Late April - grey days mean good birding

Friday, 21st April 2017 

I cycled out for a couple of hours in the boardwalk hides at Mai Po.  The tides were pretty low, but I wanted to see whether there were many birds on the moss in front of the outermost hides.

The answer, obviously, is "Yes" - but the birds were distant.  The first three comprise the pick of the bunch...

Citrine Wagtail - Motacilla citreola

Little Stint - Calidris minuta

Little Stint - Calidris minuta (right) - with Red-necked

Chinese Egret - Egretta eulophotes

Fifty-or-more Black faced Spoonbills still around...

Black-faced Spoonbill - Platalea minor

Kentish Plover (f) - Charadrius alexandrinus

Red-necked Stint - Calidris ruficollis

Terek Sandpiper - Xenus cinereus

Saturday 22nd April 2017

A nice grey day for a trip to Po Toi Island

Po Toi is a flycatcher magnet....

Blue-and-white Flycatcher - Cyanoptila cyanomelana

Grey-streaked Flycatcher - Muscicapa griseisticta

Comparing pretty well with April 13th on Po Toi, which was also a "two flycatcher" day.....

Ferruginous Flycatcher - Muscicapa ferruginea

Asian Brown Flycatcher - Muscicapa dauurica

Back at Aberdeen Promenade, a migrant Blue Rock Thrush greeted us from one of the parked (Sorry "moored") boats.

Blue Rock Thrush - Monticola solitarius

23rd April 2017

Back in the New Territories, a bash around San Tin Fishponds turned up a very nice male Yellow-breasted Bunting.  They have been upgraded to Endangered and are difficult to find these days...well, I find them difficult, anyway.

Yellow-breasted Bunting - Emberiza aureola

Yellow-breasted Bunting - Emberiza aureola

And, - always a morale raiser on a grey day - a group of exactly TEN Blue-tailed Bee-eaters nearby.

Blue-tailed Bee-eater - Merops philippinus

Blue-tailed Bee-eater - Merops philippinus

April - the month when anything might turn up.