Sign of Spring - Singing Birds and Migrants

Spring is certainly here, evidently with increasing number of spring migrants coming through, as well as local birds in song. One such local bird that is best looked for in spring is the Chinese Grassbird, Hong Kong is still perhaps the best place to look for this globally rare species, we had fantastic view of this singing bird in the open despite a little bit of mist that morning.

Chinese Grassbird

At Mai Po, there were quite a few vocal Pleske's Grasshopper Warblers in song along the boardwalk out to the mudflat, got lucky with one that showed exceptionally well! A surprise drop-in of an Oriental Plover was a real delight, these uncommon migrants never stay very long, this one stayed aproximately 3 hours before it flew off and was never seen again. Other spring migrants such as Great Knots and Red Knots are now starting to trickle through, I am sure we will see a lot more of them in the coming month.

Pleske's Grasshopper Warbler

Oriental Plover

Great Knots with Grey Plovers

At the scrape, a good high tide usually pushes the birds in to roost here, good numbers were seen although nothing hugely exciting yet. A Far Eastern Curlew amongst the hundreds of Eurasian Curlew was perhaps the better wader around. A Brown-cheeked Rail also came by in front of the bird hide, but was very shy and remained in cover.

Far Eastern Curlew and Eurasian Curlews

Brown-cheeked Rail

Out on the mudflat, many Kentish Plovers, Siberian Sand Plovers and Greater Sand Plovers were seen feeding, although never too close to the bird hide. I was there on a very poor day for gulls, with only a handful of Lesser Black-backed Gulls (heuglini) present, other birders have had luck with Slender-billed Gulls a few days later, so there are certainly potential if one is lucky. The Black-capped Kingfisher is still around, and showed quite well when tide is at the right height; not too low, but not too high.

Kentish Plover

Lesser Black-backed Gull (heuglini)

Black-capped Kingfisher

Our wintering raptors are still lingering on, although probably not for long now. Both Greater Spotted Eagle and Imperial Eagle can still be seen occasionally around the Osprey Hide at Mai Po.

Greater Spotted Eagle

Imperial Eagle

Over at Tai Sang Wai, the long staying male Bluethroat have been showing well. As long as you stay quite still it would come all the way towards you. Bluethroat numbers usually drop off by early April, with very few lingering on until late April and sometimes early May, but I expect this one to take off in a few weeks time.

Bluethroat - male

The fish ponds have been fairly quiet otherwise, our wintering White Wagtails are still around in good numbers, race ocularis is perhaps our second most common race in Hong Kong after our local leucopsis. Black-faced Spoonbills are now moulting into their breeding plumage, making them quite the spectacular bird to look at. Little Grebes are now chasing one another around, getting ready to breed.

White Wagtail - ocularis

Black-faced Spoonbill

Little Grebe

Right now you can't go to Long Valley or anywhere without hearing an Asian Koel or two singing, the males are often very showy at this time of the year, unlike the rest of the year where they are quite shy and reclusive. A few Oriental Pratincoles have taken up short term residence at Long Valley, attracting many photographers, not surprising given how attractive they look.

Asian Koel - male

Oriental Pratincole

At Tai Po Kau, many birds are in song or pairing up. Crested Serpent Eagles are now singing often, while I observed a Yellow-cheeked Tit collecting nesting materials. Many Blue-winged Minla and Grey-chinned Minivets have paired up now, so we see less large flocks of these together.

Crested Serpent Eagle

Yellow-cheeked Tit - female

Grey-chinned Minivet - male

Blue-winged Minla

I had a good photo opportunity of a female Scarlet-backed Flowerpecker, when seen well the red rump is also visible, the white throat also extends down towards the breast, which differs from the Plain Flowerpecker. Pygmy Cupwing can be heard throughout at this time of the year, but never an easy bird to spot. Crested Goshawks can be seen displaying above the forest, even the usually difficult to see Mountain Tailorbird was showing relatively well.

Scarlet-backed Flowerpecker - female

Pygmy Cupwing

Crested Goshawk

Mountain Tailorbird

Grey-headed Canary Flycatchers are still around, so are the few wintering warblers, although I didn't really have much luck photographing those jumpy warblers, the flycatcher gave fairly good views in good light for a little while.

Grey-headed Canary Flycatcher

The best bird there however, probably goes to this rather unremarkable looking warbler. I noticed a Blyth's type warbler in the bird flock, at first I thought it was a fokiensis Hartert's Leaf Warbler, having rather whitish grey underparts, its behaviour was however very un-Hartert's like, as it gleaned the leaves instead of following larger branches like a nuthatch as you expect of a Hartert's. It had a central crown stripe but it was very washed out near the forehead, and greyish not yellowish. The song was also quite different, a distinctive “chu-weet, chweet chweet chweet chweet”, the last repeated phrases varied by the number of times it was repeated, sometimes three times, with six being the longest I heard during my observation. I tried matching all the songs, and Claudia's Leaf Warbler came up as the most suitable candidate. Claudia's is not currently on the Hong Kong list, but certainly one that we may have been overlooking over the years with non-vocal Blyth's type warblers. For those interested, a recording was uploaded onto the eBird checklist: https://ebird.org/checklist/S307850085

Claudia's Leaf Warbler

Weather is still on the cooler side at night, so I haven't been able to find many snakes, although a Collared Scops Owl was nice to see as always. East Asian Porcupines are fairly common in Hong Kong, but I am always happy to see them, especially when they show well, such as this mother with her cub. The little bit of rain lately triggered our frogs to call, the Short-legged Horned Toad is one of them.

Collared Scops Owl

East Asian Porcupine

Short-legged Horned Toad