Saturday 26 May 2007

No.... another birdless day






Each of these was taken today at The Lions Nature Education Centre, Sai Kung. The Lantern Bug has bugged me (pardon the pun) for some time. Everybody photographs them and I hadn't found one. Today an elderly gentleman showed me 2 on a Longan tree. Thank you sir.

The centre has several dragonfly ponds and they were active enough today. More odonata to follow. Now if only I had seen the goat-eating python (Monty to its friends) of Sai Kung my day would have been complete.

Friday 25 May 2007

New toy day

I have bought a new toy, the new canon 1D mkIII. Here are some images shot with it. Top to bottom:

Black-winged stilt
BWS chick (ahhhh!)
Blue magpie
Little egret




Sunday 20 May 2007

Otterly wonderful

No pictures today but I wanted to report on 3 books I have read over the last 12 months.

A while ago now I caught the tail end of a TV programme called The River, filmed by Charlie Hamilton-James. I discovered that his wife, Philippa Forrester had written a book on the making of the film. PF describes her book as "A Love Story, a New Life in the Country, and One Idyllic Year Filming Otters". That's about right and it is an enjoyable read but not a classic.

What it did do however was to inspire me to read, for the first time, Tarka the Otter. Now I guess most English people learn about Tarka at some stage in their school years but most, like me, never read the book. Pleased do so. It is just wonderful prose. It is one of the most graphic stories I have ever read. You can smell, feel, almost touch the characters and sites. It is a joy to absorb Williamson's writing. It lifts you up and makes you yearn to be out, looking for otters. The story follows Tarka from birth to death with all its ups and downs. If you have any feel at all for natural history and wildlife this is guaranteed to ignite the flame and get you into the field.

From Tarka it was a short step to Ring of Bright Water by Gavin Maxwell. There is alo a film available on DVD, starring the lovely Virginia McKenna and Bill Travers. This is autobiographical and tells the story of how Maxwell took a remote Scottish croft and settled there with first 'Mij' and later 'Edal', both wonderful otters of a character that is both captivating and enchanting. It is hard not to feel that everyone should have an otter at home. Better than cats or dogs, infinitely preferable to mice, birds or reptiles, bunnies or tortoises, otters can be taken for a walk if so inclined but essentially are free living spirits that love to roam, swim and chatter. I'm not sure how many homes have the facilities necessary to allow an otter its daily swim. Nor how many could provide a supply of live eels, an otters favorite diet it seems.

Apart from the horror of Mij's demise - how can man be so cruel - there is nothing here but sheer fun and magic. It is not too anthropomorphic, thank goodness, and Maxwell is alert to the danger of becoming so. I learned too that Maxwell had travelled with Wilfred Thesiger, a man, who has always interested me. And this is how my reading develops. I'm sure that after finishing parts 2 and 3 of Maxwell's trilogy I will re-read some of Thesiger's work. WT is a man I'm sure would have been great to have round the dinner table for his conversation.

Williamson, Maxwell and Thesiger have all shuffled off this mortal coil but young Hamilton-James and Ms Forrester are still with us. Although I love reading and take my own photo or two I am also a sucker for great natural history films and some of the output today is stunningly good. So if anybody knows how I can get a copy of the programme, The River, please let me know. I've read the book, its time to see the film.

Tuesday 15 May 2007

In celebration of Moth-er's Day

No time for birding recently. However the moth season is in full swing. Coming back to the warmer climes of Hong Kong gave me a different cycle to mothing. I started moth-ing in the UK some 4 years ago when the birding was quiet. Broadly speaking this is after Spring migration and before Autumn migration. The other distraction is dragonflies (odonata). In Britain, few moths fly when the temperature is below 10 degrees Celsius and to get a significant flight you need temperatures up in the higher teens and a balmy, dry evening. Strong winds and moths do not generally mix well although sometimes they can blow in vagrants from the South.

In Hong Kong the flight periods tend to stretch a little longer but activity starts more around 20-25 degrees Celsius. High humidity is good, calm evenings also good but light rain doesn’t seem to dampen the moth spirits too much.

The variety here is excellent and the chances of finding a ‘first for HK’ are measurably higher than they are of finding a ‘first for Britain’. There are few people actively recording moths and keeping records. Even my own humble efforts have produced a few. How about this little chap, Naganoella timandra. Never recorded in HK until I found it.




Currently there is no field guide to identify moths in Hong Kong. There are some websites and a guide is in prep but as with all natural history books it seems to have the gestation period of an overdue elephant. As it is primarily a one man labour of love this is understandable if frustrating at times. I have seen the ‘work in progress’ and it will be a truly remarkable achievement when finished, of incredibly high quality. Indeed, even Britain has only 2 reasonably recent quality fieldguides, Skinner (with the moths pinned in traditional fashion) and Waring (in natural resting positions). This is not a hobby or science that is producing work in the league of birding, where maybe 5 or 6 new books come out each month. Perhaps one book every 5 or 6 years might be a reliable guideline.

The Moths of Borneo was until recently the only reference text for this region. There is now a series of books on Thai moths and Thailand also has the wonderful John Moore website, where you can see the splendid “Happy Cow” moth. I believe this is not its scientific name.

To start yourself off on moths may I suggest the following. Switch the outside light on at night. wait. If conditions are suitable moths will arrive. Photograph 1 or 2 of the nice ones and post them on the Yahoo HK Moths website for us to ID. That is it. Who knows, you may have a first for Hong Kong.

Sunday 13 May 2007

The 7mm beauty



This is a micro moth. Wingspan 12mm, tip of the palps to end of the folded forewing 7mm. It is beautiful. More proof that moths are gorgeous and they don't have to be big to be beautiful. The loss of scales on top does not harm the moth. It is collision damage when they come to light. My moths are allowed to fly free after being photographed.

Saturday 12 May 2007

Kite flying




These 2 pictures were taken a home today. They were very much 2nd best. Earlier in the day my wife and I were in the lower part of the road when I saw a Crested goshawk right above our house. I was stranded with no camera and missed the closest flyover by a CG that I have seen in 2+ years. During the afternoon I took these as the Black-eared kites swooped past but the light was harsh and the heat oppressive. This is the same bird - note the 2 damaged inner primary feathers.

Below is a damselfly, Neurobasis chinensis chinensis. This gorgeous green-winged gem flies along the stream at Ho Chung and I took this when my wife and I took the dog for a walk last Sunday.

Friday 4 May 2007

A grand day out

I went to Mai Po Nature Reserve this morning. It rained. I was trapped in Hide number 1. There are worse places to be trapped. It was dry, comfortable, warm and I had drinking water with me. In extremis I could have drunk the rain. After an hour or so I realised that the birds were behaving differently, depending on the species. The Little egrets were hunkering down. Their Daz white plumage (would you swap missus?) quite, well, dazzling. Some showed the feathery plumes of breeding plumage, others were simply sleek and elegant. But when you are wet and miserable there is an inevitable air of resignation about you. The egrets looked resigned to their drenching.

The avocets however did not miss a beat. Their long, upswept bills swished from side to side. They swish and squabble all the time. They are, I'm told, called "kluuts" by some, after their noise. I learned this from Simon Barnes' evocative book, "Flying in the face of Nature", possibly my favourite book bar none. I'm not convinced by the transliteration but that does not stop me marvelling at them each time I see them. A flock of Avocets in flight is something to make the heart race, to lift the spirits and feed the soul. Rain? They did not seem to notice it at all.

A bigger swish was made by the large spatulate bill of the appropriately named spoonbill. At Mai Po the star attraction is the Black-faced spoonbill. A tall, always stately bird, given to standing on one leg with the other crossed across it. If rarity were their only attraction it would be a shame because these are fine birds and they also seemed unflustered by the rain. Indeed the solitary bird in front of Hide 1 paraded, for that is what it did, up and down the water channels without a break. A worthy talisman for the reserve.

A Chinese pond heron in breeding plumage is a rather nifty bird, a dandy, clad in long red socks, a claret shirt, black and white shorts, sporting a multi-coloured hooter and a sort of mullet haircut. Shades of West Ham United in the 70s perhaps? Today "my" bird was on edge. Skulking around, in and out of the reeds, dashing for cover at the drop of a hat. Although I don't recall dropping a hat. Did he know it was raining? Possibly. More important it seemed to keep busy and feed on. Occasional forays into the bushes were brief. A short game of a peek-a-boo followed as the neck stretched up and then recoiled. Then splosh, it dropped back into the water and padded on.



The "West Ham" pond heron

A moorhen swam out, diamonds covering its back, sliding into the water only to be replaced by more as the rain pitter-pattered on. This bejewelled bird kept to a tightly drawn area and never ventured far afield. Similarly the snipe. I saw it drop in. Then nothing. Sheltering perhaps? Maybe because when the rain eased it crept silently along the fringe of the grassy area, low and half hidden, noticeable at times for its splendid cream bracers, yet totally focused on feeding. Bob and probe, bob and probe.

Away to my right I suddenly spotted a Great egret in apparent discomfort. My binoculars showed me a large problematic lump in its throat. This egret had bitten off more than it could chew. Never mind the rain, it was desperately throwing back its head, trying to shift the trapped fish or mudskipper. I had this momentary vision of another egret coming over, giving it a hefty slap on the back to help the process. Silly me. Eventually the bulge disappeared down the snake-like neck and into the stomach. And the egret moved on to the next dish.

All around the ponds were distant dots, crowds of huddled waders. I had no telescope with me but some I could recognize. The big, lumpy curlews, the stilts, hundreds of Red-necked stints, sand plovers, godwits, greenshank (surely a Nordmann's in there somewhere?), Spotted redshanks and my favourites, the Curlew sandpipers.

After 2 hours the rain eases and instantly the prinias are active again. Rattling their call out. A White-breasted waterhen shuffles quickly across the grass, and then another. The light lifts and in the distance I can hear a pole being driven into the ground. The workers are out again from their shelter. A passage of Barn swallows shoots past the hide and the Indian cuckoo picks up its calling once more. 4 notes, over and over again. Scarce a break (except when rain stops play). A Long-tailed shrike sits up on its perch again, surveying the ground for a meal. Smart birds the shrikes. But I have to go. I can escape my trap and wander on, looking for the next magic moment.



Little egret

An "etcetera"


Especially for DG who is missing............... Hong Kong