BIRDING MONGOLIA: Important Bird Areas

Showing posts with label Important Bird Areas. Show all posts

November 26, 2016

part 18 (final part):

Gorkhi Terelj National Park

text by Thomas Langenberg

( links to previous posts:

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 ,12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17)

Entrance gate in the rain, Gorkhi Terelj NP

Jun 2014 © Matze Putze

Ruled by heavy rains, Gorkhi Terelj NP

Jun 2014 © Armin Schneider

Skies are clearing up, Gorkhi Terelj NP

Jun 2014 © Armin Schneider

Inside the forest, Gorkhi Terelj NP

Jun 2014 © Matze Putze

Rhododendron dahuricum, Gorkhi Terelj NP

Jun 2014 © Andreas Buchheim

On 15 June we travelled the short way up from Gun Galuut to the famed Gorkhi Terelj National Park. The NP is well developed but as we wanted to camp undisturbed we went into the forest for the rest of the trip. Our aim was to see some forest species. As the NP lies at the southern fringe of the Siberian taiga we hoped for Siberian birds like Siberian Tit (known as Gray-headed Chickadee in North America) and Siberian Jay plus the difficult Black-billed Capercaillie (BBC). Upon our arrival the forest was quiet, no wonder as the rain continued for several hours. But soon after the rain had ceased Orange-flanked Bluetails, Pallas’s and Two-barred Warblers and Olive-backed Pipits started to sing, mostly from the tree tops. On an escarpment we found an occupied nest of Eurasian Black Vulture and just above our kitchen tent a pair of Taiga Flycatchers was busily feeding their chicks, nice!

Orange-flanked Bluetail

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Thomas Langenberg

Oriental Cuckoo

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Matze Putze

Ural Owl

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Thomas Langenberg

Ural Owl

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Andreas Buchheim

Ural Owl

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Thomas Langenberg

For the next two days we explored the forest, mostly by hiking up the valley which was quite exhausting. The reward was to see up to 15 BBC per day. These birds proofed to be impossible to get photographed. As soon as we saw one, the bird took flight and dashed through the forest so our cameras had no chance to track them for a shot. A bit more cooperative birds we came across on one of our walks: A family of Spotted Nutcracker, though venturing off straight away, and finally we saw also Siberian Tit and Siberian Jay. Another good one to discover was an Ural Owl in tree not far from our camp. Sönke checked out the distress calls of Red-throated Thrushes and by doing so he found the owl. Well done!

Eurasian Black Vulture

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Armin Schneider

Eastern Buzzard, one bird of the breeding pair

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Thomas Langenberg

Aquilegia sibirica

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Armin Schneider

Male Taiga Flycatcher

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Thomas Langenberg

Male Taiga Flycatcher

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Thomas Langenberg

Grey Wagtail...

and no running water around at the top of the mountain…

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Andreas Buchheim

Northern Pika

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Armin Schneider

Siberian Chipmunk

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Matze Putze

Siberian Chipmunk

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Armin Schneider

Siberian Jay, juvenile

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Thomas Langenberg

Spotted Nutcracker, juvenile

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Thomas Langenberg

Siberian Tit

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Thomas Langenberg

Siberian Tit

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Thomas Langenberg

On our last day it started to rain again and we packed our wet tents to dry them in our hotel in UB later. With more than 210 species seen during this trip, and lots of goodies among them, we returned back to Germany very satisfied! We will come back!

Group of Swamprunners

Gorkhi Terelj NP, Jun 2014 © Thomas Langenberg

September 23, 2016

Birding trip around the Khangai Mts

central Mongolia, summer 2013

A birding hotspot of the Gobi Desert: Boon Tsagaan Nuur

with the Gobi Altai Mts in the background, Aug 2013, © T. Hallfarth

part three:

Aquatic birds in the Gobi Desert –

birding around Boon Tsagaan Nuur

by Thomas Hallfarth

( links to previous posts: part one, part two )

On 31 July we left the nomadic family of our driver’s brother to go birding at Boon Tsagaan Nuur, the largest of the Gobi lakes. The change from mountain to desert birdlife already began at the southernmost hills of Khangai Mts. Here we saw the first birds of desert habitats. We found a group of Mongolian Finches in a dry river valley, probably the breeding ground of these birds and also a pair of Isabelline Shrikes. Not far from this place, a female Chukar with one chick crossed our way. Surprisingly we also discovered three Henderson's Ground Jays and a single juvenile Desert Wheatear, both species we expected not until we reached the proper Gobi Desert.

Mongolian Finch

South part of Khangai Mts, Jul 2013, © B. Möckel

Isabelline Shrike

South part of Khangai Mts, Jul 2013, © T. Hallfarth

Henderson’s Ground Jay

South part of Khangai Mts, Jul 2013, © T. Hallfarth

Desert Wheater, juv

South part of Khangai Mts, Jul 2013, © T. Hallfarth

During the short crossing of the Gobi Desert we saw good numbers of Pallas’s Sandgrouse, including a family with one chick and some flocks of several hundreds of birds.

Pallas’s Sandgrouse, pair

Gobi Desert, Jul 2013, © T. Hallfarth

Then, in the afternoon we arrived at one of the birding hotspots of our trip, the famous Boon Tsagaan Nuur. Here we stayed until 2 August. In this time we made some interesting observations. The greatest concentration of birds was at the estuary of Baydrag Gol in the north-eastern part of the lake.

Boon Tsagaan Nuur: Beautiful landscape surrounding
the lake, Aug 2013, © T. Hallfarth

A minimum of 15,000 Black-headed Gulls were here, furthermore 1,100 Spoonbills, 800 Cormorants, 800 Caspian Terns, and 500 Pallas’s Gulls. Mongolians fourth Slender-billed Gull was one of the top species we saw here. Also, 25 Relict Gulls, eleven Greater Sand Plovers, two Pallas’s Fish Eagles and singles of Grey-tailed Tattler, Terek Sandpiper and Little Tern provided further nice observations.

Caspian Tern

Boon Tsagaan Nuur, Aug 2013, © T. Hallfarth

Pallas’s Gull (flying in front of Black-headed Gulls)

Boon Tsagaan Nuur, Aug 2013, © T. Hallfarth

Slender-billed Gull

Boon Tsagaan Nuur, Aug 2013, © B. Möckel

Relict Gulls

Boon Tsagaan Nuur, Aug 2013, © T. Hallfarth

Relict Gulls

Boon Tsagaan Nuur, Aug 2013, © T. Hallfarth

Relict Gull

Boon Tsagaan Nuur, Aug 2013, © T. Hallfarth

Relict Gulls

Boon Tsagaan Nuur, Aug 2013, © T. Hallfarth

Grey-tailed Tattler

A short trip into the nearby very dry Gobi Altai Mts. provided a further Chukar and some beautiful views at Boon Tsagaan Nuur.

Chukar

Gobi Altai Mts.

With these observations we finish our journey to Mongolia and also this little trip report. A German proverb says literally: “After the game is before the game”. And so we were already planning our next trip to Mongolia…

Gobi Altai Mts.

August 1, 2016

First Jankowski’s Buntings in Beijing for 75 years

by Terry Townshend

Courtesy of the Oriental Bird Club (OBC), an article about the first JANKOWSKI'S BUNTINGS in Beijing for 75 years, just published in BirdingASIA, is now available as a downloadable PDF.

For more great articles like this about Asia's birds, please consider joining the OBC - they are doing fantastic work to celebrate and protect the birds in this wonderful continent!
____________
The above has been copied from the fabolous Birding Beijing blog

April 18, 2016

Hard walk

text by Jonathan Stacey & ABu

This rock held the Wallcreeper.

On 4 Feb 2016, shortly after noon, I teamed up with Jonathan Stacey for birding in Gorkhi-Terelj National Park, just an hour’s drive from UB. We checked in at a ger camp and then walked around. Jonathan had found an active nest of Bearded Vulture (aka Lammergeier) nearby in February 2014 and we slowly walked up the slope to see whether breeding had already commenced. There were only a few Eurasian Nuthatches and some Willow Tits plus the usual corvids around, including resident Ravens. Before we reached the point from where we could check the nest, a small bird flew out of the cliff just a few meters above our heads and flitted its way over the rock and out of sight: Wallcreeper! Unfortunately and despite our efforts, we could not relocate the bird to take some pictures. Funnily enough, we had been discussing the possibility of encountering Wallcreeper in Terelj or in UB, literally 1 minute before we saw it suddenly appear. Pure serendipity! Strike!

The female Bearded Vulture was indeed incubating tightly, with just her head visible peering over the rim of the eyrie. Her mate soon made an appearance, soaring along the high cliffs before coming into roost before sunset at a favorite site, indicated by lots of white-wash. We then went back to our accommodation, lit the fire and had a dinner which was accompanied by a couple of beers and talk of birds and travel well into the night.

The red dot indicates where we had had parked the car.

The next morning saw us driving into one of the side valleys and after we had parked the car we started our ascent. To reach to top of the mountain of interest we could have chosen an approach from the north, but we did not try this because we expected it to be too difficult, mainly because of deep snow on the northern slopes. So we hiked up the southern slope which was not completely free of snow either. The lower forest of larch and aspen was frequented by scattered parties of Nutcrackers calling to each other and moving across the slope. It was unusual to see them out of their more typical preferred Siberian Pine habitat. Our route took us through huge slabs of snow-covered granite, where once Jonathan had to find an alternative path and slide—very inelegantly—for several meters to find better footing. After this we had to cross a huge scree-slope. This turned out to be very exhausting as we had to deal with loose, sometimes very unstable rocks, and oftentimes for three steps up we slid one step down. During our long ascent through the morning we saw the male Bearded Vulture again, a small group of Eurasian Black Vultures closely inspected us, there were those nuthatches and Willow Tits again and we saw a distant group of Alpine Accentors as well as a pair of Long-tailed Rosefinches.

Birdless but mature forest,

dominated by Siberian Pine and Siberian Larch.

In the forest on the mountain summit plateau, although looking quite promising, we did not see much: only Willow Tits, Eurasian Nuthatches and an Eurasian Treecreeper, the latter heard only! Walking was as difficult as expected with the snow sometimes reaching up to our knees. Wolf tracks were evident. After an hour or so we headed back, giving us plenty of time to make the long arduous descent to the car. At the forest edge we finally got closer to a group of c25 Alpine Accentors. Suddenly they all were spooked—by what we knew not—and so we had no more reason to stay 600 m above our car. As we had to be even more careful on our descent we climbed down painstakingly and slowly to reach our vehicle just at sunset. Totally exhausted after a spectacular, but a rather quiet birding day—we drove back into the smog of the capital.

Alpine Accentor

Portrait of an Alpine Accentor

Almost sunset