Shear delight

A long day on a boat today along with 20 other birders, many finer photographers than I......... John Holmes, Martin Hale, Pippen Ho, Hendrix - all top notch HK photographers. It was hot but we managed to find (thanks Mike) Short-tailed shearwater, a tick for me and the subject of my middle three images. Go to the pbase site for better quality. This is not a common bird and I was pleased with the pics though others will have better ones. The White-winged terns are just stunning and the Yellow bitterns unusually open - normally they skulk. So a splendid day on the water with a couple of hours on Po Toi. Great stuff.

It's a fair cop

Over a month without a post. But I have been to Karachi (like Bombay but with more guns), Singapore, London and Po Toi....... so I have a reasonable excuse. Some nice images of moth-heads, macro shots with my 180mm f3.5. Just for Fumie, 2 images of insects in the act of copulation, a rather nice Greater crusted tern (or 'crested' as the pedants would have it) and some beetley things on some flowery stuff. I am not a botanist.

Don't expect much more frequency in the near future. I am off to Singapore again on Monday then in June Mrs. Ha and I are set to invade Italia for a couple of weeks or so. Florence ("time for bed, said Zebedee"), Venice and Rome. Yawn. I shall be all cultured out when we get back. In the meantime, look after the bugs etc. fo me.

Four birds and a smirk for Fumie

Here are 3 shots of a Sandplover, the top one being particularly nice in my humble opinion and an Avocet, which any self-respecting Brit knows as the logo or "Trustmark" of the RSPB. The odd one out is a moth called Ceira longipennis and I thought it would make Fumie say "oo-er missus", or something similar.

As you can tell, work is still prevailing. Could someone end the liquidity crisis please?

Lazy old blogger

I plead guilty to slacking. Mrs. Ha has been unwell for 2 weeks and I have been devoting myself to her even at the expense of Sunday at the 7s. We went to Dubai and she shopped whilst I dropped. Actually she dropped and I shopped after working for 2 days. My encounter with Cathay Pacific was beyond the pale. If you read this Tony Tyler, your Dubai desk is a shambles. Sorry old boy, but it is. I shall be in touch.
And so I escaped to Mai Po and rattled off a few frames but the tide is so fast. Whoosh in, whoosh out. Not good for photography and the camera autofocus was giving me problems. A few good ones though and I shall repeat the exercise tomorrow.

Toodle jolly pip.

Whoops - forgot to give Fumie the names. Black-winged stilt,Koel (a handsome male), a flock of waders and a Marsh sandpiper.

Trials and tribulations

I am in turmoil at the moment because my renewed AFCD / Police permit has been caught in a Kafkaesque bureaucratic circle and I am without. This means I cannot (legally) go to the mudflats in the frontier closed area. Fortunately WWF gave me a temporary one yesterday but this involves considerable hassle and goodwill on their part. Thank you Bena!

At 7.30am yesterday, Mrs H having made me brekkie at 5.30am, I was already in the hide. Not much to see. Two bags of old jumble stuck on posts a long way out. Ah yes! Those would be Ospreys. It is grey, overcast and only the sound of wind and curlews reaches the hide. Off to my right a gaudy Black-capped kingfisher sits on a branch at the edge of the mangroves. Too far away to contemplate a photo.

Out of the mist 3 Grey herons emerge. Large, flappy pterodactyls with not a lot to do and in no hurry to do it. A Swallow skips past the hide, chipping away quietly. The hide begins to fill up. Lots of (very good) local bird photographers. They have their breakfast rather too noisily for my liking but the birds are still distant. No harm done. The sunshine is squeezing though the clouds. It is a tight fit but a Little egret gets a luke warm dousing of golden light. An Eastern marsh harrier quarters across the mudflats. Distant ducks panic. Wigeon and Shoveler mostly. At 8.06 the gulls are within view and at 8.10 they start to stream in. The action starts.......

Gulls, gulls, gulls and a Greenshank

Astute readers will recognize this as a Black-headed gull, common in Blighty as it is here. The wader is a Common greenshank. Oh, and I got a distant view of the Slender-billed gull, thanks to Geoff Carey. HK tick. :-)

More from Mai Po

Little ringed plover, Koel (Mrs.), 2 shots of a curlew.....