Bad luck makes good luck

I had plan to organize birding cruise in Tomakomai.
Unfortunately, the ship was in unexpected repair, so I was stopped organization of cruise....

As a last resort, I went Ishikari with friends who board the boat to see shore birds.

There were not many species of shore birds.
But we were lucky.

At first this is not a shore bird, but this is my lifer: White-winged Black Tern young.

Mountain Hare.

Sanderling, this is not rare species, this individual was in flocks of Red-necked Sandpiper.

And a rare species was in this flock.

Spoon-billed Sandpiper!!

Surprisingly, there were 2 individuals in this harbor, though they were in different flock.

Although We couldn't ride the boat, we had very luck of birds.

Tomakomai cruising -with stu-

I organized Tomakomai cruise 14th Aug, and STU attended.

He was very exited to see this flock of seven Black-footed Albatrosses at short range. He shot many pics and call his wife to see this bird.

Bathing.

We saw young suspected individual in the flock.

 In this cruise, I saw flock of Fork-tailed Storm Petrel, it is first record.

 There were many floating objects because it was strong rain two days ago.
Both of Arctic (left) and Pomarine (right) Skuas were on piece of styrol box.

Streaked and Sooty.
Fresh-footed Shearwater was not observed but there was in my friend's photo....

Japanese Pika

I climbed Mt. Hakuun to see Japanese Pika inhabiting rocky place, which be in top of this mountain.
It cost about one and half hour to be top of mountain, I felt my  stamina got down so tired.

I waited to see Pika about 3 hours, as a result I saw it only once but I could not take photo...

I got up to take photo of Pika at this place and went down this mountain.

I went to a famous place of Pika in base of this mountain, which was in place of about 5 minutes on foot from parking area.
I knew this place of course, but I wanted to take photo at other place.

As soon as I arrived, Pika was front of me.

I got back after 30 minutes because it was time to go home.

All photos in Shikaoi, Hokkaido. 31th/Jul/2010.

Tomakomai cruising -others-

Common Tern perched on a floating object.

After cruising, a Fulmar was in fisher port.
It was very rare case.
But I was not impressed because I saw many Fulmar in the cruise.