And a few more ...... (heavy crop of the cuckoo). Don't often see two Oriental Reed Warblers showing together !
Sparrows don't get much love
Sparrows don't get much love
-
Welcome to BirdForum, the internet's largest birding community with thousands of members from all over the world. The forums are dedicated to wild birds, birding, binoculars and equipment and all that goes with it.
Please register for an account to take part in the discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.
Shanghai Perambulations (2 Viewers)
- Thread starter Frogfish
- Start date
Wenzhou Region, Zhejiang
A 4 day trip to visit Wenzhou (my wife's home town and source of her business) was planned as my wife had to entertain clients and this coincided with the Dragon Boat public holiday, so I tagged along with the idea of scouting the Wenzhou area (within a 100kms radius) for good birding sites .... I didn't find any to speak of !
My brother-in-law lent me a nice car and so at least I was comfy in my travels ; going on Day 1 to the South of Wenzhou up into the mountains by following the Yuexi Brook (river), in the Nanyan Lake Forest Park, until the road ended about 20kms up into the mountains (where the river really was a brook !) and also to the Xiwan Scenic Area on the coast (enduring traffic jams on the coastal mountain as people were trying to get to their favourite Buddhist temple); on Day 2 to the North of Wenzhou, up to the Nanxijiang Shizi Scenic Rock area (nice wide river and paddy fields galore - as on Day 1) and ; on Day 3 to the offshore islands (via sea bridges) of Wenzhou, Zhuangyuan'Ao, Dasanpan and Dongtou.
Day 1 was fun as much for the traditional countryside & lifestyle of the very friendly people there (even invited to lunch in one family's home) though I was very much restricted to the area close to the road as it wound it's way through narrow valley's and ravines. Day 2 was better birding and quite scenic and Day 3 was an almost total waste of time as all of the islands look like industrial work units with land reclamation and the building of coastal 'holiday home' apartment developments going on at a frenetic pace all around these islands' coastlines. The best birding coming in a park (!) and only one wader was seen the whole day ! There were literally hundreds of terns on Zhuangyuan'Ao Island (over the fish ponds next to the freeway) but no way to even stop and get the bins on them. These were to be the last seabirds I saw all day :eek!:
The highlights of the trip were seeing some of my favourite birds ; White Rumped and Scaly Breasted Munias, Rufous Faced Warblers, Black Throated Tits and the star turn, a mother and fledgling duo of Asian Barred Owlets (TBC - please see pics attached and confirm for me) !
The mother was diligently shepherding her newly fledged chick and keeping a close eye on me .. from a distance ... since the chick decided a wire cable not 30m away from me was the perfect place to sit and watch it's mother's aeronautical display !
Anyway here is the full list ( 45 - 49 species inc. 3-4 birds yet to be ID'd) :
Asian Barred Owlets (mother and fledgling)
Azure Winged Magpie (6)
Barn Swallows
Black Billed Magpie (1)
Black Capped Night Heron (2)
Black Drongo (1)
Blackbird
Black Throated Tits (ca. 30)
Brown Crake (1)
Cattle Egrets (common)
Chinese Bulbul (common)
Chinese Pond Heron (1 - BIF)
Collared Finchbills (numerous)
Common Coot (2)
Common Moorhen (6)
Common Pheasant (2 x BIF)
Crested Myna
Eurasian Cuckoo (1 - call confirmed)
Eurasian Jay (5)
Great Tits (Northern & Eastern)
Himalayan Bulbul (numerous)
Intermediate Egrets
Little Egrets (common)
Little Grebe (8)
Little Ringed Plover (1)
Long Tailed Shrike (6)
Japanese White-eye (5-6)
Mountain Bulbul (1)
Oriental Greenfinch (ca. 12)
Oriental Magpie Robin (M&F ca. 8)
Red Billed Magpies (ca. 30)
Red Billed Starlings (one flock of ca. 30)
Red Rumped Swallows
Reed Warbler (2 x spp. TB ID'd)
Rufous Faced Warblers (5)
Scaly Breasted Munias (8)
Spotted Dove (numerous)
Terns (spp. hundreds)
Tree Sparrows (common)
Vinous Throated Parrotbills (common)
White Cheeked Starlings (6-7)
White Rumped Munias (6)
White Wagtail (5-6 all leucopsis)
Yellow Bittern (1)
There as one small dark raptor but I was too slow to get on it.
A 4 day trip to visit Wenzhou (my wife's home town and source of her business) was planned as my wife had to entertain clients and this coincided with the Dragon Boat public holiday, so I tagged along with the idea of scouting the Wenzhou area (within a 100kms radius) for good birding sites .... I didn't find any to speak of !
My brother-in-law lent me a nice car and so at least I was comfy in my travels ; going on Day 1 to the South of Wenzhou up into the mountains by following the Yuexi Brook (river), in the Nanyan Lake Forest Park, until the road ended about 20kms up into the mountains (where the river really was a brook !) and also to the Xiwan Scenic Area on the coast (enduring traffic jams on the coastal mountain as people were trying to get to their favourite Buddhist temple); on Day 2 to the North of Wenzhou, up to the Nanxijiang Shizi Scenic Rock area (nice wide river and paddy fields galore - as on Day 1) and ; on Day 3 to the offshore islands (via sea bridges) of Wenzhou, Zhuangyuan'Ao, Dasanpan and Dongtou.
Day 1 was fun as much for the traditional countryside & lifestyle of the very friendly people there (even invited to lunch in one family's home) though I was very much restricted to the area close to the road as it wound it's way through narrow valley's and ravines. Day 2 was better birding and quite scenic and Day 3 was an almost total waste of time as all of the islands look like industrial work units with land reclamation and the building of coastal 'holiday home' apartment developments going on at a frenetic pace all around these islands' coastlines. The best birding coming in a park (!) and only one wader was seen the whole day ! There were literally hundreds of terns on Zhuangyuan'Ao Island (over the fish ponds next to the freeway) but no way to even stop and get the bins on them. These were to be the last seabirds I saw all day :eek!:
The highlights of the trip were seeing some of my favourite birds ; White Rumped and Scaly Breasted Munias, Rufous Faced Warblers, Black Throated Tits and the star turn, a mother and fledgling duo of Asian Barred Owlets (TBC - please see pics attached and confirm for me) !
The mother was diligently shepherding her newly fledged chick and keeping a close eye on me .. from a distance ... since the chick decided a wire cable not 30m away from me was the perfect place to sit and watch it's mother's aeronautical display !
Anyway here is the full list ( 45 - 49 species inc. 3-4 birds yet to be ID'd) :
Asian Barred Owlets (mother and fledgling)
Azure Winged Magpie (6)
Barn Swallows
Black Billed Magpie (1)
Black Capped Night Heron (2)
Black Drongo (1)
Blackbird
Black Throated Tits (ca. 30)
Brown Crake (1)
Cattle Egrets (common)
Chinese Bulbul (common)
Chinese Pond Heron (1 - BIF)
Collared Finchbills (numerous)
Common Coot (2)
Common Moorhen (6)
Common Pheasant (2 x BIF)
Crested Myna
Eurasian Cuckoo (1 - call confirmed)
Eurasian Jay (5)
Great Tits (Northern & Eastern)
Himalayan Bulbul (numerous)
Intermediate Egrets
Little Egrets (common)
Little Grebe (8)
Little Ringed Plover (1)
Long Tailed Shrike (6)
Japanese White-eye (5-6)
Mountain Bulbul (1)
Oriental Greenfinch (ca. 12)
Oriental Magpie Robin (M&F ca. 8)
Red Billed Magpies (ca. 30)
Red Billed Starlings (one flock of ca. 30)
Red Rumped Swallows
Reed Warbler (2 x spp. TB ID'd)
Rufous Faced Warblers (5)
Scaly Breasted Munias (8)
Spotted Dove (numerous)
Terns (spp. hundreds)
Tree Sparrows (common)
Vinous Throated Parrotbills (common)
White Cheeked Starlings (6-7)
White Rumped Munias (6)
White Wagtail (5-6 all leucopsis)
Yellow Bittern (1)
There as one small dark raptor but I was too slow to get on it.
Attachments
-
Asian%20Barred%20Owlet%20%28fledgling%29%20-%20Zhejiang%2C%20China-X2.jpg -
Asian%20Barred%20Owlet%20%28fledgling%29%20%234%20-%20Zhejiang%2C%20China-X2.jpg -
Asian%20Barred%20Owlet%20%231%20-%20Zhejiang%2C%20China-X2.jpg -
Asian%20Barred%20Owlet%20%28fledgling%29%20%232%20-%20Zhejiang%2C%20China-X2.jpg -
Asian%20Barred%20Owlet%20%232%20-%20Zhejiang%2C%20China-X2.jpg
Last edited:
thirudevaram
Trapped in mist ***s
You kept the owlet as a surprise! Lovely shots mate!
MKinHK
Mike Kilburn
Superb pix of the owl Kevin.
I agree that sparrows are rarely photographed - here's a pair of House Sparrows from Melbourne
Cheers
Mike
I agree that sparrows are rarely photographed - here's a pair of House Sparrows from Melbourne
Cheers
Mike
Thank you Gentlemen !
Yep the male tree sparrows especially can look really good in breeding plumage.
I agree - I think tree sparrows can actually be very smart birds (of course we see some grungier versions too - they're obviously not all living in places as nice and clean as a tree |:d| ) I'm really fond of Chinese style paintings that feature sparrows.
McMadd
You should see the other bloke...
The former 'dear leader' was apparently not big on brushing...so it said in a book wot I read ;D
M
Hengsha Island - Hunt for the fabled (in my mind) PTJ.
Without a birding buddy last weekend I decided I wanted to get high IQ shots of the Pheasant Tailed Jacana (there was a report on the SWBS website of 12 being seen on Hensha), so this being a short distance from home (but a messy trip) I set off at 06.00 on Monday morning expecting to miss the rush-hour traffic ... I didn't, I hit it after 5 mins and it took me nearly 2.5 hours to go the ca. 50kms to the car ferry to the island. Eventually driving off the car ferry and starting birding at closer to 09.30 than the 08.00 I'd anticipated :eek!:
it was to be a bit of a disastrous day (that's what happens when you go birding instead of to the office), with scrapes down one side of my car (800RMB and it now looks like new) and a flat tyre at 16.00 forcing an early curtailment to the day's activities. Change the tyre, onto the car ferry and drive home through more rush hour traffic (only 2.5 hours 'door to door' to go the 70kms this time though, as I went the long way around to miss the downtown traffic).
Anyway suffice to say I didn't find my heart's desire and had to make do with cuckoos and LTS' galore.
Here's my description of Hensha again :
Hengsha Island is a detour off the bridge from Shanghai to Chongming Island, going through the developed Changxing island and picking up the car ferry to Hengsha (a short 5-6 min trip across the channel between the islands). The island has a seawall road that encompasses the whole island (an off the top of my head guess of maybe 50-60kms of seawall) with numerous areas of land reclamation (one plot we saw covered around 50 kms2). There are however huge areas of reed beds (with far more lakes and ponds than in Nan Hui, one lake covering maybe 5-6 sq.kms), some mudflats and internally (at least according to the map) some small wooded areas (not explored).
The List (on a very hot day):
30 species.
Barn Swallow
Black Crowned Night Heron
Black Winged Stilts (12)
Cattle Egret (numerous)
Chinese Bulbul
Chinese Pond Heron
Common Kingfisher
Coot
Crested Myna
Cuckoo (Eurasian)(6 Cuckoos spp. seen in total)
Great Egret
Grey Heron
Intermediate Egret
Little Egret
Little Grebe
Long Tailed Shrike
Manchurian Bush Warbler (numerous)
Moorhen
Oriental Reed Warbler (numerous)
Plain Prinia
Purple Heron
Red Rumped Swallow
Skylark (Oriental)
Spotted Dove
Tree Sparrow
Vinous Throated Parrotbills
White Wagtail
White-Fronted Waterhen
Yellow Bittern (numerous)
Zitting Cisticola (numerous)
Without a birding buddy last weekend I decided I wanted to get high IQ shots of the Pheasant Tailed Jacana (there was a report on the SWBS website of 12 being seen on Hensha), so this being a short distance from home (but a messy trip) I set off at 06.00 on Monday morning expecting to miss the rush-hour traffic ... I didn't, I hit it after 5 mins and it took me nearly 2.5 hours to go the ca. 50kms to the car ferry to the island. Eventually driving off the car ferry and starting birding at closer to 09.30 than the 08.00 I'd anticipated :eek!:
it was to be a bit of a disastrous day (that's what happens when you go birding instead of to the office), with scrapes down one side of my car (800RMB and it now looks like new) and a flat tyre at 16.00 forcing an early curtailment to the day's activities. Change the tyre, onto the car ferry and drive home through more rush hour traffic (only 2.5 hours 'door to door' to go the 70kms this time though, as I went the long way around to miss the downtown traffic).
Anyway suffice to say I didn't find my heart's desire and had to make do with cuckoos and LTS' galore.
Here's my description of Hensha again :
Hengsha Island is a detour off the bridge from Shanghai to Chongming Island, going through the developed Changxing island and picking up the car ferry to Hengsha (a short 5-6 min trip across the channel between the islands). The island has a seawall road that encompasses the whole island (an off the top of my head guess of maybe 50-60kms of seawall) with numerous areas of land reclamation (one plot we saw covered around 50 kms2). There are however huge areas of reed beds (with far more lakes and ponds than in Nan Hui, one lake covering maybe 5-6 sq.kms), some mudflats and internally (at least according to the map) some small wooded areas (not explored).
The List (on a very hot day):
30 species.
Barn Swallow
Black Crowned Night Heron
Black Winged Stilts (12)
Cattle Egret (numerous)
Chinese Bulbul
Chinese Pond Heron
Common Kingfisher
Coot
Crested Myna
Cuckoo (Eurasian)(6 Cuckoos spp. seen in total)
Great Egret
Grey Heron
Intermediate Egret
Little Egret
Little Grebe
Long Tailed Shrike
Manchurian Bush Warbler (numerous)
Moorhen
Oriental Reed Warbler (numerous)
Plain Prinia
Purple Heron
Red Rumped Swallow
Skylark (Oriental)
Spotted Dove
Tree Sparrow
Vinous Throated Parrotbills
White Wagtail
White-Fronted Waterhen
Yellow Bittern (numerous)
Zitting Cisticola (numerous)
Last edited:
Yesterday Dev & I motored on down to the Jinshan coast and worked our way around to the Nan Hui (Holiday Inn) reed beds. Luckily it was a cooler day on the coast than last week's 35-38C in Shanghai, with a lovely refreshing breeze making it feel more like 20-22C than the needle indicated 27-28C.
So mudflats, reed beds and also some small ponds in the SCIP wetlands were the order fo the day.
44 species.
Barn Swallow (numerous)
Black Crowned Night Heron (numerous - 100+)
Black Drongo (3)
Brown Shrike (family, adults & chicks, of at least 5)
Cattle Egret (numerous - 100+ on a mudflat in Jinshan)
Chinese Bulbul
Chinese Pond Heron (numerous)
Cinnamon Bittern (1)
Common Kingfisher (1)
Coot
Crested Myna
Great Egret
Hen Harrier (male)
Hoopoe (1)
Intermediate Egret
Kentish Plover (2 adults with 1 small chick)
Kestrel (1 - great views)
Large Billed Gulls (hundreds)
Lesser Coucal (5)
Little Egret
Little Grebe (inc. one on a nest with 3 tiny chicks)
Little Ringed Plover
Long Tailed Shrike (100+)
Manchurian Bush Warbler
Moorhen (numerous)
Cuckoo (<10 spp.)
Oriental Green Finches (total of 8 in 3 different locations)
Oriental Pratincole (1)
Oriental Reed Warbler (numerous)
Oriental Turtle Dove (hundred+)
Pheasant Tailed Jacana (one adult in breeding plumage).
Plain Prinia
Purple Heron (2)
Red Collared Dove (at least 3)
Red Rumped Swallow
Reed Parrotbills (three small flocks in different locations in NH)
Skylark (spp)
Spotted Dove
Tree Sparrow
Vinous Throated Parrotbills (numerous)
White Cheeked Starling (20+)
White Wagtail (<10)
Yellow Bittern (numerous, especially on the Yellow Bittern highway of Nan Hui)
Zitting Cisticola (numerous)
So mudflats, reed beds and also some small ponds in the SCIP wetlands were the order fo the day.
44 species.
Barn Swallow (numerous)
Black Crowned Night Heron (numerous - 100+)
Black Drongo (3)
Brown Shrike (family, adults & chicks, of at least 5)
Cattle Egret (numerous - 100+ on a mudflat in Jinshan)
Chinese Bulbul
Chinese Pond Heron (numerous)
Cinnamon Bittern (1)
Common Kingfisher (1)
Coot
Crested Myna
Great Egret
Hen Harrier (male)
Hoopoe (1)
Intermediate Egret
Kentish Plover (2 adults with 1 small chick)
Kestrel (1 - great views)
Large Billed Gulls (hundreds)
Lesser Coucal (5)
Little Egret
Little Grebe (inc. one on a nest with 3 tiny chicks)
Little Ringed Plover
Long Tailed Shrike (100+)
Manchurian Bush Warbler
Moorhen (numerous)
Cuckoo (<10 spp.)
Oriental Green Finches (total of 8 in 3 different locations)
Oriental Pratincole (1)
Oriental Reed Warbler (numerous)
Oriental Turtle Dove (hundred+)
Pheasant Tailed Jacana (one adult in breeding plumage).
Plain Prinia
Purple Heron (2)
Red Collared Dove (at least 3)
Red Rumped Swallow
Reed Parrotbills (three small flocks in different locations in NH)
Skylark (spp)
Spotted Dove
Tree Sparrow
Vinous Throated Parrotbills (numerous)
White Cheeked Starling (20+)
White Wagtail (<10)
Yellow Bittern (numerous, especially on the Yellow Bittern highway of Nan Hui)
Zitting Cisticola (numerous)
Last edited:
Chinese Pond Heron
Attachments
-
Chinese%20Pond%20Heron%20%234%2C%20Jinshan%2C%20Shanghai-X2.jpg -
Chinese%20Pond%20Heron%20%235%2C%20Jinshan%2C%20Shanghai-X2.jpg -
Chinese%20Pond%20Heron%20%231%2C%20Jinshan%2C%20Shanghai-X2.jpg -
Chinese%20Pond%20Heron%20%233%2C%20Jinshan%2C%20Shanghai-X2.jpg -
Chinese%20Pond%20Heron%20%232%2C%20Jinshan%2C%20Shanghai-XL.jpg
Last edited:
Cattle Egrets
Attachments
Thanks Mike !
Dev may have better pics than me of the HH as he saw it first. I have one poor shot from distance showing some of the underwing. I'll sort it out when I get home from the office (don't fall off your seat Mark, I do come downtown now and again) !
thirudevaram
Trapped in mist ***s
I was jus texting Kevin about the Harrier. My mind was so obsessed with a male Harrier. Throughout the day i was thinking is it a Montagu's, Pallid, Hen? After some cruel photoshopping with levels n curves, this picture gave me a little show of the upper-wing. Thanks Mike, you caught me beforehand. Sorry about the false alarm Kevin.
Actually, this is a Black-winged Kite. It totally blew me off when i saw the black patch on the upper wing. I was never expecting this fella in Shanghai.
