鳥北京

After my recent tour in China I was lucky enough to be able to spend two days birding with Terry Townshend in the Beijing area. Terry and his wife Libby looked after me splendidly and our birding netted me a number of new birds.

You can read Terry's account of the two days on his blog (Birding Beijing). We kicked off by visiting Terry's local patch (Wild Duck Lake and Yehayu) in the excellent company of Jesper Hornskov. The drive out to this site is rather long and often the traffic is awful but I know now why Terry bothers. These two sites always seem to throw up something special and our visit was no exception.

Chinese grey shrike was one of the new species for me on the day out to Wild Duck Lake.

In the brutal cold we checked a partially frozen Wild Duck Lake first, highlights here included: Daurian partridge (2), great bittern (3), Baikal teal (<10), Chinese grey shrike (4-5), Asian short-toed lark (13), Chinese hill warbler (4), Pallas’ reed bunting (common) and Japanese reed bunting (1). But also ruddy shelduck, Chinese spot-billed duck, gadwall, ferruginous duck (1 late bird), goosander, merlin (1), sparrowhawk, goshawk (1), hen harrier (4), common crane (120), grey-headed woodpecker and vinous-throated parrotbill.

At Yehayu, after negotiating the fence around the site, highlights included a black bittern (1, a great rarity in this part of China and at this late date too), great egret (1), grey heron (1), upland buzzard (3), great bustard (2 flying past), black-headed gull (2), a common kingfisher dying on the ice, Naumann’s thrush (1), chinese penduline tit (heard only) and pine bunting (2). A tolai hare here was nice too. Towards the end of the day we started losing momentum from fatigue and headed for Jesper’s home for an enjoyable evening meal.

The next day we headed out again, this time to the botanical gardens on the outskirts of Beijing. In the garden proper were berry-laden bushes with plenty of light-vented bulbuls and both dusky and Naumann’s thrushes in good numbers. Azure-winged magpies were common and three introduced crested mynas flew over. At least two Chinese grosbeaks perched up nicely for scope views. We checked an area of conifers briefly for Chinese nuthatch and then moved on to tackle the ridge behind the gardens for a few special birds. The ridge walk produced a small group of curious plain laughingthrushes and we heard the Chinese hill warbler.

When we finally got down (after searching in vain along the busy paths for Siberian accentor) and found a pair of very busy Chinese nuthatches storing pine nuts for the winter. A great bird. A good flock of Pallas’ warblers was present here too, we had seen odd individuals during the day and also a handful of red-flanked bluetails. Mammals seen here were red and Père David’s rock squirrels. Another great day out.

So huge thanks to Terry and Libby, I sat on my flight to Delhi absolutely exhausted after 48 hours non-stop socialising and birding - a great stay in Beijing.

From Copenhagen to Beijing

Terry Townshend - you'd smile too if you looked like Timothy Dalton's lovechild and had just been transferred to China for a year.

Fans of Terry Townshend's Birding Copenhagen blog will be delighted to hear that he is up and running at his new location - Beijing! Catch the new blog and a great start to his birding in China at the new site.

Birding with Terry and Mikael

Terry and Mikael at Farhult, it is always a novelty for me to spend time in the field with people over five years old.

Terry came up again nice and early for a day out of Copenhagen. We met up at the train station at Ängelholm in the rain and headed for Rönnen, hoping for the gyr falcon. At first light we found a goshawk along the road in to the site. No joy with the big falcon sadly but we did meet Mikael Olofsson (bonus!). All three of us scanned about, finding a peregrine and three white-tailed eagles. Offshore three long-tailed ducks bobbed about.

Taking Mikael along with us, we next headed to Farhult. Plenty of birds offshore here. A big raft of tufted duck (170) and goldeneye (250), included a few scaup (6+) and pochard (5). At least seven Slavonian grebes here too and way offshore the male smew. As we watched another (or the same) goshawk (1K) flew in front of us, lightly mobbed by a hooded crow. It ended up down the far end, perched on a fence-post and as the rain had finally stopped, hung its wings down to dry. Also here another white-tailed eagle for the tally. The reedbed was alive with calls of water rail (2), bearded tit and reed bunting.

Dragging Mikael with us yet again we headed inland to look for golden eagles. Lönhult produced a rough-legged buzzard. But Mikael's knowledge of the back-roads here soon produced the goods when Terry spotted a fine sub-adult golden eagle flying along at Tursköp. Also here two more white-tailed eagles (easily my best ever day for these in NW Skåne) and another rough-legged buzzard.

White-tailed eagle high-jinks.

Love 'em! I have not got tired of seeing these guys yet.

After our successful inland mission we returned to the coast at Sandön - fairly quiet with Slavonian grebe (1), oystercatcher (11), and smew (redhead). Dropping Mikael off again at Rönnen we had time for another quick but unsuccessful scan for the gyr. It was not to be our day with this unreliable bird.

Our last few sites were on-patch. We headed to Torekov rev for purple sandpipers (9 - my first this month) and nearby had two shags on offshore rocks. A great end to the day [although when we got back we discovered that the gyr had been seen really well inland at Lönhult during the day, can't win 'em all!].

The big day - birding with TT

A three kilometre sandy beach with no-one on it!

Tawny pipit habitat

Today I showed Terry Townshend around a few sites in NW Skåne and neighbouring Halland and we had a great day. Terry lives in the middle of Copenhagen, but (like me) is a Norfolk boy, so I tailored a day to show him some good wader action and then get him into some dunes (to make him miss Winterton) and finally show off some great beech woods. It worked really well, but lets start at the beginning.

Before I picked up Terry at Ängelholm station I nipped into Ranarpstrand for a quick look - this move was repaid with four avocet and a peregrine streaking towards Kullen. Terry's train was on time and we headed off to Sandön. No sign of yesterday's white-wingers but a fantastically obliging grasshopper warbler demanded our immediate attention. See Terry's blog (no doubt) for photos. Highlights here included gadwall (male), 8 little gulls (one adult), grey plover (9), two fishing ospreys and swift (1 & year-tick).

Next stop was Rönnen and a spring wader bonanza. Our Temminck's stint count hit 15 but they were thinly spread out and there may well have been more. We kept getting diverted by the stonking little stints (3) and curlew sandpipers (3 & year-tick). Also here were fluffy lapwing chicks (first of the year), a single whooper swan, ruff (8), wood sandpiper (7) and dunlin (19 - scarce this month so far).

Last stop along this stretch of coast was Farhult. Here it transpired we either just missed or horror-of-horrors overlooked a white-winged tern! We did see knot (1), little ringed plover (pair) and had a brief encounter with a marsh warbler. Despite Terry's early start he was keen-eyed and alert and showed me most of the above birds. This theme continued through the day...

A short drive up the motorway took us to a quiet stretch of the Halland coast. Here we put Terry's dune-birding prowess to the test and he eventually found me my first Swedish tawny pipits. [I was starting to feel like a chauffeur at this point]. Excellent result (the bird not the chauffeur bit) and we were both chuffed. The pair showed really well, allowing us to enjoy the subtle but nevertheless attractive plumage, and the male made an effort and started some desultory singing from a nearby pole. Superb! A few scoters floated offshore and a couple of goosander slept along the beach.

Last stop of the day was the hugely impressive Dömestorp beech wood where we lunched. Here we hunted down a feisty little male firecrest, that eventually gave good views. The site also produced abundant wood warblers, pied flycatchers and a pair of hawfinches. A great day out, thanks to Terry for great company and for proving emphatically to me that I should get some sleep (....but it's MAY!!!...).