Introduction. In Autumn 1983 Andrew Moon, the late much missed Rupert Hastings and I
started thinking seriously about a winter trip to Japan but the more we looked
into it and decided where we wanted to go (Hokkaido, Arasaki and Okinawa) the
more expensive it looked like being. I was unemployed at the time and started
to have serious doubts as to whether I could afford to go so when the costs
approached the total of my savings I very reluctantly pulled out. Andrew and
Rupert, with Richard Bosanquet and Steve Webb, had a great trip. My only
consolation at not going was that in February 1984 while they were away I found
a job at The University of Sussex and at the time of writing this (August 2016)
I‘m still there. Japan remained high on my wanted list without my ever really
considering going there, that is until late in 2002 when Dave Sargeant posted
on the OrientalBirding email discussion group. He had been going on a two week
trip put together by Sarus Bird Tours but the other participants had dropped
out. He was looking for others to join him to make it feasible. Most of the
bookings were made and it would be at cost. I didn’t know Dave but had come
across his name several times and knew him to be a serious birder so I found
out more details. The trip was covering the main areas I wanted to visit and at
an estimated cost that appeared very reasonable, my only slight concern being
that it was in January whereas February is traditionally the best month. This
wasn’t a deal breaker and I agreed to join Dave and to see if I could find one
or two others to come as well. I asked John and David Cooper, John was very
keen and came, David was regrettably unable to do so due to work commitments. A
week later John, John King and I drove up to Scrabster for a Rufous Turtle Dove
near Stromness. On the long journey John and I were talking enough about Japan
to spur JK’s interest and with just over a month to go before we left he
decided to join us to making a group of four, the ideal number for most trips.
Friday 10 January. JFC, JK and I left a snowy Heathrow for the short
hop to Paris where the weather was even worse. Our flight to Tokyo was delayed
by an hour while some orange foam was sprayed over the aircraft’s wings to
de-ice them. Otherwise the flight was uneventful with the usual worries as to
where we would meet DS as we were arriving late. We had to catch a train to
Oarai and the overnight ferry to Tomakomai in Hokkaido so had little time for
contingencies. We would have been even more concerned if we had known Dave had
been delayed by 18 hours leaving Bangkok but fortunately his message to that
effect didn’t get through …
Saturday 11 January. We arrived in Tokyo mid-morning, collected our
luggage and found Dave waiting for us. He had only arrived a couple of hours
before us rather than the previous evening but had fortunately had time to
visit the hotel he had been booked into to collect various travel and hotel
vouchers, buy a road atlas from an airport bookshop and suss out where the
station was. I just had time to visit a chemist and buy what I took to be some
cough medicine as I felt a cold coming on. We hurried there and soon bought
tickets to Oarai, finding the platform and catching the train
with 10 minutes to spare. The journey and changing trains was easy, helped by
the train being spot on time and almost empty. We could easily follow our
progress against the timetable and we soon noticed that station signs had small
English names of the station and the next one. Birding was just about possible
from the train with a couple of Bull-headed Shrikes seen well and a
Brown-headed Thrush rather poorly. At Oarai we took a taxi the short distance
to the ferry terminal where we were left our bags in the ticket office. We had a
couple of hours of light hours before the ferry departed and walked around the
town and looking in the inner harbour. A
superb Brown-headed Thrush was feeding in berries by the terminal entrance and
we saw Black-faced Bunting, Brown-reared Bulbuls and Vega Gulls. We tracked an interesting
song to a neighbouring street and a Japanese Robin in a cage. It, and its song
was superb and immediately became a most wanted species for me. Sadly not on
this trip though as they were only summer visitors to the areas we were
visiting. Also seen in cages in Oarai
were Japanese Bush Warbler, Blue & White Flycatcher (!!), Varied and Marsh
Tits and Meadow Bunting. Sad. We boarded the ferry and found our four-berth
cabin which was very decent, more than we could say for the food being sold on
board. Just as well we’d brought our own, making use of the unlimited supply of
hot water.
Sunday 12 January. Our cabin was comfortable but I didn’t sleep well mainly
due to jet-lag and some cold symptoms and it was no effort at all to be
on deck at dawn. It was dull and cold but not as bad as expected when out of
the wind at the rear of the ferry. There were fewer birds than expected too which
was disappointing and it was hard to get decent views of those we did see,
especially the auks which predominated. A superb Dusky Thrush flew around the
ferry and for a long time looked set to be the best bird seen until a single
Laysan Albatross appeared. I identified 4 Least and 11 Crested Auklets, 2
Ancient Murrelets, 30 Brunnich’s Guillemots and 2 very distant shearwaters that
were almost certainly Streaked. Approaching a snowy Hokkaido the sun came out
and Tomakomai harbour, where we docked at 13:15, was comparatively full of
birds with Harlequins, Long-tailed Duck, Black Scoter, Scaup and Black-tailed,
Glaucous, Slaty-backed and Vega Gulls. After some delay, we were a bit slow to leave
the ferry, we found a taxi to take us to Tomakomai station from where we caught
a train to Chitose, readily changing to another train to Chitose Airport.
Japanese railways were living up to their excellent reputation. From the Avis
desk at the airport we were bussed back to their office near Chitose station,
Japanese car hire wasn’t at quite the railway standard of efficiency. There we
were given an all-wheel drive Honda Accord and DS quickly mastered the Sat-Nav,
quickly turning off the annoying Japanese instructions. JFC skilfully drove us
over the mountains on icy roads and through quite a bit of snow. We broke the six
hour journey to Kushiro with a fast food stop at a Lawsons convenience store
although the range of food sold was rather limited. We arrived in Kushiro at
23:00 and were turned away from the first hotel we tried which was apparently
closed. Fortunately the second, the Inn Hotel had vacancies. We’d opted not to
book somewhere in advance as we hadn’t been certain how long the journey would
take.
Monday 13 January. I slept really well although hadn’t shaken off my
cold. We were up and out at 06:00, thermoses filled, to find the
car had frozen and hard to get into. Once we did and started it we discovered
the temperature had dropped to minus 12 degrees. It took 30 minutes to drive to
Setsurigawa Bridge, the Red-crowned Crane roosting site on Kushiro Marsh, with
DS working Sat-Nav. We had no concerns about not being in the right pace when
we arrived as there were about 75 Japanese photographers waiting on the bridge
over the river. It looked like a major twitch but on closer examination only
one or two had binoculars and they were more like opera glasses. They were all
there hoping to take the perfect photo (sunrise, roosting cranes and the
steaming thermally heated river they roosted in) and the few we spoke to didn’t
know of any other birds in the area. Most departed before the cranes did and by
07:30 we pretty much had the bridge to ourselves. We stayed another couple of
hours seeing 220+ Red-crowned Cranes, 2 Japanese Wagtails (I only saw one other)
and a Great Grey Shrike. After a warming drink (soup in my case) we started to
head back to Kushiro but had only gone a short distance when a small patch of roadside
woodland was too tempting to ignore. We quickly found a female Pygmy Woodpecker
and some Marsh Tits but it was generally quiet. We saw some of the Red-crowned
Cranes again at a feeding station but as a spectacle it didn’t match the river.
Once at the coast we headed east and at one of our first ‘stop and scans’ a
stunning adult Steller’s Sea Eagle flew right past us at eye level and
continued along the coast. Brilliant, we saw another 6 during the day but none
as memorable or as close as this. Most harbours we looked in had small flocks
of Harlequin and we saw Red-necked Grebe, Whooper Swans, a Rough-legged Buzzard
and a few Glaucous and Glaucous-winged Gulls. Superb winter birding. At Cape
Kiritappu we checked some garden feeders for Asian Rosy Finches and found a flock
of over 120. We arrived at Lake Furen at dusk and headed to the Hattoushi Bridge,
a recognised site for Blakiston’s Fish-Owl. We heard one calling briefly shortly
after dusk but it was distant and well away from the road which we were
restricted to. The good looking forest on both sides was fenced off and
inaccessible. After an hour of it calling only once or twice more and never any
closer to the road we gave up, hoping that we might find a local to show us one
at a daytime roost. We headed for the nearby Furen Nature Inn where we were
staying for three nights but were struggling to find it when Matseo-san, the
lodge’s owner, fortunately spotted us driving by (more than once) and came to
get us. We were warmly welcomed and well fed, his homemade sake being as good
as cough medicine for my cold which was taking hold.
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| me at the Setsurigawa Bridge |
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| Red-crowned Cranes in the thermally heated river |
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| superb on the ground |
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| even better in flight |
Tuesday 14 January. We woke at dawn to freezing conditions and
walked out onto the frozen lake and into the face of an icy northerly wind. DS
had come direct from the Gulf and was particularly struggling despite wearing all
his clothes (two hats, long-johns, double trousers and two coats). I wasn’t doing
much better as my cold had moved onto my chest. Glaucous-winged and Glaucous
Gulls were common, feeding on the ice, as were Black-eared Kites with a few White-tailed
and Steller’s Sea Eagles. We returned for an excellent breakfast (our best in
Japan were at Furen) and a chance to warm up before heading to the Ochiishi Peninsular.
After a short drive we reached Ochiishi Harbour. It was full of sea duck with
Harlequin and Black scoter the most numerous (I recorded 150 of each for the
day) and smaller numbers of Goldeneye, Long-tailed Duck, White-winged Scoter,
Goosander and Scaup. After a long and tiring walk, at times through knee-deep
snow, we reached Ochiishi Lighthouse. Here we found some shelter and sea-watched
before returning. We saw 2 Long-billed Murrelets and 2 Pacific Divers but our
time on the peninsular failed to produce the hoped for Spectacled Guillemot that
had been seen a few days earlier or any red-faced Cormorants amongst the 100 or
so Pelagics. We then drove to Cape Nosappu and sea-watched but the wind at the
headland was vicious and horizontal snow flurries made viewing difficult. Despite
this we saw a Least Auklet and 30 Ancient Murrelets but at 16:00 we decided to
return to the Hattoushi Bridge to look again for the fish owl. Again at around
17:15 a single call was heard, and then around 17:30 a bird flew in along the
frozen river and perched on the ice at the forest edge for a few seconds before
disappearing back the way it had come. Unfortunately we were spread out a bit
at the time and JFC was just too far away to see it. I only just did, having
returned from collecting something from the car. The owl was on the ice for
long enough for me to get my bins on it, just. A huge owl with a small head and
when it flew away down the river very broad wings and a square tail. That was
it, it never returned leaving us all very disappointed. Somewhat reluctantly we
returned to the Nature Inn by 18:40. I had become really cold waiting for the
owl and was now suffering flu symptoms as well as a chesty cough.
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| Ochiishi Harbour |
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| Nemuro Peninsular |
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| Harlequins |
Wednesday 15 January. Overnight
temperatures dropped to around minus 17 degrees and I hadn’t slept well and was feeling quite ill. Before breakfast
we walked around the nearby nature centre seeing a few tits and woodpeckers. After
another good breakfast we walked out onto frozen Lake Furen to watch the
Steller’s Sea-Eagles feeding around fishing holes cut in the ice. I found it a real
effort walking into the strong wind. Despite bright sunshine the freezing
temperatures and wind-chill made it the coldest weather any of us had ever
experienced. I counted 119 Steller’s Sea Eagles on the ice (and another 21 during
the course of the day), 75+ White-tailed Eagles and 100 Black-eared Kites (quite
unlike their European counterparts which head for Africa when it starts to get
cold). We only managed to stick it for an hour or so before heading back to the
car to thaw-out. We returned to the Ochiishi Peninsula, where we again looked
for, and failed to find, Spectacled Guillemot although we did see two Red-faced
Cormorants. We had discovered a short route to the lighthouse which was just as
well for me as I was struggling to keep up with the others and resorting to
sitting a lot. It was along a board-walk through the pine forest where I saw a
Coal Tit and missed a Goldcrest, fortunate really that it was not anything serious.
Sea-watching produced nothing new, so by 16:00 we returned to the Hattoushi
bridge one last time to try for the owl. Walking the road we encountered a
local coming out of a track from the fenced off area. He spoke some English and
was appearing quite encouraging as we were asking about access to look for the
owls but when he heard where we were staying he rather shut down and moved off.
We heard an owl calling several times but never close to the road.
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| frozen Lake Furen, the dark specs are mostly eagles |
Thursday 16 January. We
had an early breakfast and I caught up with the Hawfinch on the bird feeder by
the window having missed it the previous morning. We left Furen at 07:00 to
visit Cape Hadoshi (Haddashi?) and continued on to Kiritappu where we walked out
to the end of the cape. I was feeling little better and have virtually no
recollection of the day but noted seeing amongst others 4 Steller’s and 3
White-tailed Sea Eagles, 75 Harlequins, single Long-billed Murrelet and Least
Auklets, 3 Dusky Thrushes and 8 Asian Rosy Finches. JFC drove us back to
Chitose, the journey back over the icy mountains being as tricky as it had been
on the way out. It took 7 hours and we checked into the Hotel Nikko Chitose for
our last night on Hokkaido
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| Cape Hadoshi |
Friday 17 January. Rather than having breakfast we drove to
Utonai where we had an hour to check the frozen lake and feeders around the
bird centre. I saw 8 Whooper Swans, 5 Marsh Tits and 2 Hawfinches but was still not well. We then went to the Avis office to return the car and catch their shuttle bus to the airport
in time for our 11:00 flight to Okinawa. I was pleased to be sitting down, less so that no food was served on a three hour flight although anything we were given would probably not have been to my taste.
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| Chitose street scene, it was a scold as it looks |
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