Watercock is a very sensitive and shame bird.I saw only two times in Lamma at 1995 summer . Living habitat is similiar to White-breasted waterhen , but their status is summer visitor rather than resident .They may be found in Lamma but chance is getting little and little because their favourable habitats such as fresh water swamp , paddy fields have nearly disappeared in Lamma .

There are four kind of owls that have been seen in Lamma (maybe even more that waiting us to find ).They are collared scops owl,asian barred owlet,oriental scops owl and eurasian eagle owl.
Collared scops owl may be fairly common from April to May and September to October.Last year I could even hear its call in Wanglong in late April .Other owls are more difficult to be heard or found not because they are nocturnal but really rare in number .
Old villagers like to tell someone was attacked by eagle owl in Hungsingyeh area but this will not happen again because the area has too many light and people now .

Sorry the photo attached is a common rosefinch because I clicked the wrong file. Anyway common rosefinch is not common in Lamma . The one in photo was taken two weeks ago at Tailing .If you see the birds like bunting or munia ,be sure they are not female common rosefinch .
Here the photo attached is the collared scops owl .

More great shots, and interesting records too. I had never heard of either watercock or rosefinch on Lamma. I doubt whether watercock will return in a hurry, but I'll keep a look out for rose finches in the winter migrants. The collared scops owls are heard quite frequently around Tai Peng in season, with the single or double mournful "hooo" at intervals of a few seconds.

Good news : Guy told me he has seen watercock in Golong village many times . I think the coming summer I will go to get my chance .But I notice the wetland has begun to fill up by some people .

This is also my first time to see a common rosefinch in Lamma . They may be overlooked before .

Very impressive pictures, Mr (Ms?) LYC - would you mind sharing with us what kind of camera and lens you use for the shots of the flying birds?

The buzzards I've seen on Lamma all seem to be of the japonica sub-species, so I'll look out for the other one.

Is Guy certain that the bird he has seen in Kolong are not immature white-breasted water hens? Conclusive photographic evidence please!

Mr.Chav Darwin:
I don't mind to tell you what equipment I use . But I hope you do not pay too much on the brand because several brands of digital camera also have suitable models for taking such photos .Anyway my camera is Canon 20D but I use my old Contax Tele-tessar 300mm F/4 len .So I can only use manual focus .One thing I want to point out is that the reflector on Canon SLR and DSLR cameras produce the sound very disturbing to birds.So close encounter may frighten the bird to fly away .In my experience , Contax and Nikon are better in this subject matter.In the page of white-bellied sea eagle ,I have shared my experience on taking bird in flight photos.The suitable lens are 300mm f/4 or 400mm f/5.6 telephoto lens .Large aperture len is heavier and expensive .Modern DSLR all have very good high speed and picture quality unlike film .You can use even ASA 800 still having good picture quality .

Once a large flock could be found in open field, but due to the decline of rice growing they became rarely seen birds . This few years I have noticed that there was a small flock or individual passing through Lamma during winter .

They are now available in Lamma .Not common , but can be found each year at the same area .

Nice that these are back. I can often hear them - they have a very attractive liquid song - but they are very difficult to see let alone photograph, so a nice capture.

I know Guy would be too modest to mention it (don't laugh, I'm being serious), but he took some excellent shots of this skulking bird last winter by tempting it out into the open with fresh maggots. Some pictures by Guy and Neil are on the Birdforum site at:

http://www.birdforum.net/pp_gallery/sho ... iled+Robin

They are not easy to find but not really difficult to see and take pictures . Why ?
Because they are not so scare people as other thrushes .In fact , they are quite curious and not sensitive to stable object such as a man sit still on ground .So once you find where the bird is you can try to get close . The bird may be frightened away but it will come back again to see you and continue to find food in its 'area' if it find that you are just a still object .Unlike some birds that they scare human figure very much no matter it is still or moving .
The real challenge to take pictures is that they like thick undergrowth where light is so dim and they like moving rentless . If you don't use flash , it is very difficult to have a change to get a sharp image in the era of film camera . But modern digital SLR camera changes the situation by having high speed ISO and benefited by the drawback of APS size censor(magnify your len by 1.4x or 1.7x ) . As a result , it is relatively easy to take bird pictures .To feed wild animals is not a good practice .
When digital era haven't come , I attemtped to use film camera to take pictures with the bird in Tailing years before.The attached pictures are copied from color slides .

I am very lucky to catch this bird at the weekend near Tai Peng hill. It is a black-naped monarch flycatcher, female. I think there are not many seen on Lamma.

Nice one! These birds are certainly not commonly seen. The person who probably knows best is Mr "out and about." Seen any of these, LYC??

I've seen these in the bush beside the path from Sok Kwu Wan to Mo Tat, but as you say, not at all common. Hard to get a picture, so a good record.

I got a big surprise to see this White's Thrush (or Scaly Thrush) so did not have time to get good picture, then it was off again

Just to be sure, ID confirmed by Bird Society. This is the photo I wish I would take of this bird.
This wonderful clear picture is from Birdforum:

http://www.birdforum.net/pp_gallery/dat ... CN1929.jpg

The first half of September always brings some unusual wanderers. This morning was lucky enough to find a tiger shrike (I think) and a forest wagtail. Phtos are too far away and heavily cropped, but just for record.

Good stuff, especially the tiger shrike. There are only a handful of records anywhere in Hong Kong for this rare bird. The birds seem to be coming thick and fast now - maybe time for Harry Li and LYC to get their photo gear out of mothballs too. In fact even your convenor is getting sucked into this bird photography lark. Here is a pic taken this afternoon on the back road to Powerstation beach of an Asian Paradise Flycatcher, another uncommon migrant.

Slightly better picture (but not much) of another forest wagtail, this time at Tung O village near Sok Kwu Wan. These birds seem to be very restless and never sit still.

I think the bird above is a Japanese paradise flycatcher. The back is a bit darker and duller than the Asian, although the two species do look rather similar.