Telford Garden continue to works it migrant magnet magic, with a steady stream of Grasshopper Warblers, while I kept missing the Lanceolated Warblers which Captain sees and photograph on a regular basis lately, the newest more unusual arrival includes a Styan's Grasshopper Warbler, now also known as the Pleske's Grasshopper Warbler. This usually very shy species is a regular passage migrant in Hong Kong, most usually found along the mangroves in Deep Bay area, this one however found itself in the middle of a shopping mall roof top garden. It still baffles me how these warblers seems to be attracted to this 100% manmade habitat. Nonetheless, it is a great to be able to observe these usually obscured species up close.
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| Styan's Grasshopper Warbler - Finally in full view! |
I can't say for certain what it's been feeding on for the past few days, it looks like some kind of grubs or pupae, but it certainly have no trouble finding them! Its been active in a flowerbed and hedge no bigger than 2m x 3m wide, but does have a tendency to disappear once in a while and reappearing again.
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| Styan's Grasshopper Warbler - feeding |
In the same flowerbed there were up to two different Pallas's Grasshopper Warblers. This leads me to believe that this very flowerbed likely have the highest density of grasshopper warblers in the world! The Styan's certainly want to keep this spot all to itself, but those two little warblers just kept coming back, plus an Oriental Magpie Robin also claiming this flowerbed to be its territory, so it was constant chasing and fighting from these few birds.
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| Pallas's Grasshopper Warbler |
Things were much more peaceful in other flowerbeds, with this very friendly Pallas's occupying this one all by itself. This is one of the tamest I have seen and will readily walk all the way to the edge of the flowerbed at arm's length! So, naturally this one attracted the most attention by photographers.
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| Pallas's Grasshopper Warbler - the friendliest of the bunch |
Another one occupied the rockscape near the pool, occasionally jumping out to the open before flying back into the covers of thick vegetation. There were likely two more elsewhere and apparently a Lanceolated Warbler according to Captain, but I didn't spend too much time looking for those. All in all a great season for these warblers! I am still hoping for something much rarer like Gray's or Brown Bush Warbler to turn up, fingers crossed!
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| Pallas's Grasshopper Warbler |
My luck for snakes seems to have improved a bit of late, first with a young Common Rat Snake that was found during a night tour! This very cute and gentle snake was a huge hit for the kids, and everyone got to see this beautiful snake up close. This species is diurnal, so we don't usually see them at night, just so happened that this one was sleeping on the side of the road. We moved it off to somewhere safer afterwards. We also found a Bamboo Pit Viper plus a young Red-necked Keelback that evening, but those I didn't bother with photos.
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| Common Rat Snake |
I found yet another Futsing Wolf Snake while out one evening, this one was still pretty small, but certainly a feisty little snake! It gave me a good nibble twice, although no blood drawn as its teeth were still too small. It was also not a great model and constantly moved around, having photographed this species quite a few times already, I took a few record shots and let it go back about its business.
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| Futsing Wolf Snake |
The best snake of late being a Chinese Mountain Snake, found by James while we were out birding! We had a lengthy photo session with this cute little snake, as I've yet to get any proper photos of this species. While this species is actually quite widespread, it is rarely seen during herping sessions at night, as they are diurnal and usually burrow itself under leaf litter at night, making them a tricky snake to locate. I have seen them a few times already while out birding, walking along forest tracks during the day seems to be the best way in finding these docile snakes.
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| Chinese Mountain Snake |
Another interesting find during night walk is a Reeve's Terrapin! This is one of the native species in Hong Kong, and like all native turtles they have been heavily poached and getting rarer and rarer by the day. Reeve's Terrapin is likely the most common native species left, but due to competition with released exotic species such as Red-eared Sliders, these turtles are much rarer than they were used to. I myself have not seen one in the wild for quite sometime! It is important that if you ever find a local turtle species to keep the location TO YOURSELF! Do not share or reveal location with anyone.
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| Reeve's Terrapin |
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