Gang-wha Island, Waderwatch 2012

Expecting for Waders, and some after storm(there was a great typoon passed by last day) vagrants, Me and my collegues visited Gangwha Island. 29, August, 2012

It was not so productive as we expected, but still we could find a lots of Far Eastern Curlews and Terek sandpipers. It was a really sunny and windy day right after typoon.

there were lots of black tailed gulls..as always. this day, the tide was very high,about 700m.

an Juvile Far eastern curlew showing relatively shorter bill than adult's extremely long and curved one.

many birds were this year's juveniles, including this brown eared bulbul.

although we know that most of these young birds do not survive until next breeding season, we hoped that this poor, somewhat ragged kid could live long and prosper.

Several mudskippers amused us during birdless long walks.

 it is really funny to watch that they running on the surface of water.

Far eastern curlews, about 12 hundredbirds were the most abundant birds of this day's Gangwha Island.

and one of the 7 black faced Spoonbills,This yearling was busy in fishing in the upcoming tide.

Breif count during birding, Birds of this day.

Grey Plover 10-20
Terek Sandpipder 200-300
Eurasian curlew 2-3
Far eastern Curlew 1200-1300
Wimbrel 10
Common sandpiper 10
Common greenshank 30
Chinese egret 30 (mostly in non-breeding plumage)
Great egret(eastern?) 9
Grey heron 3
Black naped oreole 1
Grey wagtail 1-2 flying overhead
White wagtail, leucopsis 2
Brown eared bulbul 6-9
Black faced spoonbill 7
Dark-sided flycatcher 1
Tree sparrows 100+
Vinous throated parrotbill 50+
Eurasian turtle dove 10+
Black billed magpie 10+
Large billed crow 2
Straited heron 2
black crowned Night heron 1
Great commorant 1
(eastern)Great tit 2-3

Shorebird migration 2012 Yubu island, korea

Yubudo Island is last refugee for East asian austalian flyway waders in Korean side of yellow-sea costal mudflat. I can quite surely assume that area around reclaimed saemangeum was asia's Largest and most significant wader sating area during both spring and autum migration, but at 2006, the saemangeum reclaimation was finished, and since then, Yubudo Island functions as an insufficient but the only "workaround" for the exhausted, long traveling waders. 

At 20, August, 2012 I visited Yubu island with Dr. Chung, my Guru of birding and studying.

I was expecting several spoon-billed sandpipers and other flagged, or ringed birds,  but the weather was unfortunate, harsh rain and wind made us difficult to make us search.

The first waders of that day was several sanderlings and Kentish plovers, running and foraging on the sandy beach. Between those bird, Dr.Chung first noticed this bird was ringed.

Sanderling, Yubu Island, Chungcheung nam do, Korea, 20,8,2012 color-flagged at Southern australia, I've reported to the AWSG page,

Waders of yubu island. 20, 8,2012 : Dunlins, Lesser sand plovers, kentish plovers, terek sandpipers, Red necked stints, sanderlings were most abundant small waders of this day,

In my aprox. count, more than 30 thousand shorebirds were staging there, and due to the rain and wind, I couldn't conduct any more scrutiny.

because I also had to find this trip's prize, the SPS.

if you look above photo with inner sight of birding, youmight find one adult SPS at the right-upper coner

I observed one adult in stunning breeding plumage and one juvinile from this year's breeding. 

we met american birder, who works for NGO in korea, told us that he counted up to 5 SPS that day.

and like waders, searching for energy supplement at this staging area, there was another bird in search of daily meal.

 Eurasian hobby swooping the waders.

It was very high tide at that day and most of other birds flew away and only small numbers apporached to the handful left land. See that sandlovers in breeding plumage, how striking orange! they just added color at the grey rainning mudflat.

and right before we leave, we found this poor great knot, who got it's lower manible caught by a small clam.
he was not able to fly easily and he looked very exhausted.

Waders of Nam-dong resevoir, Incheon City, Korea :