that it either is raining or the ground is so muddy that I haven't been able to make it there for awhile.
 
Jun-20

A nice trip out to the local wetland area. The only thing of importance to notice was that the dikes around the rice beds had been sprayed with 2-4-D or some similar chemical in the last few days. I was dismayed to see that as there were Oriental Reed Warbler, Eastern Cattle Egret, Pond Heron and Black-Crowned Night Heron nesting in those areas. Fortunately the only the Cattle Egret and most of the Oriental Reed Warblers were gone and I was still seeing BCNH young peeking out from the now dead reeds. Pond Heron were still in evidence also. I did come across a couple of dead Grey Heron chicks, about domestic chicken size, which looked to be a few days dead. Recent enough to still be identifiable. From where they were, I don't think it had anything to do with the spraying, at least directly. Looked to be more likely weasel or feral cat predation.

Panjin, Dawa County, Liaoning, CN, Liaoning, CN
Jun 20, 2018 8:30 AM - 10:00 AM
Protocol: Traveling
1.0 kilometer(s)
20 species

Eastern Spot-billed Duck (Anas zonorhyncha) 6
Ring-necked Pheasant (Phasianus colchicus) 3
Little Grebe (Tachybaptus ruficollis) 2
Gray Heron (Ardea cinerea) 2
Purple Heron (Ardea purpurea) 1
Great Egret (Ardea alba) 1
Intermediate Egret (Ardea intermedia) 1
Little Egret (Egretta garzetta) 1
Chinese Pond-Heron (Ardeola bacchus) 8
Black-crowned Night-Heron (Nycticorax nycticorax) 6
Eurasian Moorhen (Gallinula chloropus) 1
Black-winged Stilt (Himantopus himantopus) 6
Gray-headed Lapwing (Vanellus cinereus) 5
Common Cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) 3
Eurasian Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus) 3
Brown Shrike (Lanius cristatus) 5
Barn Swallow (Hirundo rustica) 20
Light-vented Bulbul (Pycnonotus sinensis) 4
Oriental Reed Warbler (Acrocephalus orientalis) 3
Daurian Starling (Agropsar sturninus) 1

View this checklist online at https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S46672234
 

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Those Chinese birds -- some of the toughest on the planet! And the fish...

Speaking of fish... Yesterday at the emergency water supply pond by the fire station, they had cut down the growth along the bank shortly before I arrived and there were mats of cut reeds floating in the water. Some pretty good sized fish were eating the leaves off of the stems. Looked really strange as the mats of stems seemed to have a life of their own. They would suddenly jerk, then disappear down into the water. Occasionally, a stripped stem would bob back up to the surface.

Also had a brief glimpse of a little, green snake maybe 30 cm long and only as big around as my little finger, hunting littler minnows who were also nibbling on the leaves. It only poked it's head up to quickly scan the area and grab a breath then disappeared back down into the water.
 
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