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

A Caspian Plover confirmed at the same location for two consecutive years.

The webbing on the inner toes is visible.

Seeing multiple White-faced Plovers gathered in a group is also a rare treat.

Little Ringed Plovers can be seen commonly in Okinawa and the Yaeyama Islands as well.

A large flock of Eurasian Tree Sparrows had many Russet Sparrows mixed in among them.

An Oriental Greenfinch was in the same rice paddy as the large sparrow flock. It doesn't seem to be joining the sparrow flock.

Grey-headed Lapwings seemed to be everywhere. Also a rare bird in Okinawa.

The Lesser Whitethroat moved through the bushes catching small insects. It apparently eats berries too, but the whole time I was watching, it was eating small insects only.

Continuing from the photo above — after finishing the first insect, it caught another of the same species sitting on the same branch.

Small bird, but I understand the Lesser Whitethroat breeds in temperate Europe and western and central Asia, then migrates as far as the Sahara, Arabia, and Africa to winter.

Head-on, it looks like it's wearing a bandit mask. ^^

It was often around wild roses, and I thought it might be eating the red berries, but apparently not.

On this individual, the white eye-ring and supercilium are also striking.

I've picked shots where it came out into the open, but essentially it was moving through scrub like this the whole time.

Smew, adult male.

Smew, female (right) and male.

Six Smew at the far end of the pond. The bird in the middle might be a first-winter male.

A flock of Mallards, swimming around the pond while feeding.

Great Crested Grebe, adult winter plumage.

A Black-faced Bunting that didn't flinch whether people or dogs walked past.

Twenty-seven Tundra Swans. Near the centre there is one wearing a white leg ring and another with what looks like a data logger around its neck.

A Black Stork in the distance.

A family of White-naped Cranes.

They were foraging in grassland and at a compost dump.

Nine Eurasian Spoonbills and one Black-faced Spoonbill were feeding in a drainage channel.

The single Black-faced Spoonbill mixed in among a group of Eurasian Spoonbills.

Red-footed Falcon, juvenile.

When two Red-footed Falcons flew around, the small birds scattered in all directions.

Hen Harrier, female. There was a male too, but I couldn't get a photo.

Rooks — a large flock of several dozen had come down into the rice fields.

There were plenty of Meadow Buntings, but Reed Buntings were on the sparse side.

The Eurasian Skylark has a different feel from the skylarks rarely recorded in Okinawa.

There were Buff-bellied Pipits in large numbers. I looked for any unusual pipit among them but found none.

Dusky Thrushes were everywhere too.

Four Common Snipe, apparently probing for insects in a compost heap.

Northern Lapwings too — more than I could count.

The Ariake Sea on the way to Isahaya. All Tufted Ducks.

So it turns out you can see Eurasian Magpies in Fukuoka without going all the way to Saga.

A Naumann's Thrush accustomed to people. Park birds tend to be relatively unwary, but the birds in this particular park were especially tame.

Same individual as above.

In the cold, an Oriental Greenfinch was bathing.

Male Verditer Flycatcher perched in garden plantings at a field.

Facing the other way.

In flight, the silhouette of the Verditer Flycatcher looked like a Dark-sided Flycatcher.

It was perching on a dead branch near the ground and catching insects.

The Verditer Flycatcher's favourite perch.

A rare front-on view of a Verditer Flycatcher.

A Japanese White-eye eating Euonymus berries. The Verditer Flycatcher had been eating the same berries.

A Eurasian Hoopoe in wintering mode.

Activity was low with light rain falling, but it came out into the open.

The Hoopoe, which dislikes rain, was sheltering under the base of a cycad and similar spots.

A Brown-headed Thrush showing little wariness.

A White's Thrush that caught an earthworm. It didn't treat us to the tiger dance.

This White's Thrush would walk a short distance and catch an earthworm. It was getting to its prey considerably more efficiently than the other thrushes, Brown-headed Thrushes, and Pale Thrushes.

Brown-headed Thrush, first-winter. For a moment it also looked like an Eyebrowed Thrush, but this is Ishigaki Island, so I went with Brown-headed Thrush — a process-of-elimination ID. ^^;

The lowest in the pecking order on this lawn was a Pale Thrush, first-winter. It was being chased around by the Brown-headed Thrushes and Dusky Thrushes.