Around midday on the first day, while checking the pastures at Minamihazama, I spotted a bird that looked like a Pale Thrush or maybe a Dusky Thrush. When I put the binoculars on it — a Black-throated Thrush? As I was trying to get a better look, a light truck came by and flushed it. Thrushes tend to return to the same feeding spot even after being flushed, so I waited about 20 minutes and it appeared again. Looking again through the binoculars, it was a male Red-throated Thrush in first-winter plumage. Just as I was about to shoot, a Common Kestrel flushed it again — but sure enough, while I was eating my lunch in the car it came back. ^^

It stood up on a perch and showed me its back as well.

A Red-throated Thrush that had caught what looked like a looper caterpillar.

The Red-throated Thrush that flushed twice but came back.

A Dusky Thrush also appeared. First record of the season.

The 40th species on my Iriomote birding list was a Chinese Pond Heron.

A Crested Serpent Eagle near the Funamida campsite.

The Common Kestrel that flushed the Red-throated Thrush. ^^;

I also encountered Ospreys — quite a few individuals.

Ida Beach at Funauki, an island enclave accessible only by sea.

The surface of the water was as calm as a mirror. From Urauchi Bridge.

The mangrove zone spreading out at the mouth of the Urauchi River.

A beam was shooting out from the meridian monument, and there was a Ryukyu Scops Owl catching moths attracted to the light.