西表島探鳥でノドアカツグミなど
2泊3日で西表島へ探鳥、イリオモテヤマネコ探しに行ってきました。
残念ながらイリオモテヤマネコは見つかりませんでしたが、ノドアカツグミをはじめ、45種の野鳥が観察できました。^^
カンムリワシは15個体ほど観察できました。石垣島よりも多い印象です。アオバズクも石垣島よりも多く観察できました。西表島のアオバズクは石垣島よりも警戒心があまりありません。かなり近くまで寄れました。コノハズクは石垣島の方が多い印象です。また、オオコノハズクと昨年も同じころ現れたシロガシラトビも狙っていたのですが、見つけられませんでした。^^;
西表野生生物保護センター の「 西表島クイズラリー 」も挑戦したのですが、クイズの設置場所すら分からないところがある難しさ…。とりあえず20問中の半分を解いて1問間違いでした。来月あたり、再チャレンジで西表島に渡ります!!
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.