29 May 2016

Crap pictures but interesting birds.............



The warm weather in the last week brought a couple of interesting birds with it...............


This Striated Heron was west of town and I watched it for about half an hour as it caught lots of tiddlers in the shallows. I tried both teleconverters but the pics from the 2X were lousy and those from the 1.4X (ie all of them in this post) were only slightly better.

It is a pretty small heron but look at that extending neck...............







I was a bit disappointed with the shots but this is not a bird I see very often up here in Hokkaido (this was only my 4th in the last 10 years) so at least I got something.

Here's a short video I made of it (with the 2X on).



Whilst we were inland in the mountains I noticed a strange bird perched on the wires beside the road. It flew off into the forest but not before I fired off a record shot.


A bit of a local rarity this one.  A Dollarbird (or Broad Billed Roller), presumably wafted up to Hokkaido by the recent warm southerly winds, a lifer and the 4th addition to my Japanese list in 2016.

Not much else around. a summer plumage Great Crested Grebe at Kikonai, the usual summer stuff including lots of Ospreys everywhere..........



10 comments:

  1. Congratulations on the "lifer" Stu that's always a thrill. Don't be too critical of the pic's you can't win em all.

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  2. Wow! A Dollarbird reminds me of home. Never thought of one being in Hokkaido. Great find. Your heron shots are pretty good.

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  3. Despite your photographic tribulations a pretty good post if you ask me.

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  4. Hello Stuart!:) Ha ha!! You are so hard on yourself! These are fabulous pictures and I enjoyed every one of them. Congrats on the lifer bird.

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  5. Congrats on the lifer and local rarity, Dollarbird - one or two stragglers still down here this week.

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  6. I was surprised to see you get Striated Heron. I saw them in Egypt, a good few miles away.

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