Subject: [Tweeters] Russian Far East/ROK birding--typhoons and storms
Date: Oct 5 15:21:39 2012
From: Scott Atkinson - scottratkinson at hotmail.com






Tweeters: Well I missed the heart of the fall flight here but thought some out there in Tweeterland might be interested in an unusual birding experience I just had. The typhoon and its rainfall had the Russian Far East flooded out (on both Sakhalin I. and in Vlad). The weather was very stormymuch of the Sept 14-21 week, but very low pressure andheavy rain were also apparent in parts of the PrimorskiiKrai during the Sept 29-30 weekend. And there was morerough weather in between. The result of all of this was the best birding I've ever seen there in 31 trips to date (plusadditional at-sea time in the Russian Bering Sea). Really, in view of over 150 species and more notably the rarities, this might have been the most exciting three weeks of birding I've ever had. And yet this was a business trip, with the weekends and a few eves/mornings to dash out after birds. But even those plans were disrupted several times by late starts, mishaps and access issues. On September 22, I hiked up to Chekhov Peak (3458' above sea level, due east of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, the main city on s. Sakhalin I.) in hopes of JAPANESE ACCENTOR which nests here and nearby, and nowhere else in Russia. I failed to detect it, but the storm deposited a stunning 6 ORIENTAL HONEY BUZZARDS (listed as a vagrant by Nechaevin 1991) and an island-first N. WHEATEAR at the rocky ledges at the summit. Then, just a ways down, a WHITE-BELLIED GREEN PIGEON was very far out of place (although they have been seen a number of times on s. Sakhalin and are suspected breeders), and quite late. A few DUSKY WARBLERSand WINTER WRENS (this the dark-chocolate brown fumigatus) were hanging in there with other more typicalspecies. On September 23, at Aniva (s. end of island, midway between the tail fins of the "tail" that forms the south end of Sakhalin Island), there was a once-in-a-lifetime fallout of migrants.Among a horde of COMMON SNIPE at the flooded marshjust above the high-tide mark, both single PIN-TAILEDand SOLITARY SNIPES were flushed--the latter a bit early. Shockingly, as I worked my way through these,I flushed from 20 feet a SLENDER-BILLED CURLEW (Numenius tenuirostris), a species recently considered either extinct or close to it--yet two specimens exist for Japan, although that was in the first half of the 20th century. I tried hard to turn this into a LITTLE CURLEW (which although rare is more expected and which Ihave seen previously) or a WHIMBREL (a semi-tame individual was nearby), but no go. But the Aniva fallout wasn't restricted to shorebirds. JAPANESE SPARROWHAWK and EASTERN MARSH HARRIER singles drifted south over town; both are rare per Nechaev.An impressive flight of wagtails included 6 GREEN-HEADED WAGTAILS (broken out as a separate species by the Russians on the basis of several factors, including very fewcrosses with adjacent Yellow Wagtail populations), and several more Yellow Wagtail, sp. Here there was also a notable movement of SKYLARKS (including one of the JAPANESE SKYLARK, another breakout by Nechaev) and three pipit species, including a RICHARD'S (rare on the island), plus the expected Red-throateds and Buff-bellieds, no Pechora on this day, though. The movement in the woods was not less thrilling. In onepasserine flock at the edge of town, I was enjoying closeup views of an ARCTIC and several PALLAS' WILLOW-WARBLERS when a bold black-white-gray passerinejumped into the open--EURASIAN PIED FLYCATCHER,another island first!!! This is a common bird around Moscow, nesting as far east as Lake Baikal, but hardly what you'd expect on Sakhalin, although fall vagrants have reached Japan and other e. Asian countries. This was the star of what ended up as a SEVEN-FLYCATCHER DAY (MUGAMAKI, NARCISSUS, ASIAN BROWN, TAIGA (1), GRAY-SPOTTED (1) and a shocking 16 DARK-SIDED FLYCATCHERS, most of these seen at a single Red Elderberry (!) just north of Aniva at Usplenskoye, right off the main highway). And yet this was just the first weekend, on Sakhalin Island... Scott AtkinsonLake Stevensmail to: scottratkinson at hotmail.com