Just now I have crossed Republic Square; saw flying male Sparrowhawk with food, which hid in the high trees. Probably it nests here. Also I saw Hooded Crow! In Almaty in June I didn't see Hooded Crows before today. Unfortunately I was without camera. [...... read more ]

In this hot day I and Gennady Dyakin planned to visit well known spring in the foothills of Big Boguty mountains. In this year Vassily and Tonya were there, and took many good photos. We arrived to the final destination rather early about 9 am; birds were a lot, immediately came flocks of Mongolian Finches, and singles of Grey-necked Buntings, Rosy Pastors, Horned and Greater Short-toed Larks, only some times we saw juvenile Rufous-tailed Rock Thrush (perhaps same bird photographed by Vassily), male and female Linnets, Tawny Pipit and Isabelline Wheatear. Latters probably came to the spring to drink the water some times during the day (2-5 times before the mid-day), but how many times Mongolian Finches and Grey-necked Buntings drink the water impossible to count because impossible to count the number of these birds. I don’t know is it same or different birds permanently drink the water from the spring. I think that Buntings often drink water because in the far edge of the pool only Buntings [...... read more ]

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Day is hot and sunny. Trip with Gennady and Elena Dyakins to Degeres for Rock Nuthutch and to Akterek for Paradise Flycatcher. In Degeres we expected quickly to take photos of common in this place Rock Nuthutch and quickly went for Paradise Flycatcher. But everything went not according to plan. First known nest of Nuthutch placed among the colony of Rosy Starlings (absent at this year) was broken. The second one looked like live, but twenty minutes of waiting finished without result; Nuthatches didn’t come, moreover I heard its sound once only and from a far. We guess that Nuthatches as residents nest early, and probably they already left nests and broods dispersed in nearby rocks. We didn’t watch Nuthatch but saw couple of Nightjars, and two Blue Rock Thrushes. Nightjars were sitting (close one to another but not together) in the narrow cleft between rocks. First we flushed female which twice flew from place to another one, and then hid over the slope. Then I flushed male. Of course [...... read more ]

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I waked up early but sun already rose but hid over the clouds. I went to the next artesian-well where I watched the Larks. In addition to Larks one Demoiselle Crane came to well but noticed me, turned and flew away. Wind was strong and its direction was to clouds, means sun will open soon. And it was after a short time. I and Gennady went to well where yesterday we watched tens of Brown-necked Ravens. Here we noticed Marbled Polecat. Polecat entered to concrete split, then went to the steppe in company of tens of Larks; some of Larks perhaps to distract Polecat from the nests in my opinion. One Black-bellied Sandgrouse came and landed at some distance. Then two more Sandgrouses came but noticing the car flew away; the first Sandgrouse flew away too. Brown-necked Ravens which were our main target in this spot were coming but landing far and flying away from a short time. We came back to the camping without any significant records, had the breakfast and went to the city direction.Firstly [...... read more ]

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Yesterday we left the city at 8 pm and arrived to camping about 12 pm. Night is rather cold and hostess gave us the sleeping bags and blankets. Morning we get up early (not before sunrise but early) and before breakfast tried to find Macqueen’s Bustard and Caspian Plover which was observed this season near the camping. Nobody from us is able to search Macqueen’s Bustard therefore our attempt was unsuccessfull. Until we tried to find Bustard sun is high and the numerous Larks appeared all around, mostly Calandra and Greater Short-toed, sometimes Bimaculated Larks. We took photos of larks and explored plain clearings of rare low grass without tussocks, and finally found the colony of Greater Sand Plovers of about 5 or 6 couples with different age chicks. One of females diverting us from chick showed imitation of wounded bird, it was laying to land and up the wings. At 8am the Black-bellied Sandgrouses (main and guaranteed target of Kanshengel) began to visit the watering places. And some [...... read more ]

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Night was with rain, morning is overcast. But already when we had breakfast (many thanks Malik and Kuralai) the sun appeared. So we went to the nests of Little Bustards with the perfect weather. Grass after rain was wet and my shoes became fully wet too with my first steps on field. Malik marked the nests found in fields by the stick, stuck into the ground (he calls it “my GPS”). But it’s impossible to view the nest even staying directly near Malik’s “GPS”, because nest is covered by the high grass. But Malik finds the nests by himself method (it’s secret to me how he do it) and begins the shamanic ritual of opening of bird. Malik very carefully clean up grass from the female sitting on nest. Malik said if you don’t touch bird by stick, bird don’t flush but continues to sit on nest. It’s really true, we saw how Malik almost full opens Bustard but bird only watch to the humans staying at one meter from nest. Fantastic! Then Malik carefully covered bird on nest by grass [...... read more ]

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Trip with Gennady and Elena Dyakins to visit Malik’s village for watching the Little and Great Bustards. Day was cloudy during all road. We departed Almaty at 7.00 am, and decided to stop only near the nest of White Strok or in case of very significant record, because road is long. Before the bridge over th Chu river we didn’t see any extra interesting birds, also we didn’t notice some birds from the list of common birds, such as Eurasian Bee-eaters, Long-legged Buzzards. This two species became rare recent two years. Probably Bee-eaters were rare due to building of many brick factories which use the clay from the ravines. It’s only suggestions but the absence of bee-eaters is fact. After the Chu bridge we noticed the couple of Spoonbills flying cross the road in direction of Tasukol reservoir. Unfortunately we can’t take photos. We made stop to lunch near the nest of White Stork. There were one adult Stork (probably female) and 4 chicks. We didn’t approach close to nest but [...... read more ]

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Yesterday I saw Black kite from the window in my office (Temiryazeva - Aimanova crossroad). Before yesterday I saw it twice in April. Raufael Bairashev saw it in this area too. Black kite in the center of the city in summer time is uncommon record. Probably it nests here and finds food in dumps? [...... read more ]

Two-days trip to Ile river floodland to picnic with friends. 18th of May was sunny before midday, but evening was cloudy and even overcast. 19th of May was sunless with the little rain in evening. Because the picnic was the main target of trip, birding was in background; but Gennady and I tried to pay attention to birds any time. During the Kapchagai road we saw Hobbies, Orioles, flock of Demoiselle Cranes, hoopoes etc. We made first stop near the ravine where are Rollers, Kestrels, Jackdaws and Little Owl nest. Owl was not found but other birds were not so significant to us. The next stop was near the single tree on the Malay-Sary pass. As usually the single tree is full of birds; we saw couple of Hobbies, three chicks of Carrion Crow in the nest, about ten Spotted Flycatcher, two Common Redstarts, Hume’s Warblers, Barred Warbler and probably some other birds.During the long staying near Bura village we didn’t see a lot of birds, perhaps due to heat or off-season time. Twice we noticed [...... read more ]

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Great Whitethroats and perhaps Blyth’s Warblers are singing in the Republic Square. I also saw female Turkestan Shrike, three females of Stonechat. In the high and dense elm-trees (karagach) I tried to watch the singing little bird (perhaps Blyth’s Warbler) but noticed the odd-coloured female Blackbird with the caterpillar in beak. Of course bird brought the food to nest, but perhaps worried and ate caterpillar itself. [...... read more ]