Another quiet day. The showers didn’t materialise and the wind persisted in being a moderate to strong South-South-Easterly. After taxi driver number 3 dropped us at the point, we enjoyed a trickle of early migration involving at least 9 Black-naped Orioles, 7 White-throated Needletails and 9 Forest Wagtails (our first of this trip). But after that, it quietened down considerably and, by 9.30am, the skies were quiet. We tried the woods and trails but these were equally dead with even fewer birds than yesterday – there really has been a major clearout in the last few days.
The highlight has to be the White-throated Needletails (again!). After two hanging around high over the lighthouse at 5am, a group of 5 bombed past at head height at 0905am allowing excellent views of the rarely seen upperside of these beasts. I rattled off a few images in the few seconds they were on view before they powered past the lighthouse and out to sea. Whoosh!
Tomorrow is our final day at Laotieshan and we have high hopes. The forecast is for the wind to switch to northerly overnight with light rain and drizzle from 3am through to 10am. That might not sound like the recipe for a pleasant morning on a clifftop but, for a birder on the Chinese coast in May, that forecast could mean a stack of migrants on the peninsula. The forecasters, so far, have not covered themselves in glory so we are not holding our collective breath but, if they are right, we could be in for a treat. It would certainly be a nice way to end what has been a very memorable and fun trip.
Edit: a quick count up of the species seen so far shows that the total is on 149 species with a day to go!



Species List (in chronological order, not including Tree Sparrow or Common Magpie):
Ashy Minivet (3)
White-throated Needletail (7) – 2 at 0500 and 5 at 0905.
Chinese Grosbeak (16)
Spotted Dove (1)
Forest Wagtail (9)
Oriental Greenfinch (9)
White-cheeked Starling (5)
Barn Swallow (70)
Red-rumped Swallow (25)
Olive-backed Pipit (7)
Crested Myna (5)
Great Tit (6)
Black-naped Oriole (9)
Tristram’s Bunting (1)
Asian Brown Flycatcher (4)
Common Pheasant (5)
Pallas’s Warbler (1)
Amur Falcon (4)
Daurian Starling (6)
Peregrine (1)
Chinese Hill Warbler (2)
Fork-tailed Swift (9)
Black-tailed Gull (heavy passage east with 236 counted between 1345-1355 and 393 between 1505-1515)
Chinese Bulbul (2)
Egret sp (2) – too distant to be sure of identification but probably Chinese
Blue Rock Thrush (1)
Chinese Pond Heron (2)
Oriental Honey Buzzard (2) – one in off the sea at 0805 and one soaring at 1100
Large pipit sp (2) – possibly Blyth’s
Radde’s Warbler (1)
Hobby (2)
Two-barred Greenish Warbler (1)
Black-browed Reed Warbler (1)
Eastern Crowned Warbler (1)
Vinous-throated Parrotbill (6)
Grey-streaked Flycatcher (1)
Pale-legged Leaf Warbler (1)
Yellow-browed Warbler (2)
Dark-sided Flycatcher (1)
White Wagtail (1) – ssp leucopsis
Common Rosefinch (1) – immature male singing
Dusky Warbler (1)
Streaked Shearwater (10) – all between 1345-1400. In the evening, Jesper reported a passage rate of 900 per hour (!)