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Message: <blockquote data-quote="china guy" data-source="post: 4097252" data-attributes="member: 6819">Chengdu Birding – <a href="mailto:chengduuk@hotmail.com">chengduuk@hotmail.com</a> - Chengdu, Sichuan, the gateway to Tibet - to see more travel pics of Sichuan go to my travel blog at - <a href="http://chengdutravel.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">http://chengdutravel.blogspot.com/</a> In that last entry I gave you the John Cleese of the bird-world – our Yellow-legged Buttonquail and its very silly walk – nature does give us a laugh at times. Yesterday’s birding was no exception – a trip to nearby Qingcheng Mountains giving us this odd looking fellow<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3228/2948642628_4b0cc4f5a0.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" />'allo, 'allo - whats goin' on around here - a Spot-breasted ParrotbillThat head sticking out the bush isn’t a computer generated character drawn-up for some Disney cartoon – it’s a real flesh and feathers creation – the Spot-breasted Parrotbill. It took us some time to get photos of this lovely bird – we were constantly hearing them – but it was darn difficult to get our eyes on one. However we were determined – we’d just lost a brief, but close quarters – face to bill - chance to get some nice snaps of three Moustached Laughingthrushes that I’d whistled up from the scrub (these birds will sometimes come and investigate calls). Birding is sometimes a story of the hunted disappearing into thin-air (or should that be tangled-bush) long before your equipment is ready!!!! But our funny Parrotbills were sticking around – it just took a bit of time before one decided to show itself in that comic pose.<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3032/2947849231_475d29700d.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" />Fancy paint job!!!!!!And it doesn’t seem to be just the birds that we can imagine as clowns – here’s some kind of bug that surely must be off to a fancy-dress party – where did he get those threads??? (Anybody know what kind of bug this is?) In the next couple of days we're planning to set-off again on our travels – this times we want to head west onto the start of the grasslands while the passes are still easy to negotiate. These areas have been restricted during the Olympic Games – but we’re now hearing reports of folk getting through with no problems.<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3160/2947882093_e412337cd6.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" />Its high up here - over 4,000m - and it can be cold and icy - the zheduo pass about an hour a half outside Kangding.We were lucky to “sneak” up there just at the beginning of June – but I was guiding at the time, so wasn’t able to take any pics. That part of the trip brought us among other stuff - White-eared Pheasant, Blood Pheasant, Grandala,  and Giant Babax (this isn’t supposed to be here – we brought out the birds using playback). However at the first mountain pass there was snow and ice at 4,000m, which meant the road was blocked by a queue of trucks heading in the direction of Lhasa - we had to turn around and sneak back out.Lets hope for slightly better luck this time round.<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3292/2948736516_33af7b7043.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" />Himalayan Rubythroat - got this beauty at the top of that pass, just over a year ago.</blockquote>

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