A Monday in a harbour #1

Most of Monday was spent in a couple of ports north of Yakumo..............


My target was Long Tailed Duck, this is the only reliable local place to see them in fact. There were only 3 present today, 2 males and a female.

I never seem to get these in good light recently.................in many lighting conditions the males (like many duck species) are tricky to photograph due to the contrast in plumage..............

And like many duck species, the females are never as tricky..............

Offshore there were groups of scoters, both species. Black Scoter often venture close inshore and are regular visitors to ports like the ones we visited on this occasion (although not today) but the Asian race of White Winged Scoter seems to avoid coming inshore, at least in south Hokkaido. They are also much scarcer and I have yet to get an even halfway decent shot of one.

This is pretty much a 100% crop at 700mm of a male White Winged Scoter (the one behind is a Black Scoter).

There is a regular flock of Dunlin at one of the ports but the first time I've seen them this winter. They were very skittish though and flew away before I could get close.

Glaucous and Glaucous Winged Gulls were everywhere, they seemed almost as numerous as the resident Slatybacks...............the 500mm lens is not ideal for group shots of squabbling large birds however............

The sun did come out sometimes and it is nice to see that male Scaup (the commonest duck species in the ports) are not actually black and white at all..............