Yunnan Birds (1 Viewer)

[sichuan jiujiu]

Hello everybody!
Apart from my birding activities in Sichuan, during many years traveling through the adjacent Province Yunnan I have had fabulous chances to learn more about Yunnan's local as well as migratory birds, to watch and to enjoy them, to understand their environment and habitat, and to learn about severe threats some species are (obviously) facing.

In order to share sightings as well as information about Yunnan, I have decided to open a new thread on the birdforum.

Roland

 

[sichuan jiujiu]

This trip was my first trip to Yunnan in this season. I had the idea to get more information about Biet's Laughingthrush, since I knew that this extremely rare bird, apart from its existence in Muli in SW Sichuan, has been recorded around Lijiang - and Lijiang is a much more accessible destination though. Therefore, Lijiang might become a good start off point for general Yunnan round trips in the future.
Lijiang is quite a big prefecture and ranges from high alpine habitat to quite low subtropical climate along the banks of the Yangzi Jiang (the upper stream here called Jinsha River). Generally, winter and spring months are very dry with almost no or very little precipitation.
Mediocre quality secondary growth of pine forest is the main vegetation here. However, it still holds the endemic Yunnan Nuthatch (need to find older stands of trees); and in gullies and wet north slopes one still can find quite a big number of birds.

A convenient and rich birding area is the mountain range that separetes Lijiang Town from the Yangzi River. There are various access possibilities. The easiest one is just a paved road that starts straight from the Sanyi Village next to the airport and leads through partly decent habitat.
Here's the list of encountered mountain and forest birds around Lijiang during my stay from December 7-9. The letters in brackets shall give a rough idea of a general frequency.
vc=very common, c=common, o=occasionally, r=rare
Spotted Dove (vc)
Grey-capped Pygmy Woodpecker (c)
Eurasian Sparrowhawk (o)
Black-shouldered Kite (c)
Bar-tailed Treecreeper (o)
Grey-backed Shrike (c)
Long-tailed Shrike (vc)
Eurasian Jay (o)
Spotted Nutcracker (c)
Large-billed Crow (c)
Common Raven (o)
Red-billed Blue Magpie (c)
White-throated Fantail (c)
Blue-fronted Redstart (vc)
Siberian Stonechat (vc)
Yunnan Nuthatch (c)
Chestnut-vented Nuthatch (vc)
Green-backed Tit (c)
Japanese Tit (vc)
Yellow-browed Tit (o)
Black-bibbed tit (o)
Black-throated Tit (vc)
Black-browed Tit (vc)
Coal Tit (o)
Brown-breasted Bulbul (c)
Crested Finchbill (vc)
Pallas' Leaf Warbler (vc)
Hume's Leaf Warbler (o)
Goldcrest (vc)
Elliot's Laughingthrush (c)
Giant Laughingthrush (o)
White-browed Laughingthrush (c)
Black-streaked Scimitar Babbler (vc)
Streak-breasted Scimitar Babbler (vc)
Chinese Babax (o)
Blue-winged Minla (o)
Chestnut-tailed Minla (c)
White-browed Fulvetta (c)
Spectacled Fulvetta (vc)
Rusty-capped Fulvetta (o)
Black-headed Sibia (c)
White-collared Yuhina (vc)
Three-toed Parrotbill (r)
White Wagtail (vc)
Rufous-breasted Accentor (c)
Grey-headed Bullfinch (c)
Little Bunting (vc)

attached a picture of Yunnan Nuthatch, taken with iphone through a telescope.

 

[sichuan jiujiu]

here two more pictures from the forest section:

A Charismatic Lijiang Bird: Crested Finchbill, very common, but in other areas difficult to find;
And Black-streaked Scimitar Babbler, here they were not as shy as in Sichuan (maybe because Sichuan has thicker undergrowth)

 

[MKinHK]

Great to see this thread starting Roland - as Yunnan has the longest bird list in China it's long overdue!

Cheers
Mike

 

[jonathmartinez]

agree, very nice thread which I'm sure will become very thick with time...

Merry christmas,

jonathan

 

[Owen Krout]

Sounds like quite a variety of habitat and hence you should have a corresponding variety of bird life! Welcome to the forum!

 

[McMadd]

Sounds like quite a variety of habitat and hence you should have a corresponding variety of bird life! Welcome to the forum!

Roland's been around for ages Owen...

 

[sichuan jiujiu]

Hi guys! Thanks for the interest. I'll try to keep as much information posted as possible. Next month I will be going down again. Not sure yet where exactly - got my kids with me...

Meanwhile some more info about Lijiang:
Lijiang town is situated in the middle of a quite wide basin. Formerly large water bodies and marsh areas obviously covered this ground. Of course, due to human development most of it has been drained and is used for farmland nowadays, but there's still plenty of lakes, puddles and wetland of different sizes left. One of the bigger ones is the Grass Lake (Cao Hai) ca. 10km south of the Lijiang airport or Lashi Hai west of Lijiang.
Additionally, and this is quite important for the casual birder, many villages maintain their own private pond or small water reservoir for water supply during the long dry period in winter/spring. These are sometimes good places for rails or migrating waders.

A 3h delay of my flight out of Lijiang gave me enough time for a spontaneous visit to the Grass Lake. And, unexpectedly, even in early afternoon, birding was non stop and I could write down a nice list of birds in less than two hours:

Ruddy Shelduck
Mallard
Spot-billed Duck
Northern Shoveler
Gadwall
Feruginous Pochard
Greylag Goose
Common Kingfisher
Common Moorhen
Common Coot
Black-tailed Crake
Common Snipe
Solitary Snipe
Black-shouldered Kite
Common Buzzard
Great Cormorant
Little Grebe
Little Egret
Chinese Pond Heron
Bluethroat
Siberian Stonechat
Brown-breasted Bulbul
Yellow Wagtail
White-Wagtail
Olive-backed Pipit
Water Pipit

Attached a picture of a Black-tailed Crake photographed in one of the above mentioned and heavily littered village water ponds
and a Purple Water Hen on Grass Lake - I've counted 12 in total

 

[Jeff Hopkins]

Nice shot of the crake, Roland.

 

[Dong Bei]

Roland, great idea with the new thread on Yunnan! Some good reports to start and I'm sure there's more coming. Really excited about following this thread. I would really encourage you to consider ebird for keeping track of all your sightings. I was never an ebird guy (thinking it was too Americanized and just another step in the busy process of making reports) until a person basically got in my face and told me to try it. Now I have no idea what I would do without it as it saves me a lot of time. I only ebird my Liaoning sightings to keep track of numbers, distributions, etc... The cool thing is that it helps me organize everything for my own interest but also documents the sighting in a large database. You could have one username for Yunnan and another username for Sichuan. After a year of entering it's very interesting to see all the graphs, diagrams, etc...

Anyways, sorry to stand on that soap box there but I think you would really love it. Congrats on the new thread!

Tom

 

[Gretchen]

I'll echo others and say this is a really good idea. I've been reading yours (and Sid's?) earlier reports about Yunnan in the Sichuan thread, but I think it will be a great help to gather info for Yunnan here!

Your notes are also quite practical and helpful:

...Additionally, and this is quite important for the casual birder, many villages maintain their own private pond or small water reservoir for water supply during the long dry period in winter/spring. These are sometimes good places for rails or migrating waders.

A 3h delay of my flight out of Lijiang gave me enough time for a spontaneous visit to the Grass Lake. And, unexpectedly, even in early afternoon, birding was non stop and I could write down a nice list of birds in less than two hours...

We had a great (casual birding) trip to Lijiang last Jan (which I see I didn't write up anywhere :-C). This kind of info would definitely helped us out!

 

[MKinHK]

Here's a link to a report on a short trip to Lijiang in June two years ago:http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=286045

Cheers
Mike

 

[MKinHK]

Attached is another report from a trip to Ruili and the Gaoligong Shan in March 2005 in which our group nailed 297 species in just ten days!

I've also added a list of birds seen at Dali and Lijiang from Autumn 2003, which serves to supplement Roland's info of Lijiang - and particularly to mention that Giant Nuthatch can be seen on the hill next to the Black Dragon Pool.

I also have reports from Dali and Lijiang from even longer ago - including a successful trip to see Sclater's Monal! but hess will need even more digging out.

Please feel free to come back to me with any questions.

Cheers
Mike

 

[sichuan jiujiu]

Hi Mike!

Great to have more information on Yunnan from your side as well.
It's good to have a data exchange! For instance I didn't know that Giant Nuthatch is around Lijiang as well. I always made a big detour to Chuxiong for that bird.

And I love your report about Gaoligong and Ruili. Both are magnificent places to go birding!
In Baihualing however changes are quite enormous: The forest is shrinking rapidly on its lower edges, due to expanding coffee plantations. In some places the forest fringe moved up more than a hundred meters in altitude compared to 2012. So watch what coffee you drink!

Your "Pepsi Cola Bush" is called Leucosceptrum canum, as long as it is the same one as on the picture attached.
This would be a marvelous plant to have in any garden in the subtropics!!!
Unfortunately Sichuan seems to be too wet to find it among shrubs, apart from the bordering areas towards Yunnan (Liangshan Prefecture).

Need to sort some lists of my Gaoligong Shan trips, but there will be some more from my side soon.
Cheers

 

[tony.saw]

Hi
A further account on Lijiang is at http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=231682 although the info might be aging!
Tony

 

[sichuan jiujiu]

Just checked the PURPLE SWAMPHEN, picture above.
Now it is supposed to go under the name Grey-headed Swamphen (Porphyrio poliocephalus).
Split from Purple Swamphen in July 2015

 

[MKinHK]

One more trip report - from Xishuangbanna. To whet your appetites Oriental Dwarf Kingfisher was the star of the show!

http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=90761

Cheers
Mike

 

[Dahe]

Hi Roland,

Great, I look forward to following this thread too (and reading all these reports). Just don't stop adding all your interesting contributions to the Sichuan thread too!

Ed

 

[sichuan jiujiu]

Dali

Another superb place in Yunnan is the Old Town of Dali, just at the foot of Cang Shan Mountain. Apart from easy and nice views of the Grey-headed Swamp Hen (formerly Purple Swamp Hen) and White-throated Kingfishers at the reedy shores of Er Hai Lake, Cang Shan Mountain is the place to go. Getting there in March or a bit later, one will even be rewarded with a huge diversity of flowering Rhododendron trees and bushes, just to name one of the various features this place has to offer apart from bird watching.

Common birds on the mountain are Rusty-capped Fulvetta, Spectacled Fulvetta, White-browed Fulvetta, Black-headed Greenfinch, Rufous-vented Yuhina, Black-browed Tit, Black-streaked ScimBab etc. More difficult or rather rare birds are the Bar-winged Wren Babbler, you need wet spots or gullies for this, in winter it comes a bit lower down the mountain though; I've also seen Assam and Red-tailed Laughingthrush, White-browed Bush Robin and Lady Amherst's Pheasant. Latter is fairly common, however needs special treatment (for it is a shy one). Scaly-breasted Mergansers are reported on Er Hai Lake in winter randomly.

Dali is a major tourist place and thus offers more than enough accommodation; there’s a cable car that runs up the mountain too. However, with regards on birds the mountain road that winds up just behind the Three Pagodas (UNESCO world heritage!) is the right choice. Driving up in a car might be the best option, if looking for Lady Amherst's Pheasant, but you have to be early, otherwise the barrier will be down (after 7am). The road makes its turns all the way up to approx. 3200m and you’ll need a car with high clearance. However in winter most of the birds are down in the snow free section anyway, and you just have to cover the lower third of the mountain which is doable on foot.

I think from last year there’s an entrance fee for this road as well, since it connects to the scenic area of Cang Shan. I can’t remember exactly how much it was, might have been 30Yuan (charged on the way out).

Attached is a google earth map with the forest road highlighted.

 

[sichuan jiujiu]

Obviously I am still pending with a more detailed description of the birding sites within the Gaoligong Shan Mountain Range, and I definitely will write a bit more about it in the near future. Hopefully I will get there again in a few days time and thus may be able to even add more recent information.

But at the moment I am going to spend some days in Sipsong Panna (or Xishuang Banna in Chinese) before I move west again. Here I followed Mike’s report of Sipsong Panna and I am quite happy to have had a good study of it. So far the best birding site was Caiyang He Nature Reserve (confusingly also called Taiyang He) which actually still belongs to Pu’er District (where the famous Pu’er Tea comes from). The fancy hotel Mike was talking about has been demolished and instead there’s … nothing, except birds (e.g. a wonderful Hill Prinia). I guess the hotel was not fancy enough and proved not lucrative, that’s why they have built a new one on the other side of the hill. Latter place and its surrounding forest is now called Pu’er National Park. My very private recommendation: DON’T GO THERE! I haven’t checked the forest and birds, but the rooms were at ridiculously cheap 1380Yuan/night, including karaoke at night, tour busses with loudspeaking guides and shuttle busses from the entrance. Additionally you have to pay 150Yuan/person just to enjoy a walk of a few hundred paved meters through the forest which ends at a compound that exhibits African Rhinos!
Much better and my recommendation is the old site Mike was talking about. It's a bit confusing to find it, because of the new “national park” (=Rhino Park) has drawn away attention. Here's the direction: At the very top of the newly build tarmac road, about 1.5km behind the national park entrance when coming from the expressway (Nandao He exit), there is a turnoff with a sign that says Viewing Platform (liaowangtai 瞭望台, in Chinese only). Take this road and a after ca. 300m you are there! I have attached a sketch map of this place. It’s free, empty, birdy and convenient. From here you have good trails through the forest. Another good birding option is the road that goes downhill exactly at the same turnoff. It leads through the same forest for quite a few km, is paved and ends at a small village – so almost zero traffic guaranteed.
The birds I could see in only 1.5 days (half day with thick fog) were:

Grey-capped Pygmy Woodpecker
Greater Yellownape
Rufous or Bay Woodpecker (Just seen in flight with a brief call, so no definite ID)
Great Barbet
Blue-throated Barbet
Red-headed Trogon
Collared Scops Owl
Asian Barred Owlet
Collared Owlet
Savannah or Large-tailed Nightjar (flushed one from the road)
Mountain Imperial Pigeon
Crested Serpent Eagle
Black Eagle
Mountain Hawk Eagle
Crested Goshawk
Common Buzzard (vulpinus)
Silver-breasted Broadbill
Orange-bellied Leafbird
Long-tailed Shrike
Grey-backed Shrike
Large Woodshrike (a flock of about 30 birds roaming through the forest)
Large Cuckooshrike
Scarlet Minivet
Greater Racket-tailed Drongo
Black Drongo
Brown-chested Jungle Flycatcher (ID not confirmed, it didn’t call)
Blue Rock Thrush (ssp philippensis)
Chestnut-bellied Rock Thrush
Bluetail (Himalayan I guess)
White-tailed Robin
Fujian Niltava
Verditer Flycatcher
White-crowned Forktail
White-rumped Shama
Japanese Tit (Parus minor)
Yellow-cheeked Tit (ssp rex)
Chestnut-bellied Nuthatch (Sitta cinnamoventris)
Velvet-fronted Nuthatch
Puff-throated Bulbul
Ashy Bulbul
Hill Prinia
Yunnan Fulvtta
Streak-breasted Scimitar Babbler
Blue-winged Minla
Chestnut-fronted Shrike-Babbler (must have been Clicking Shrike Babbler ‘intermedius’)
Blyth’s Shrike-Babbler
White-bellied Yuhina
Striated Yuhina
Mrs Goulds Sunbird
Black-throated Sunbird
Streaked Spiderhunter
Fire-breasted Flowerpecker
Oriental White-eye
Japanese White-eye
White Wagtail