Another birding trip report - Amagasaki, Osaka and Ogura, Kyoto

If you don't think you can handle reading about my birding exploits today then turn back now, if you dare...

I met up with Neil and Gabor this morning at 7.30am and we headed off to Amagasaki, on the road to Kobe, on a wader run. Amagasaki, a suburb really or district of Osaka, is built up, loud, ugly and very American actually in it's layout. Gabor was driving as the place we needed to get to was off the public transport route. It reminds me a lot of the Mallow Sugar Lagoons, it is a collection of pools, some with high water levels, others with very little. The Osaka Public Authority are reclaiming land, for what puropose is anyone's guess but Gabor thinks it's a housing development but to ben honest, just like Cosmo Square, it's too out of the way to work. Anyway, we birded for a couple of hours in the unbearable heat and humidity and welcomed a few showers to cool us down.

Birds present were: Terek Sandpipers (30+, calling in flight, magic), LRPs (many), Common Sandpiper, single Red-necked Stint, Spotted Redshank, Green Sandpiper and Mongolian Plover, with flyover Osprey and Black Kite and a hunting Peregrine (3 BOPs in one day here is good at this time of the year). There was other bits and bats aswell but I didn't take any photos as I was too hot to bother. Singing Fan-tailed warblers and the ubiquitous Japanese Cormorants, Great White Egrets, Little Egrets and Grey Herons added to the atmosphere.

After that we drove up to Ogura which is quite near Kyoto, about 90 minutes or so in the car. Thankfully I fell asleep for most of the journey, as is my want, and woke up just before we reached the vast expanse of rice paddies and lotus flower fields . The lotus flowers were quite stunning but in my haste to photograph birds from the moving car, I didn't take any shots of the lotus flowers. We got out of the car every now and again if there was a good spot and we just walked around trying to flush snipes, rails or waders. Our objective in coming here was to see Oriental Pratincole, but unfortunately, lady luck was not with us and we didn't connect. Despite this, we had a good day here and the species tally is as follows:

Latham's Snipe (2, and a lifer), Painted Snipe (3, also a lifer, see below)
Long-toed Stint (to add to the one yeseterday), Wood Sandpiper, Common Sandpiper, Red-necked Stint (see below, a bit distant though), LRP, Great Egret, Intermediate Egret, Little Egret and Cattle Egret, along with Black Kite, Kingfisher and Grey-headed Lapwing. A great day out and thoroughly enjoyable. It was raining on and off but it didn't really matter too much, it was a nice place to spend a Sunday afternoon....