Quiet summer days #2

A young Night Heron near my flat this afternoon. Lots of young birds about recently. Most of them hide in the lush vegetation though. This Night Heron posed quite nicely before it disappeared into the undergrowth beside the river. This was taken with the 70-300 lens. I haven't been able to photograph the local Night Herons with the 100-400 lens yet.

Maybe there is a pair breeding on the river. There are always young birds around but I presumed they bred out of town and dispersed.......

I remember the first one of this species I ever saw. An adult at Redscar (near Preston) in May 1987. I ditched my 'A' level revision to go and see it. They are common summer visitors to south Hokkaido and indeed are the bird that persuaded me to buy a DSLR.










There have been several young Grey Wagtails around too. They definitely only breed upstream. Most noticeable summer breeders are the Red Cheeked starlings. Family groups of them were everywhere this afternoon.





Nothing interesting happening recently. I've just started the latest Iain M Banks sci-fi novel. I gave up any literary pretensions a long time ago and am now a sucker for this kind of stuff.

The Euro 2008 final is tonight, I can't be bothered getting ( or staying) up to watch it. I see Liverpool are signing more foreigners I've never heard of. I hope the 2008/9 season is better than last season for both Liverpool and England. If it's any worse I'll give up on football I think.

Cricket? England must be the crappest one day side ever.

I'm 40 in a few months. Perhaps I should just stop worrying about football so much. I should turn my atention to pondering the meaning of life as I enter the last 50% or so of my own, my own personal poverty and indeed world poverty in general, prostate problems and IBS or other equally important things.

Quiet summer days begin.........

It was the summer solstice yesterday. Sunset is around 7pm here. No daylight saving in Japan plus it's right at the edge of a timezone means no long summer evenings here (although the sun comes up very early. Too early actually). Around this time of year the birding also dries up quite dramatically for 7 or 8 weeks. Nothing arriving or leaving. No wanderers reacting to cold spells elsewhere in the East. Just the residents and summer visitors busily finding food for hungry mouths.

The Red Cheeked Starlings were feeding young a couple of days ago. These shots were with the 70-300 lens. This female seemed to have picked up a cherry from somewhere.







On this exact date last year I got some better shots of this species.

Not much else around town. Today we stopped by at Ono, the Night Herons were still around (as were most of the other species from last week) but nothing was posing for the camera. The most noteworthy thing was the smell of strawberries wafting over the rice fields (lots of strawberries are grown around here).

Earlier in the day we were at Kikonai. The Little Ringed Plovers posed nicely at least.........







Lots of common stuff in evidence here too. More interesting birds included White Rumped Swift and Little Cuckoo. The inevitable Ospreys flashed past and i still haven't got a good shot of this species yet.




The missus will be working most of the next 8 weeks so no wheels most of the time. I'll have to find something interesting to do next month........

My prize for that photo comp? An electric polisher. Value about $15-20.

Hi chicks

Summer well and truly here. Nests everywhere. The Great Spotted Woodpecker was at Onuma and the Swallows were up near Niseko.

The Woodpecker was apparently the last of the brood and has seemingly been abandoned by its' parents. Not to worry though.





The female Red Cheeked Starling was still feeding it. Bizarre behaviour. Cross-species fostering. the photos were from a couple of days ago. The last chick looked likely to leave the nest pretty soon (and I guess has probably done so).



The Lotus flowers were out at Onuma and there were a few Moorhens walking across the lilies. No Moorehen chicks yet, strange to think that 12 weeks ago in the UK they had already hatched.........



Today we drove up to Niseko. The coast was fogbound, we stopped at Yakumo (3 Great White Egret, 1 Little Egret and all the common stuff). By the time we got to Niseko it was a beautiful warm summer day.





At the various road stations the Swallows and Asian House Martins were nesting. Difficult to take pics as of course they were nesting under dark ceilings. Very slow shutter speeds with a big slow lens like mine......









Thanks to Julian for lunch (he can bake fantastic bread). We visited him in Hirafu Village in boomtown Niseko. God that place is changing fast. And to think I complain about too much construction here in Hakodate......

Lots of Oriental Honey Buzzard today, here's a crappy record shot.......



Nice sunset on the way home.........



I watched the second half of Italy v France this morning. Sorry my Gallic friends but France are as bad as England. No, worse. Your coach is even better comic relief than second choice Steve with his brolly.

Summer in the Ricefields

Nice summer weather this week (and a big earthquake yesterday too, not serious up here but it lasted a long time). There's not much in the way of new birds to see from mid June to mid August, the summer breeders are all busy singing and feeding their young. Siberian Stonechats and Black Browed Reed Warblers are my 2 favourites, so lots of pics of these.

Last Wednesday we went up to Yakumo. Lots of common stuff here. Here's some of a diving Osprey. A bit far offshore and I lost track of it as it dived. The mountain in the background of the first shot is Mt Yotei up in Niseko.







Here's another view of Yotei from a bit further south.



Black Browed Reed Warblers were very common here too.





There were also a few Grays Grasshopper Warblers singing in the bushes but they were impossible to see. Other stuff included Sand Martin, Japanese Thrush, Common Cuckoo, lots of Grey Heron and several Reed Buntings. Yellow Breasted Bunting was apparently here a few days before but I couldn't find it.

This Great White Egret was the most noteworthy other species.



This afternoon we were driving around the ricefields in Ono. We were looking for the Oriental Pratincole from last week but the only waders around were Little Ringed Plover. Lots of Stonechat though.....









Here are some views of Mt Komagadake from various locations all over the Oshima area......



We stopped off at Onuma to try for the Ruddy Kingfishers again but we only had a very brief view before they disappeared off into the forest.....







Last Autumn I saw loads and loads of Night Herons in and around Hakodate. Now I think I've found where they nest in the summer. I've seen a few adult birds around Ono, standing around in the ricefields.





Nervous things, they fly off as soon as you even look at them out of an open car window.......

Here are some more of the common birds around the last week. Chestnut Eared Bunting, Japanese Skylark, Black Faced Bunting and Black Kite.









Not much going on near my flat. Bullheaded Shrikes, Red Cheeked Starlings and Asian House Martin are all breeding (and they'll be the only birds to photograph in July probably). Here's one of the big hairy caterpillars that are everywhere this time of year.....



So Euro 2008 has produced some pretty good games by all accounts. I tried to watch some of the juicier early evening games last week (Germany v Croatia, Portugal v Czech Republic) but they weren't on regular TV here. I guess now would be the time England would have been making their excuses for a dire opening round. It's painful England aren't there but it would have been just as painful if they had been......if that makes sense.

I entered a photo contest in March. It was run by Kitamura Camera. I only won a tiny prize (not even cash, I have to go and pick up my 'present' next weekend) but this pic of a Long Tailed Tit I took in January will be in a national photographic magazine in July. Woohoo!



Wonder what I'll get as my prize? A cloth to clean my lens perhaps? A memory card maybe? The tension is killing me.......