Staggering birds at both ends of the day
9th December. Staggering birds at both ends of the day
Dawn saw us back in the Sangti Valley, attempting to get better views of Black-tailed Crake. So we all stood in a line overlooking the marsh praying the early morning fog would lift soon. As we stared hard at a patch of swamp where the crake could be heard calling intermittently, our driver was looking elsewhere and was soon excitedly babbling and pointing further down the valley. What had he seen? Scanning the wet fields through the clearing fog, we soon saw the cause of his excitement: a fantastic Black-necked Crane, quietly in the small paddy fields. What an amazing bird and one we thought we’d missed as we’d searched the valley in vain on our previous visit. All too soon, the fog shifted again, swallowing up the crane but exposing the marshy area once more and instead we were all able to have brief views of the Black-tailed Crake! From here we made the drive up a narrow and twisting rough track, past remote villages and dramatic landslides before arriving at Lama Camp in the Eaglesnest Sanctuary. Arriving at the tented camp there was no time to rest before we headed out birding the mountain track. Amazingly one of the first birds we saw was our main target bird for this area, Bugun Liocichla. A pair of these recently discovered birds showed off in a gully just yards from our camp! How lucky to see such an incredibly rare bird so quickly and so well.
Bird species list: 4198The Biggest Twitch website will remain online in 2009 to keep you up to date with our birding adventures and let you know how we settle back into normal life, if we do!! We will also share more of our adventures and lots of photos from The Biggest Twitch.