On Sunday December, my guide Philip took me to a couple of spots in Chongqing, where we got around by light rail, metro, bus and uber taxi!
We began the day at 8am at the Zhaomu Mountain Forest Park with 4 lifers, all species of tit, in our first half an hour! Japanese Tit and Green-backed Tit were reminiscent of Great Tit, and the Chinese endemic Yellow-bellied Tit very similar to a Blue Tit. But the nicest were the Black-throated Bushtits. These birds were soon followed by Himalayan Bluetail, Oriental (Grey-headed) Greenfinch and both Striated and Black-chinned Yuhina. But the best bird of the early morning was a Chinese Hwamei. This bird has a beautiful song and is collected for sale as a cage bird making it quite hard to find in the wild.
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| Japanese Tit |
As the morning went on we found a couple of Oriental Magpie-robins, a quick fly-by Red-billed Blue Magpie and a Long-tailed Shrike. Close to the ground we had flocks of Vinous-throated Parrotbills, Collared Finchbills, Yellow-billed Grosbeaks, Light-vented Bulbuls, Mountain Bulbuls and White-browed Laughingthrush. A Buff-barred Warbler, a couple of Rufous-capped Babblers and some Pacific (Fork-tailed) Swifts flying around the pagoda meant that I ended the morning with a number of lifers although the birding had slowed as the morning wore on.
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| Oriental Magpie Robin |
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| Mountain Bulbul |
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| Yellow-billed Grosbeak |
We then took the metro into the heart of the city, where the Jailing River meets the Yangtse, stopped at a noodle shop for lunch and then took a taxi to the South Botanical Gardens. The afternoon spent here was very slow, and despite walking several miles we only added Daurian Redstart to the day's list.
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| Daurian Redstart |
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