{"id":24030,"date":"2021-01-21T13:44:03","date_gmt":"2021-01-21T04:44:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/?p=24030"},"modified":"2021-01-21T13:44:05","modified_gmt":"2021-01-21T04:44:05","slug":"hwaseong-wetlands-fns-and-gyeonggi-coast-january-12th-14th","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/?p=24030","title":{"rendered":"Hwaseong Wetlands FNS and Gyeonggi Coast, January 12th-14th"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Bird News from Nial Moores and Hanchul Jung (Gyeonggi KFEM)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Highlights of three more days of survey for the EAAFP-Hwaseong City Wetlands Project included 5-7 Relict Gull<\/strong> (between north Teibu and the Gojan Tidal flat), Saunders\u2019s Gulls<\/strong> (including one banded bird in the FNS from..?), and in, or immediately adjacent to, the FNS stunning views of Oriental Stork<\/strong> (11 seen in total) and of two different Eurasian Bittern<\/strong> (out of up to five seen in one day), in addition to a minimum of five Upland Buzzard<\/strong> and 3+ Lesser White-fronted Geese<\/strong> still.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Two adult Relict Gulls<\/strong> Ichthyaetus relictus<\/em> \uace0\ub300\uac08\ub9e4\uae30, with Black-headed<\/strong> and Black-tailed Gulls<\/strong> \u00a9 Nial Moores<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Saunders’s Gull<\/strong> Chroicocephalus saundersi<\/em> \uac80\uc740\uba38\ub9ac\uac08\ub9e4\uae30: top adult, below, First-winter (with leg band: F 3?) \u00a9 Nial Moores<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Globally Endangered Oriental Stork<\/strong> Ciconia boyciana<\/em> \ud669\uc0c8 \u00a9 Nial Moores<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Two of five Eurasian Bittern<\/strong> Botaurus stellaris<\/em> \uc54c\ub77d\ud574\uc624\ub77c\uae30 seen in one day \u00a9 Nial Moores<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Because of a near month-long deep freeze almost all freshwater in the Hwaseong FNS was frozen and much of the higher tidal flat zone was also covered by ice (which was then used opportunistically by roosting flocks of Eurasian Curlew<\/strong> and smaller numbers of Grey Plover<\/strong> and Dunlin<\/strong> at high tide).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Grey Plover<\/strong> Pluvialis squatarola<\/em> \uac1c\uafe9 and Dunlin<\/strong> Calidris alpina<\/em> \ubbfc\ubb3c\ub3c4\uc694 roosting on ice \u00a9 Jung Hanchul<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Eurasian Curlew<\/strong> Numenius arquata<\/em> \ub9c8\ub3c4\uc694 \u00a9 Nial Moores<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Grey Plover \uac1c\uafe9 \u00a9 Nial Moores<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The conditions did make it easier to find mammals though. In addition to seeing suspected River Otter tracks, and 2-3 globally Vulnerable Korean Water Deer, we also enjoyed excellent views of an Amur Leopard Cat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Korean Water Deer \u00a9 Jung Hanchul<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Amur Leopard Cat \u00a9 Nial Moores<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Importantly, largely because of the freeze, we counted only 8,598 waterbirds within our main Project Survey Area (which largely overlaps with the Hwaseong Wetlands FNS), with 5,500 of these Tundra Bean Goose<\/strong>, and an additional 8,434 waterbirds along almost 50km of Gyeonggi coast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This January total compares with a minimum 51,946 waterbirds counted within the FNS alone in mid-December 2020 (and 81,783 waterbirds counted there in mid-November, including at least 40,500 Tundra Bean Goose<\/strong>).\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Where do all the duck and geese go when things start to freeze up?\u00a0 Not locally based on our research\u2026And it has longed seemed much more likely (and self-evident) that the majority must head southwest across the Yellow Sea into China. This is because we can have more than 300,000 Tundra Bean<\/strong> here in the ROK during southward migration (in October and November), but only 80,000-90,000 are suspected to winter here. A very recent paper, “Bean Goose flyways in East Asia” in Wildfowl (2020), states that c. 270,000 Tundra Bean now winter in China. This suggests that perhaps the vast majority of these China-wintering Tundra Beans first stage in Korea. However, the same paper does not discuss the difference in numbers in Korea between November and January, and instead recommends recognising three distinct management units, with (more or less) discrete populations wintering in China, Korea and Japan. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The best decision?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Maehyangri tidal Flat and sea: January 12th 2021 \u00a9 Nial Moores<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bird News from Nial Moores and Hanchul Jung (Gyeonggi KFEM) Highlights of three more days of survey for the EAAFP-Hwaseong City Wetlands Project included 5-7 Relict Gull (between north Teibu and the Gojan Tidal flat), Saunders\u2019s Gulls (including one banded … read more<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":24028,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[1049,179],"class_list":["post-24030","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bird-sightings","tag-hwaseong-wetlands-fns","tag-oriental-stork"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24030","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=24030"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24030\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24036,"href":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24030\/revisions\/24036"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/24028"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=24030"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=24030"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.birdskoreablog.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=24030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}