Gageo Island, April 25, 2019

female Citrine Wagtail Motacilla citreola

Chestnut-eared Bunting Emberiza fucata

Chestnut-eared Bunting Emberiza fucata

Little Bunting Emberiza pusilla

Common Rosefinch Carpodacus erythrinus

Dusky Warbler Phylloscopus fuscatus

Black Wood Pigeon Columba janthina

Red-rumped Swallow Cecropis daurica

Eastern Cattle Egret Bubulcus coromandus 

The sad fate of a Tsushima Smooth Skink Scincella vandenburghi

Siberian Weasel Mustela sibirica

  Bored with the same old birds in 1-Gu, I undertook the long walk to 2-Gu in the morning. As opposed to last week, when I had to drag my dead ass all the way up the hill, huffing and clutching my heart, I zipped up with no problem this time – once again, my legs have evolved into super-legs. No doubt my knees will be effed next week.
  It seemed that, in spite of the winds blowing from precisely the wrong direction, there was a decent arrival of new birds in the night. The cuckoos are back! After cresting the top of the steep switchback road out of 1-Gu, I first heard the eerie “Poo-poo poo-poo poo-poo” of the Oriental Cuckoo, followed shortly after by the Indian Cuckoo’s “Woop-woop-WOOP-wup.”
  At least eight Black Wood Pigeons were seen or heard on the road to 2-Gu, including one perching on a wire like some common city pigeon. The indignity.
  Not many birds recorded in Hangri Village itself, as the fog was so thick that effective visibility was often only at about 20 feet or so. A Brown-headed Thrush and a Chinese Blackbird were notable in the old stone-walled gardens, which are tended by some of the less than dozen or so elderly inhabitants of what is surely one of the most remote and archaic settlements in South Korea.
  On the way back, two more Common Rosefinch, and the beginning of the surge in the Olive-backed Pipits (400+) and Black-faced Buntings (at least 850). The latter species were everywhere, especially when I did an afternoon circuit of 1-Gu – there were several flushing from the trail at all times, from the quarry all the way up and around “Little Hokkaido” and into the upper village, with many more overhead, and many seen coming in off the sea. A noticeable arrival of Little Buntings (150+) was mixed in, and several more Yellow, Tristram’s, Yellow-browed, and Yellow-throated Buntings kicking around town, as well as single Chestnut and Chestnut-eared Buntings.
  A Common Kingfisher in the harbour still, and an uptick in Siberian Rubythroat (9) and Siberian Blue Robin (4) numbers. More White Wagtails noted too, with nine species of pipits and wagtails for the day including several Eastern Yellow Wagtails (both tschutschensis and taivana), a Richard’s Pipit, and a Citrine Wagtail.
  There was a huge influx of hirundines towards dusk, mostly Red-rumped Swallows, with at least 750, but possibly twice that number fluttering over town, or perched – I noticed that every wire in town was heavy with swallows as the skies darkened.
  The 68th and final species for the day was seen well after sunset, when I poked my head out of the bathroom window to spy on the hundreds of chattering swallows on the wires and came nose to bill with a Sand Martin, less than a foot away.