Happy Christmas!!!
Well, it's not Chrismassy here in Chiba - no Christmas dinner! (People love fried chicken from KFC on Christmas Day...) so we were away to a small volcanic island, Hachijo-jima, about 180 miles south of Tokyo in the Pacific.
Basically, the island consists of two volcanos, Hachijo-fuji in the northwest & Miyara-yama in the southeast, and small towns and an airport in between.
Hachijo-fuji and Hachijo-kojima (a tiny uninhabited island)
Mihara-yama and the runway at the airport
Bird-wise, there are several endemic species not only on Hachijo-jima but in the whole Izu Islands area.
In the Botanical Gardens by the airport, this gorgeous Izu Thrush (Akakokkoアカコッコ) posed for us.
He was eating Japanese Beautyberries (Murasakishikibuムラサキシキブ) and the heavy rain was on and off so he didn't really notice us watching him. Gorgeous!
The Japanese White-eye (Mejiroメジロ) on the island are sub-species of the ones we see in Chiba but we were not so sure of the differences...
The Brown-eared Bulbul (Hiyodoriヒヨドリ) on the island are darker than the ones on the mainland, we were told. We were not sure about that either, though.
The White-eye and the Bulbul were absolutely everywhere on the island, maybe because blossoms and berries are still abundant even at this time of year.
He was very acrobatic and got some kind of berry!
the Hachijo-jima Visitor Centre in the Botanical Gardens
Spooky!
Fluorescent mushrooms are displayed in a dark room in the centre, which grow wild on the island in autumn.
Hachijo-jima Visitor Centre (in Japanese)
http://www.hachijo-vc.com/
Tokyo Travel Guide on Hachijo
http://www.gotokyo.org/en/tourists/topics_event/topics/110912/topics.html
