Chishirodai Reservoir

Chishirodai Reservoir is famous for two things; one as a heronry in spring and the other as a wintering place for ducks, especially the Mandarin duck.

Mandarin ducks seem to like the very edge of the water, which means they are normally at the furthest end of the reservoir from the path. Even from the distance, the males' gorgeous plumage is very much visible👍

Other ducks are wintering here as well, such as Mallards (magamoマガモ), Shovelers (hashibirogamoハシビロガモ), Gadwalls (okayoshigamoオカヨシガモ) and Pintails (onagagamoオナガガモ), and they tend to be in the middle of the lake.

a Little egret (kosagiコサギ) 

Cormorants (kawauカワウ)

Mallards, Spot-billed ducks (karugamoカルガモ), a young Black-crowned night heron (goisagiゴイサギ) and a Kingfisher (kawasemiカワセミ)

A Black kite (tobiトビ) flew high over the reservoir, which was nice, adding more variety of birds to my sighting list😍

I will come back next month to see if early breeding birds like Grey herons have started to refurbish their old nest/build a new nest.

Sakazuki-gawa

There are some good places for birding locally but just we haven't managed to go round as much as we'd love to and one of them is here by the Sakazuki.

nice day! (but chilly!)

Over the reedbeds on one side of the bank, a Grey heron (Aosagiアオサギ) was showing his back to me as if he was sulking😁

A Bull-headed shrike (Mozuモズ) was blended in the background, looking for his prey.

A huge mixed flock was passing through the reeds. 

Japanese tits, Long-tailed tits, Japanese white-eyes, Japanese pygmy woodpeckers were seen and I even heard calls of a Ruddy-breasted crake! Unfortunately, there's no pic of them.

All of a sudden, each little bird gave a harsh alarm call and everything went dead quiet,

because of this.

From the size and the surrounding environment, my guess is that it was a female sparrowhawk or a goshawk.

It circled over the woodlands by the river, and flew away very quickly and quietly.

A Common kingfisher (kawasemiカワセミ) 

and a Japanese wagtail (Segurosekireiセグロセキレイ) turned up by the water.

I should come back and walk a bit longer on the path next time👍

Izumi Shizen Koen (Izumi Nature Park)

We chose Izumi Shizen Koen for our first birdwatching of the year on the New Year's Day.

Unfortunately, it was rather windy and we didn't see as many as we had hoped for. There were 100+ ducks (the total number not the number of the species, of course!) in one of the ponds but they were all near the far end of the water, seemingly sheltering from the chilly winds.

a lovely Grey wagtail (Kisekireiキセキレイ)

a Bull-headed shrike (Mozuモズ)

a Daurian redstart (Jobitakiジョウビタキ)

I forgot to take the photos of the park itself, which was unusual! I will go back some time soon, hopefully, and take some environment in and around the park. 

We have been to this park only once and written about it in the blog more than 10 years ago just after coming to Chiba to live in in 2013.

Izumi Shizen Koen 2013

2025 HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

 Wishing you all a happy new year of 2025😍🐍