Seabirding off northeast Taiwan, 20th to 24th March 2025 - Part II

March 21st - Shen'ao Port

An early morning taxi delivered us from Rui Fang to Shen’ao Fishing Port, northeast of Taipei City.

Our boat for the day was a relatively luxurious cruiser for anglers. A tasty seafood congee was provided, and the coffee percolator was kept primed !

The weather was warming up and clear and sunny. This made for good viewing conditions, but there were far fewer birds around than we had seen in the gloom off Fen Niao Lin the previous day.

 This one of several Brown Boobies seen.

Our “Bird of the Day” was a “Stage 2” Short-tailed Albatross (Phoebastria albatrus) that passed quite  close to the boat early on.

For the rest of the day we contented ourselves with trying to photograph the pods of Indo-Pacific Bottlenose Dolphins (Tursiops aduncus) and Pantropical Spotted Dolphins (Stella attenuata) seen surfacing in the calm, blue waters of the west Pacific Ocean. 

Jemi got most of the best shots with the 7D2 and 100-400 zoom.

Most of my photos, however, featured mysterious, distant fins and tail flukes which I lacked the experience to confidently identify.

False Killer Whales (Pseudorca crassidens) - when identifiable - were the pick of the cetaceans seen. 

We enjoyed the scenery of Taiwan's Northeast Coast National Scenic Area, this is the lighthouse at Cape Bitou. 

March 22nd -Shen'ao Port

Another comfortable cruiser, and more bright sunshine.  Flying flocks of what I took to be migrating passerines turned out to be large groups of Taiwanese Racing Pigeons, flying far out to sea.  “What a quaint hobby !” I said to our hosts.  They corrected me politely  “The popularity of Pigeon Racing is due to gambling !”

Great Crested Tern - (Thalasseus bergii)

Peregrines are celebrated for nesting on geologically outstanding cliffs near Shen’ao Harbour, and one evening we all made time to photograph them.

March 24th - Fen Niao Lin

After a very welcome rest day we returned south to Suao and Fen Niao Lin and the “Hoi An No.1” , the boat we had used on the first day.  

Fen Niao Lin Port's resident Brown Booby

In much warmer and finer weather than on the 20th, our hardworking Taiwanese hosts still managed to “chum up” a flurry of Streaked Shearwaters (Calonectris leucomelas) in good light. 

Back at Fen Niao Lin harbour we had a round of “Farewells” and a photo of some of the participants......

Then everybody dispersed. The local photographers and birders headed home, our Taiwanese organisers had some post-chumming cleaning up to do.  

We visitors returned to our accommodation thinking of homeward flights the following day. 

Thanks again to to Hiroyuki and Shoko TANOI for news of the trips, and to everyone else for their good humour and good company.