A daily record.
Featuring photos of wild birds and nature, mainly from Okinawa Main Island and Ishigaki Island

The Garganey at Sankaku Pond was still there.

There were two male Garganey at Sankaku Pond.

A two-shot of the Garganey.

Male Brown Shrike.

It's a Brown Shrike I haven't seen around before, so perhaps it's one of the northbound birds passing through.

Common Greenshank numbers are increasing too.

There were around 50 Black-winged Stilts.

Long-toed Stint numbers will be picking up from here as well.

I thought two Kentish Plovers were chasing each other around, but then the male started displaying — holding out one wing toward the female. Courtship, no doubt.

The male (right) displays to the female by showing his wings and raising his tail feathers.

The female lowered her posture. A sign that mating is imminent.

The male flew onto the female's back. Copulation.

Bird copulation is usually brief, but this pair mated for about a minute and a half.

A male (left) and female Kentish Plover immediately after mating.

Kentish Plovers and Little Terns used to breed here, and around this time last year Little Whimbrel and Greater Sand Plover also turned up. Greater Sand Plover, Lesser Sand Plover, and Pacific Golden Plover were among the other species using the area as a stopover on migration — but development now appears to be getting under way.

A few Kentish Plovers had taken refuge in a rental-car parking lot.

As construction intensified and heavy machinery, vehicles, and people multiplied, the Kentish Plovers disappeared.

They were glancing up at the sky from time to time. Perhaps a raptor was flying over.

A Collared Kingfisher coming through the one gap in the mangroves where the view opens up. It was glowing in the sunlight.

A Collared Kingfisher driven off by a pair of Light-vented Bulbuls.

This is what it looks like from near the observation platform on the boardwalk. A bit distant.

If you walk back a short way from the observation platform toward the center, you can shoot at close range in good light. And because you're shooting through a gap in the mangroves, the Collared Kingfisher doesn't seem to mind.

Grey-faced Buzzards are now down to just a few. Those still lingering are all young birds with no stake in breeding.

Pale Thrushes are still around in good numbers, but they too will soon be gone as breeding season approaches.

With the cold snap returning and the daytime high only 18°C, even the Blue Rock Thrush looks chilly.

A single Tufted Duck left alone on the pond.

The right wing appears to be broken and it cannot fly. I suppose it will spend the rest of its life on this pond.

A Tufted Duck eating koi pellets thrown in by visitors.

A Sharp-tailed Sandpiper finally arrived. It stayed at Sankakuike for a few minutes before flying off somewhere. Good timing on my part.

The Oriental Pratincoles have finally started to increase in numbers.

The Oriental Pratincoles have changed into breeding plumage.

Once they crouch down in the red soil, they are quite hard to spot.

The Kentish Plover was incubating.

An Osprey comes over Sankakuike, but the other birds show no concern.

Greenshanks surrounding a Common Redshank in the middle.

The Black-winged Stilts at Sankakuike keep increasing in number.

An adult female Barred Buttonquail. The expression is distinctively Barred Buttonquail.

The Barred Buttonquail was fairly close, but watching from inside the car, it kept coming nearer and nearer.

The intricate pattern is beautiful.

Four Sharp-tailed Sandpipers were in a rice paddy where transplanting had just finished.

Adult Sharp-tailed Sandpiper in breeding plumage.

The Sharp-tailed Sandpiper looked worn out.

Adult Grey Plover in non-breeding plumage.

Adult Pacific Golden Plover. In transition from non-breeding to breeding plumage.

Adult White-breasted Waterhen.

Perhaps because it was the breeding season, the behaviour was bold — it appeared in open spots and came towards me.

Many individuals in the flock of Eastern Cattle Egrets had also changed into breeding plumage.

In the field it looked like a Swinhoe's Snipe, but looking at the photos, it's a Common Snipe.

I'm confident this one is a Swinhoe's Snipe!!

Also a Swinhoe's Snipe.

This one is a Common Snipe with a bald head.

It was near the individual above. Also a Common Snipe.

A male Zitting Cisticola busy building a nest.

This is the entrance to the nest.

Once inside the nest, the Zitting Cisticola sometimes stayed in for as long as eight minutes.

A male Ryukyu Scops Owl. This is the individual that was calling.

Another Ryukyu Scops Owl was peering out from a tree hollow nearby. This one appears to be a female. Nesting seems almost certain.

It flew off once, but the fact that it came back after a while suggests this is a favourite hunting ground.

The individual believed to be the female remained half leaning out of the tree hollow.

When I found it by following its call, the encounter was so sudden that we were both left with a look like this on our faces… ^^;

A male Isabelline Shrike on a field sprinkler.

It plucked the wings and legs off a grasshopper it had caught and ate only the body.

Little Terns along the coast. The offshore flock was too far away to photograph with a 400 mm lens.

A resting Okinawa Rail. A pair was perched in a Ryukyu pine.

A Ryukyu Scops Owl photographed for the first time in four years. Whether it is the same individual I cannot say, but it was spotted at the same feeding ground.

A male Ryukyu Scops Owl calling repeatedly. Male calls have been increasing, but I have yet to hear a female.

Also a pair of Okinawa Rails. It was early, so they still seemed to be in a light sleep.

This Okinawa Rail was found late in the evening. Sound asleep.

The Ryukyu long-furred rat was a first for me to photograph. They tend to be in dense cover, so getting a shot is not easy.

A Bar-tailed Godwit at Komen, almost fully transitioned from winter to summer plumage. It was gone the next day.

A Bar-tailed Godwit whose striped breast pattern looks sharp and summery.

Oriental Pratincoles arrived in the fields.

The Bar-tailed Godwit at Sankakuike was being harassed by Black-winged Stilts.

Bar-tailed Godwit, juvenile to first-summer plumage.

The Common Moorhen is incubating.

A few Long-toed Stints are staying in the area.

A male Japanese Paradise Flycatcher that flew out close by while chasing a Styan's Bulbul.

It was catching small insects in the undergrowth, but occasionally came out into the open for me.

Got a clean shot from head to tail tip. ^^

Now and then it flew to spots where there seemed to be no prey insects, showing what looked like behaviour of scouting out a nest site.

This male Japanese Paradise Flycatcher seemed to favour this tree as a feeding spot and stayed for about an hour and a half. A short-tailed male was also in the same area, but that one wouldn't let me photograph it.

He moved to another tree to court the female, but she didn't appear to be interested and flew off almost immediately. Her calls are coming from the thicket behind him, so she doesn't seem to dislike him entirely.

A male, but looking back over his shoulder like a beauty.

Males seemed to be overwhelmingly more numerous — I wonder if the females migrate later.

A Brown-eared Bulbul was also building a nest.