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

A Crested Serpent Eagle I often spotted from my living room. It's always being hassled by a Common Kestrel.

Juvenile Crested Serpent Eagle eating prey. No idea what it was eating….

42 Mallards. You don't often see a flock this size in Okinawa or on Ishigaki Island.

Adult White-tailed Eagle with Kunashir Island in the background.

Adult Steller's Sea Eagle at the Notsuke Peninsula.

Juvenile White-tailed Eagle on ice that had collected inside the harbour.

Young White-tailed Eagle. 4W perhaps.

Adult White-tailed Eagle.

Adult male Red-breasted Merganser.

It was out at sea, but a Common Merganser. Male, 1st-winter.

Adult male Harlequin Duck.

A female Harlequin Duck floating in the fishing harbour.

There were plenty of Greater Scaup too. They're in the rarity category for Okinawa.

I spotted a cormorant flock and thought I'd see if there were any Pelagic Cormorants among them — but they were all Pelagic Cormorants. They seem to be using it as a roost; there were nearly 200 birds.

A Whooper Swan on an unremarkable stretch of coast. It came right up to me, so it's probably been fed by people. ^^;

There were a few juveniles as well.

Hokkaido Sika Deer were everywhere. The males and females seemed to be in separate groups.

A fair number of Little Buntings are wintering in the rice paddies on the island, but they're difficult to photograph.

A Red-throated Pipit moulting into summer plumage.

Red-throated Pipit, first-winter plumage.

Preening calmly.

(Yellow-browed) Yellow Wagtail.

(Yellow-browed) Yellow Wagtail, first-winter to summer plumage.

Taiwan White Wagtail, first-winter to summer plumage.

White Wagtails were the most numerous.

A close flock of Red-throated Pipits. They were feeding on grass seeds.

Changing into summer plumage.

Red-throated Pipits offer plenty of variety in their moult — always interesting.

A Crested Serpent Eagle eating a habu.

The familiar Common Kestrel.

Black-tailed Gulls at the fishing port. First-summer (left) and adult summer plumage. Black-tailed Gulls moult as fast as Kentish Plovers, don't they.

A Common Snipe in the grass. Someone was calling it a Swinhoe's Snipe, but it's a Common Snipe.

Northern Lapwing, male. Moulting into first-summer plumage.

Northern Lapwing, female. Also transitioning into first-summer plumage.

Rosy Starling on cattle dung. It has made this a favourite feeding spot and turns up almost every day.

Dusky Thrush, first-winter plumage.

Eurasian Hoopoe. Judging by the arrival numbers so far, I have a feeling this spring will bring a lot of Hoopoes to Ishigaki.

A Eurasian Hoopoe that caught a cockroach. Cockroaches are the main food of Hoopoes on Ishigaki.

A relaxed Eurasian Hoopoe. Distance: a few metres.

A Ruddy Shelduck that has been staying since last year. There are around five individuals on the island.

Common Shelduck, adult male in breeding plumage. An adult male visiting Ishigaki is unusual.

Two Eurasian Spoonbills, moving back and forth between Anparu wetland and the rice fields.

Common Shelduck, adult male. An adult visiting Ishigaki is unusual.

A mixed flock of around 150 Northern Pintail and Eurasian Wigeon gleaning fallen grain in the rice fields.

A group of a dozen or so Wood Sandpipers — probably the first wave of spring migrants. Year after year, in both spring and autumn, Wood Sandpiper is the earliest to arrive.

Common Snipe, first-winter plumage.

A flock of about 20 Common Snipe. Up until the end of December there was a single Swinhoe's Snipe mixed in, but…

Common Snipe in a nearby rice field. A few birds are wintering here.

A strikingly vivid Naumann's Thrush. It was conspicuous enough to catch the eye even at a distance.

A dull-plumaged Naumann's Thrush, first-winter.

Olive-backed Pipit, first-winter, that dropped into my garden.

Adult Olive-backed Pipit moulting into summer plumage.

Same individual as above.

(Yellow-browed) Eastern Yellow Wagtail, transitioning from first-winter to summer plumage.

White-faced Wagtail, male. Transitioning from first-winter to summer plumage.

White-faced Wagtail, male. This one also transitioning from first-winter to summer plumage.

The Japanese Bush Warbler calls loudly but rarely shows itself.

Seven Oriental Greenfinches on a long stay. The plumage is pale — perhaps a continental subspecies.

Brown Shrike, adult female.

The dark-morph Grey-faced Buzzard, returning for the fifth consecutive year since it was a juvenile.

It appears to have caught some prey.

Year by year it has been letting its guard down.

The dark-morph Grey-faced Buzzard is really stunning.

This is a regular Grey-faced Buzzard. Adult male.

Peregrine Falcon, adult male. A threat to the birds wintering in the rice fields… ^^;

Osprey in the rain. It looked as though it had just finished a good meal.

Crested Serpent Eagle, adult. The breeding season has begun and it is very active.