Monday 27 July 2009

Emei Shan - Sichuan

We stayed at Emei for 3 short days after our volunteer trip near Beichuan 北川. Despite our little effort at locating birds we had 59 species in total at Emei.

Day 1:
We arrived at the hotel we booked at the base of Emeishan near Baoguo Si in the afternoon. After a quick lunch, we set off to a trail from Laifeng Pavilion through Fuhu Si to Luofeng. This is a trail which is not included in the travel pass for Emei, so a lot of people walk through this trail. The degraded forest produced little. Being late afternoon when it's most crowded, we had few birds.

Plumbeous Redstart x2 at the stream near First Pavilion
Slaty-backed Forktail x3
Red-rumped Swallow around town
Black Baza x2 at First Pavilion
Oriental Honey Buzzard x1 at Fuhu Si
Magpie Robin at town
Swinhoe's Minivets x30 near Fuhu Si
Spangled Drongo x8 outside our hotel window
Blue Whistling Thrush x2 near a bridge up to Fuhu Si
Collard Finchbill x2
Black Bulbuls
Chinese Bulbuls
Grey Wagtail x1

Plumbeous Redstart


Slaty-backed Forktail






Collard Finchbill


Blue Whistling Thrush


Black Bulbul


Day 2:
We woke up early around 5:00am to catch the 6am bus up to Jeiyin Dian, where we took the cable car up to the Golden Summit. The Bus took just over an hour to get to Jeiyin. The Golden Summit area is pretty birdy with plenty high altitude birds seen just walking around the crowded footpaths. We did not explore the area too much and started the descend from Jeiyin at 2540m down to Wannian at 1020m. We spent way too much time birding between Leidong Ping down to Xi Xiang Chi, the area was very birdy with plenty of "warbler waves" and other birds a long the way. We reached Xi Xiang Chi after noon, which gave us very little time to walk back down to Wannian Si. For the rest of the afternoon, we did more walking then birding as we needed to get down there before 6pm to catch the last cable car from Wannian down to the car park for a bus back to Baoguo Si. Despite our rushing pace we picked up a few birds a long the way. By the time we got down to Baoguo Si it was 5:50pm. The side effect of walking this much for one day was clearly showing, signs included: shaky legs, achey legs and lack of will to walk back up to our hotel rooms which was at the 3rd floor. 

Large-billed Crow
Speckled Wood Pigeon x1
White-bellied Green Pigeon x10 at Xi Xiang Chi
Chestnut Thrush x3 at Summit
Lesser Cuckoo heard fairly common from 2430m - 2100m
Himalayan Swiftlet x3 at Leidong Ping
Asian House Martin at Leidong Ping
Eurasian Treecreeper x1
Ferruginous Flycatcher x1 on the way down from the summit from the cable car
Rufous-gorgeted Flycatcher x1 near Xi Xiang Chi
Coal Tit
Rufous-vented Tit x5
Green-backed Tit x3
Fire-capped Tit x4 all juv or females
Mountain Bulbul x3
Plain Prinia x1 at summit
Brownish-flanked Bush Warbler heard
Yellowish-bellied Bush Warbler
Chestnut-crowned Bush Warbler x2
Yellow-browed Warbler
Buff-barred Warbler very common near summit
Chinese Leaf Warbler x2
Greenish Warbler
Large-billed Leaf Warbler 
Blyth's Leaf Warbler (I did some research and some say the former race claudia's leaf Warbler is now a seperate race and is recorded at Emei? but I have no idea how they call)
Biachi's Warbler x3
Elliot's Laughingthrush common near summit
Red-billed Leiothrix
White-collard Yuhina
Striated Yuhina x5 near Wannian Si
Black-chinned Yuhina
Ashy-throated Parrotbill near Wannian
Chestnut-flanked White-eye
Japanese White-eye
Rufous-breasted Accentor at summit
Vinaceous Rosefinch x1 at summit
Grey-headed Bullfinch x1 at summit
Slaty Bunting x1 near Leidong Ping
Hwamei

Rufous-breasted Accentor






Buff-barred Warbler




Chestnut Thrush


Elliot's Laughingthrush


Fire-capped Tit




Bianchi's Warbler


White-Collard Yuhina




Spangled Drongo

















Rufous-vented Tit





Vinaceous Rosefinch - male



Slaty Bunting - male


Day 3:

The rainy morning meant very little walking was involved, our achey legs also prevented us from any long distance walking. We spent our last morning around the base below Fuhu Si for an hour before leaving by Taxi back to Chengdu airport.

Great Tit x3
Rufous-capped Babbler x1 heard
White-browed Laughingthrush x3
Tree Sparrows
Japanese White-eyes
Magpie Robin
Spangled Drongo
Swinhoe's Minivet x10
Slaty-backed Forktail x1
Collard Finchbill x2
Black Bulbul
Blue Whistling Thrush

Including our other birds seen around Sichuan, we have a total of 71 species.