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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)

Yeah, Mike, I've been thinking about just that lately, but the 7D mkII is a great still photography platform, but not so great for video. At least not handheld which is the way I work all the time. I've made a few tries and with very limited success. Besides which, I didn't have an appropriate lens with me anyway.

I have a cheap point-and-shoot Lumix which was cheap for a good reason and I find using it to be too much hassle to encourage me to use it. Personally, I am old school enough that I find trying to hold a camera out away from me and using the view screen to just not work. For one thing, I am fortunate enough that at my age I still have good distance vision but I do need reading glasses for any detail work. I have to have the camera screen out at full arms length and squint just right to have any hope of telling if its in focus or not. The LED viewfinder on the Lumix is one feature that I have found acceptable but like everything else you have to use the back panel when shooting video.

Besides all that, I am happy with the 7D mkII for the photography I do and having to carry another camera around would not be good. As it is I've been considering trading in the zoom for a 400mm fixed just for the one pound weight reduction. Of course then the faster lens would tempt me to step up to a 2X converter, which just adds weight back again. But I digress....
 
A quick note of an interesting late season find today. I'm still finding few to none Passerines this season, even in areas that were busy with activity in the past. One notable today though of noticing some movement out at 100m or more and finding a single Chinese Grey Shrike still hanging around. Granted it has been a very mild autumn this year, but regardless I'm not sure what insects he is finding to eat by now.

I had thought that I saw a shrike the other day at Gedalou but dismissed it as too late for that.
 

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Nov-21

Weather is definitively finally making the change over to normal august for here. High of 3° and the first skim of ice appeared on the shaded areas. I did find the three Red Billed Blue Magpie working back and forth along the irrigation canal. I tried for a photo of one of them making off with a big cherry that had been missed until today from a little planting of half a dozen trees, but I missed it. I'm hoping they have decided to stay and might nest in the area next spring. The big murder of Azure-Winged Magpie was absent today so the RBBM were foraging in peace. The smaller murder of about 30 AWM was about, but as in the past they pretty much ignore the RBBM.

Just as I decided it was enough for the day, I spotted a Grey-Headed Woodpecker fly off and suddenly veer off to check out what apparently looked like an ideal pre-made nesting cavity in a recently erected mounting post for a new speed camera. You could see the the initial reaction of, "This is perfect!", only to soon be followed with disappointment when he leaned in and couldn't find an floor!

Just because I have the room for three more, I included shots from the other day that didn't really meet my standards, but together do tell a story as the AWM harass the RBBM and then the RBBM finally had enough and counter attacked.
 

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November 25

An on a whim change in plans worked out well resulting in two new lifers, both rare birds.

With clear blue skies and 7 degree temps, I decided to make the trip down to Yingkou hoping to get some late migration action. As the bus approached Yingkou though heavy smoke got worse and worse. By the time I arrived it was obvious that visibility at the Wetland Park area was going to be too low to effectively bird. Therefore rather than waste the one and a half hour trip I wandered off down a narrow path through the reed marsh that led up to the river and was rewarded with finding the reeds alive with Common Reed Bunting. At least 20 making themselves visible with many times that many rustling about in the reeds.

Due to the smoke, I couldn't see anything more than an indistinct blur anymore than half way across the river towards the Wetland Park so I decided to walk about a kilometer in the other direction to another section of the river. That worked out well as the walk gave time for a break in the smoke to arrive.

I was greeted on arriving by Oriental Magpie rummaging through a midden where fishermen have been dumping shells. I had seen a few gulls along the river but as I arrived at the top of the dike I was greeted with at least 2000 mixed gull resting on the exposed mud at low tide on the opposite bank. Looking at my pics later, I have decided that it was about a 50/50 mix of Black-Headed Gull and Black-Tailed Gull. If Lancy, or anyone else wants to have a look at some of the unprocessed images, you can view them at https://www.icloud.com/sharedalbum/#B0q5Uzl7Vdwbwj If there is interest, I can post all the usable ones I have.

The better find was that just behind the gulls were two obviously much larger and taller individuals. Photos verify that there was one Eurasian Spoonbill and one Oriental Stork ! One photo each here with more to follow.

Also mixed in with the gulls were 16 Common Shelduck and 4 Ruddy Shelduck as well as several waders that I just couldn't manage to ID at that range.

As I was leaving the area I picked up a single Hoopoe and another area of reeds with heavy activity of what turned out to be Reed Parrotbill. Only managed brief glances of two birds but could see a lot of movement and hear many more than that.
 

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Oriental Stork and Eurasian Spoonbill

A few more pics of the finds of the day
 

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Wow Owen, you found a good place there at Yingkou. Those are some good fall/winter birds for Liaoning. I didn't have the time to look through all of the gulls but the bunting photographed above is a Pallas's Reed Bunting. They are difficult to separate and often share habitat in the winter in Liaoning. The bill of the bird photographed is too thin for Common Reed. The upper and lower mandible are also different colours but that can vary between Common and Pallas's Reed.

That site looks like is could hold cranes in the future? I would head back there in December and try to get there early in the morning or at dusk to see if cranes are moving around.

Congrats on the 2 lifers, 2 quality finds!
 
Hi Tom, I was going to argue the point with you but further checking of course showed you are right. They are indeed Pallas's Reed Bunting. They are the most common ones here so I should have stuck with my field notes as that is what I had written down. At least I should have done the online check first as I already knew that the illustrations in Brazil's aren't always the most accurate. It was the dark 'bib' that threw me as Brazil's only shows it on the CRB.

I had the same thought about cranes. Early morning and dusk are tough though as I use the intercity bus between Panjin and Yingkou. It doesn't start running until 06:00 and is packed to the gills and takes at least an hour and a half due to the traffic. Having to stand and fight to keep my footing while hanging on the overhead rail for that long leaves my arthritis flared up by the time I arrive. The last bus out in the evening is just before 17:00 and again tends to be packed. At least on that one I can get on at the start so I can get a seat. This trip I caught the 16:30 bus out and got home just as it started getting dark.

The biggest problem there is that the birds stay on the opposite bank where the mud flats expose at low tide and that is 400-600 meters away. The other side is actually a reed marsh. The location shown on this screen shot. There is a paved path with stone railings right at the edge, but as is common in China it has been left to go to hell and is impassible in many areas or very difficult to actually get to it. It does almost always have gulls and does have some good reed marsh adjacent with good roads passing through with little to no traffic which makes for good viewing to try for marsh dwellers.
 

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Owen, very understandable and sounds typical of birding in that area. Maybe when everything freezes up there is more access? Be careful, but I used to get better access to places when everything was frozen. Since returning to Canada I've learned what private property is and sometimes miss the days I could go wherever I was able to get in. It does look like a good area for winter birding and your list shows that good species use it.

Patience is the key. I chased a newspaper report in Liaoning to a place where "thousands" of ducks were reported a long time ago. It took more than 5 trips to finally find out the best roads and how to get to the place. I wish you the best in your explorations.
 
Most of the time when there is a gap in reports it is because of bad weather or I've been unsuccessfully exploring, looking for new productive areas. Luckily it is actually normally very dry here during the winters as the family, I have to admit probably correctly, resists my going out roaming about when it does get icy. Bad weather, BTW, for me includes days like today when high overcast, or dense smog, makes for such a glare that taking the camera is pretty much a waste. I've often had just the experience that you describe spending more time hiking in and out or trying to figure out how to get to a viewing area than actually viewing. Now that I'm up over 200 species just for Liaoning I've got the easy ones and finding anything new requires a lot more time and effort. Not complaining though. The challenge is what makes it fun and interesting!

Yeah, whenever I am back in the US birding I have to watch myself because I have gotten so used to just going anywhere I want. Here if your not physically prevented from going into the area, then have at it! I've gotten chased off a few times but nothing serious. Now that I've been reported on by the local media here a few times people often recognize me and either leave me alone or want a picture with me. That was the nice thing were I grew up in Pennsylvania, we were literally surrounded with State Hunting areas which were public access. By my mid teens my Mother would let me take the shotgun and disappear into the woods by myself as long as I understood that if I got back too late for dinner I had to make my own. That was a time and place where private property was still sometimes posted with "Trespassers Will Be Shot" and it wasn't entirely bravado.
 
Nov-29

Hated to waste the nice weather, so I decided to visit the Panjin Wetland Park area. Looks like maybe it really was just the mild weather this fall delaying the migration as numbers were back up today. With it hovering around 0° and dead calm it was a great day to be out.

I hadn't anymore than just entered the park when I spotted a couple of Mongolian Gull far out on the thin ice which is now starting to form. Shortly thereafter I spotted a single Vega Gull nearby. I then turned my attention back towards the Tit I could hear in the trees and immediately found a couple of flocks of Long-Tailed Tit. They are usually one of the friendlier birds you can find but today they were so busy chasing each other around that it was a challenge to get some good pics. One little fellow with a really tiny bill, even for LTT finally sat still long enough to pose for a photo. After following them for a bit I managed to find about 10 Japanese Tit and a few Black-Faced Bunting. The BFB were in winter clothes and puzzled me for a bit until I noticed the shadow of the hood in pale black along the back of their necks.

I had already spotted what I thought were some Spot-Billed Duck far out on the lake and when I managed to find a closer viewing spot I was able to count 92 of them on the water. I was also able to pick out Common Merganser and Common Shelduck. While I was working on photos of that group a couple of Common Moorhen made a surprise appearance for this late in the season. Then just to top it off a pair of Great Cormorant joined the crowd of ducks.

I only went a short distance from there and encountered a small flock of Azure-Winged Magpie harassing a pair of Oriental Magpie. Tiring of that they then decided to bully the Great-Spotted Woodpecker that was busy minding his own business.

Moving on there were the usual Black-Tailed Gull and Black-Headed Gull up at the far eastern end of the lake.

By that time I was walking into the sun and had a couple of Thrush that I couldn't ID for sure as they were no more than black shadows against the sun, but were probably Naumenn's Thrush. Also one probable female Daurian Redstart, also in the sun.

I did manage to pick out one Reed Parrotbill out of a large flock that was probably between 100-200 that were feeding furiously in the reeds. Sounded like a herd of gorillas were walking through the reeds!

A pair of Hoopoe and some Grey-Headed Woodpecker rounded out the day with some Chinese Bulbul. The final appearance was by an Eurasian Kestrel on the other side of the river.

Panjin Wetland Park, Liaoning, CN
Nov 29, 2018 12:00 PM - 3:00 PM
Protocol: Traveling
6.0 kilometer(s)
19 species

Common Shelduck (Tadorna tadorna) 5
Eastern Spot-billed Duck (Anas zonorhyncha) 92
Common Merganser (Mergus merganser) 9
Eurasian Moorhen (Gallinula chloropus) 2
Black-headed Gull (Chroicocephalus ridibundus) 20
Black-tailed Gull (Larus crassirostris) 70
Great Cormorant (Phalacrocorax carbo) 2
Eurasian Hoopoe (Upupa epops) 2
Great Spotted Woodpecker (Dendrocopos major) 5
Gray-headed Woodpecker (Picus canus) 3
Eurasian Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus) 1
Azure-winged Magpie (Cyanopica cyanus) 10
Oriental Magpie (Pica serica) 2
Japanese Tit (Parus minor) 10
Long-tailed Tit (Aegithalos caudatus) 30
Light-vented Bulbul (Pycnonotus sinensis) 6
Reed Parrotbill (Paradoxornis heudei) X Large numbers hidden in the reeds. Probably 100-200 but only able to actually observe 4-5 clearly
Black-faced Bunting (Emberiza spodocephala) 10
Eurasian Tree Sparrow (Passer montanus) 230

View this checklist online at https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S50293725
 

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The gulls are national treasure! I'm planning on stealing them :D
I was looking through my eBird check lists in China and realized I had both Eurasian magpie (Pica pica) and Oriental Magpie (Pica serica). They are considered one species, according to The CBR Checklist of Birds of China v3.0 (2013) and Avibase (as of 11-29-2018). eBird treats them as separate species and listed Eurasian magpie (Pica pica) as "rare" in some if not most areas in China.
To avoid confusion and to respect local birding authority, I decided to list my sightings of Eurasian/Oriental Magpie as Eurasian magpie (Pica pica). By doing so, I lost one species on my China list and flagged P. pica on eBird, 23 times!
 
Lancy, this is a very recent split. All the ones in NE China are all still considered Eurasian as far as I can tell.

https://www.birdguides.com/articles/taxonomy/magpie-split-five-ways/

Tom

Thank you, Tom! Glad I don't have to change it again ;)
I assume the split was based on this publication:
Lee SI, Parr CS, Hwang Y, Mindell DP, Choe JC. Phylogeny of magpies (genus Pica) inferred from mtDNA data. Mol Phylogenet Evol. 2003 Nov;29(2):250-7.
A bit of risky, IMO. Taxonomy may be re-arranged with further evidence.

"Oriental Magpie P serica (found from Myanmar across to Taiwan, which includes two subspecies: serica and anderssoni)"
It seems that there is no Korean magpie in Korea anymore...

I couldn't help to think of this I read from yeas back:
http://brucemactavish1.blogspot.com/2014/11/eastern-western-willets-sos.html
 
Very recent update as it was just the August 2018. I became aware of this when the Liaoning list added Oriental Magpie. Honestly, I haven't gone back and changed my older listings on ebird but did change to Oriental at that time.

From eBird's site, the August 2018 updates and corrections - http://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/august-2018/ "....because the Clements Checklist is tightly interwoven with the taxonomy for eBird, the checklist now is referred to as the eBird/Clements Checklist."

"Subspecies serica, which we formerly included in the polytypic group Eurasian Magpie (Eurasian) Pica pica [pica Group], is recognized as a species, Oriental Magpie Pica serica. Revise the range description of serica from “S China to Myanmar, Indochina, Hainan and Taiwan” to “southeastern Russia, northeastern China, and Korea south through eastern China, Taiwan, and Hainan to northern Myanmar, northern Laos, and northern Vietnam”."
 
Hi Owen I had a look at your gull pix.

You also have lots of Kamchatka Gull, plus Black-headed, Mongolian and I think Vega Gulls.

I also think its worth posting your shrike to the ID forum - you're just about in range for Great Grey Shrike and your bird looks rather dark to me - any more pix would also be helpful.

Cheers
Mike
 
Thanks for mentioning the gulls, Mike. I was so excited about finding the Stork and the Spoonbill that I hadn't taken the time to fully go over the gull pics. Then it slipped my mind until just now. I think your right, as well as the BHG and BTG there are numbers of Kamchatka (Common) Gull. May have to adjust the numbers slightly. BTW, no argument this time, ebird listed my Eurasian Spoonbill as a confirmed rare bird sighting.

Now you've got me wondering about the Shrike. It was moving about quickly and moved out of sight after I only got three shots at it. The other two here. I didn't even consider the Great Gray at the time. When it first flew in it was in the sun and by the size I at first thought it to be an Azure-Winged Magpie but the tail was not long enough for that. Then it moved to where I got the three shots. That size if I estimated correctly would be better for a GGS and this bird did lack the prominent white eyebrow that is normal for the CGS sphenocerus. I'll throw it at the ID forum and see what they think.
 

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Very recent update as it was just the August 2018. I became aware of this when the Liaoning list added Oriental Magpie. Honestly, I haven't gone back and changed my older listings on ebird but did change to Oriental at that time.

From eBird's site, the August 2018 updates and corrections - http://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/august-2018/ "....because the Clements Checklist is tightly interwoven with the taxonomy for eBird, the checklist now is referred to as the eBird/Clements Checklist."

"Subspecies serica, which we formerly included in the polytypic group Eurasian Magpie (Eurasian) Pica pica [pica Group], is recognized as a species, Oriental Magpie Pica serica. Revise the range description of serica from “S China to Myanmar, Indochina, Hainan and Taiwan” to “southeastern Russia, northeastern China, and Korea south through eastern China, Taiwan, and Hainan to northern Myanmar, northern Laos, and northern Vietnam”."
:eek!::eek!::eek!:
Looks like I have some work to do...
I'd worry about that later. Been busy for couple of months and can finally relax a bit. It's about time as lakes are frozen and covered with thousands of gulls. I got a good opportunity to study a vagrant European Herring gull (argentatus/argenteus) which happens every few years in Newfoundland:
https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S50521961
Any gull you see would be mega rarity for me except the little one included in this checklist ;)
 
Dec-17

Not a lot to report, but decided to chime in anyway.

Winter has arrived with the last three weeks going from no permanent ice to ice fishing on the lakes and even the Liao River being mostly frozen over except for a few areas shallow enough that the current was keeping a narrow band clear. Ice fishing and ice skating underway. Even a few souls hardier than me braving the sub zero for a quick dip followed by running a couple hundred meters in their trunks!

Gulls, ducks and such are of course gone now and Passerines numbers are still very low. Only thing of note was that some Little Bunting were located after being entirely absent last winter and through until now. Also seen yesterday were 14 Oriental Magpie scattered in twos and threes and one flock of about 10 Azure-Winged Magpie. A pair of Hoopoe braving the winter weather. Two Grey-Headed Woodpecker and one Great Spotted Woodpecker, though I did hear what I think was almost certainly another GSW. A half dozen Hawfinch flew in and dropped down on the wooded area, probably migrating through. The usual minimum of 100 Tree Sparrow rounded out the days short list.

I did manage to range out further than I had before and found some footpaths into what should be some good areas for Heron, Egret, Bittern and such when the weather warms again late next spring.
 

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