Quiet March with Signs of Hope

March is always a bit of a quiet month, not a lot is happening at the moment, spring migrants are arriving at a very slow rate, and a lot of our wintering birds are starting to depart. A Yellow-browed Bunting at Ho Sheung Heung seems to have stayed on through the winter, it was seen feeding with a few Little Buntings. Around the same area were three White's Thrushes, its been an exceptional winter for this species, and I can hardly get bored of them. A Peregrine Falcon was observed on one of the electricity pylon.

Yellow-browed Bunting

Little Bunting

White's Thrush

Peregrine Falcon

Asian Koels are now a constant background noise, here is one found singing on top of a tree at Shek Kong Airfield Road. Common Rosefinches are still around, and I finally located one male there and lots of females, these should be departing very soon. Yellow-billed Grosbeaks are of course another species we most expect to find there, feeding together with the Rosefinches. Asian Barred Owlets have been showing relatively well along the road here, although locating them can still be tricky sometimes. Another species that should be departing very soon is a Daurian Redstarts, we are seeing a lot less of them this month, and most wintering individuals should be gone by next month.

Asian Koel - male

Common Rosefinch - male & female

Yellow-billed Grosbeak - male

Asian Barred Owlet

Daurian Redstart - male

Some wintering species are lingering on at Tai Po Kau, including a nice looking male Red-flanked Bluetail and several very friendly Tristram's Buntings. Both showed well on my last visit. A few Hartert's Leaf Warblers are still present.

Red-flanked Bluetail - male

Tristram's Bunting - female

Hartert's Leaf Warbler

Not a lot of spring waders arriving yet, but the Black-faced Spoonbills are now moulting into their beautiful breeding plumage, always lovely to see as always. Lots of large gulls are still present, other than the two (or three) common species such as Vega and Lesser Black-backed Gulls still lingering on, two Slaty-backed Gulls were also observed, one very bleached individual, plus a much darker looking but smaller individual, the bi-coloured bill threw me off slightly, but the rather light and unicoloured primaries plus deep red legs kind of leave very little choice in terms of large gulls in this region. I only saw one Pallas's Gull there. Other than the still lingering Oriental Stork (was too far away so I didn't bother to photograph it), a Javan Mongoose was a nice sighting along the border fence. 48 Falcated Ducks were also a lovely sight to behold.

Black-faced Spoonbill - in glorious breeding plumage

Slaty-backed Gull (middle)

Slaty-backed Gull - another 1st winter

Pallas's Gull

Javan Mongoose

Falcated Duck - 48 of these fine looking ducks!

San Tin's been relatively productive lately, I had a few Eurasian Spoonbills feeding on one of the fish pond, together with some Black-faced Spoonbills as well, these provided very close views and were very fun to watch.

Eurasian Spoonbill

Black-faced Spoonbill

 

Pipits numbers seems to be up, many Red-throated Pipits were seen, plus a few Buff-bellied Pipits around the place. The Buff-bellied Pipits are now moulting into their breeding plumage.

Red-throated Pipit - male

Buff-bellied Pipit

A Yellow Bittern was spotted along some reed, while the long staying female Pied Harrier is still around the area, although I still fail to get any decent photos of it flying close by, as it always seems to drift away from me when I was there.

Yellow Bittern

Pied Harrier - female

Finally, some clear signs of spring migration! At least two Oriental Pratincoles, and a single Pacific Swift amongst the Barn and Red-rumped Swallows. Both giving me hope that something IS happening and we will finally get some new arrivals in the next couple of weeks.

Oriental Pratincole

Pacific Swift

Bunting Time!

Since Long Valley is still closed, its been more difficult to get good photos of passage buntings, luckily the Conservancy Association started planting rice in another area close to Long Valley a two years ago, and now finally some buntings are visiting that area! After they harvested the rice, lots of buntings stayed behind to feed on any leftovers on the ground, one of the main attraction was a few Rustic Buntings. This species used to be much harder to track down, thanks to the reintroduction of paddy fields, we now get to see this species almost annually with relative ease.

Rustic Bunting

Another less common species that visited the paddyfield is the Yellow-browed Bunting, this autumn been exceptional for this species, this is the 4th individual for me this season!

Yellow-browed Bunting

Other than the less common species, other commoner species were also present, mainly Little Buntings, there was also one Chestnut-eared Bunting around, but it was far more skittish than the other buntings present.

Little Bunting

Chestnut-eared Bunting

Of course, Yellow-breasted Bunting was the whole reason why we got these paddy fields in the first place, this now critically endangered species is attracted to to rice fields, planting more rice directly benefit these migrants, as it provides more food source for them to continue on their journey. There were quite a few of these wonderful buntings feeding on the ground, including a ringed male! Hopefully with more actions aimed to conserve this species, it won't go extinct just yet.

Yellow-breasted Bunting

I finally got some time to visit Mai Po lately, this was actually my first visit to the reserve this entire autumn! At the reedbed lots of Black-faced Buntings were seen, we see them along here every winter, along with lots of Chinese Penduline Tits. 

Black-faced Bunting

Chinese Penduline Tit

Along the footpath there were plenty of smaller birds flitting about, including lots of Dusky Warblers, there was one Dark-sided Flycatcher hawking for insects, but the most numerous species was Daurian Redstarts, there seems to be one every 20 meters or so, most of them very confiding. I scanned the few Olive-backed Pipits along the footpath, but saw no Tree Pipits this time.

Dark-sided Flycatcher

Daurian Redstart - male

Olive-backed Pipit

You are never short of good photography opportunities in Mai Po. A Black-crowned Night Heron posed nicely for a photo, while I caught this Osprey taking off under the morning sun.

Black-crowned Night Heron

Osprey

Ducks are now in good numbers, other than the more numerous species, small flocks of Falcated Ducks have also returned, although those remained quite far away. It is usual to get at least 8 to 9 species of ducks at Mai Po at any given time in the winter months. Many nice looking Northern Pintails came around closer to the bird hide, I can never get bored of this wonderful looking species.

Falcated Duck - plus other common duck species

Northern Pintail

The main attraction at Mai Po at the moment are three Greater White-fronted Geese. The trio been seen daily at the tower hide, the single juvenile accompanied by two adults. These three are the only remaining geese from larger flocks earlier last month, while the reported Greylags and Taiga Bean Goose have moved on. While geese are still consider a rarity in Hong Kong, a few seems to regularly winter in the Deep Bay area in recent years.

Greater White-fronted Goose