The warm and sunny day. Trip with Raufael Bairashev and Gennady Dyakin to western foothills of Sailisky Alatau ridge.Kastek. There is the military post in the Kastek gorge now, it means that there is not possibility to walk in the gorge. So we had only watching the birds of the foothills and the beginning of gorge. A lot of Lesser grey Shrikes, Red-headed Buntings and Corn Buntings. Once we saw that two “wrestled” Corn Bunting downing by the ground slope, one of them tried to sing the song that moment. We didn't know what it was - the conflict of two males or gender game between male and female. The nesting in holes Common Starlings fed the nestlings. Near the holes the Rollers, Bee-eaters and Isabelline Wheatears were too. If I add to named birds also the colony of Rooks, Jackdaws, Mynahs and Magpies, so I get the list of common birds of Kastek and vicinity. Also we saw Collared Doves, Barn Swallows, Blackbird, Greenfinch, Common Nightingale and Long-tailed Shrikes in the villages; [...... read more ]

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The short one-hour trip to the gorge to shot the Blue Whistling Thrush. A long time I wish to photograph the Blue Whistling Thrush in the sun, but this cautious bird prefers almost all time to be in a shade. Today it was not possible to make good photos too. The scene of the windbreak after the recent hurricane was very impressive, large spruce trees lay on the slopes.In Samal I tried to shot Red-rumped Swallows and House Martins on the fly, and noted that Martins took the fluff of the seal from the broken isolation on the trunk. Probably at first there was a little cut on the isolated textile, but later birds expanded it and used the seal fluff to the nests construction. [...... read more ]

The first point of trip with Raufael Bairashev is the rocks on the left coast of Ile river. The most popular (notable) bird of this season in southern Kazakhstan is Rosy Starling. Thousands of Rosy Starlings build the nest in the cracks of rocks and among the stones, other Rosy Starlings in the flocks of several tens birds fed in the grass. In addition to Rosy Starlings also bright singing males of Red-headed Bunting are very notable. But the plain colored females of Red-headed Bunting build the nests. Also it's need to note the little grey birds which all time hid in dense bushes. We correctly identified Spotted Flycatcher and Lesser Whitethriat, but we are not sure about Chiffchaff and Syke's Warbler. Twice we saw Oriental Turtle Doves, once Golden Eagle, near the river we saw Caspian Gulls, Common Terns and Rollers. Other birds are usual to this place: Jackdaws, Rock Nuthatches, Pied Wheatears, Lesser Kestrels, Black Kites, Hoopoes, Crag Martins, Red-rumped Swallows and Chukar Partridges. [...... read more ]

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It's hard to fly to birds during and after the rain. Therefore in case of rain on the migration pass the birds find the applicable place and rest waiting the good weather. Every year at 19-20 of May in Almaty it is rainy. Sometimes rains continue several days, but often 1-2 days. And these days are directly days of Nightjars migration. These night birds migrate in morning and evening twilights and their migration are not notable to people, but in case of rain the Nightjars rest. Once I found 9 Nightjars in one day, but that year was very rainy and Nightjars congregated on Republic Square during one week. Today I found two Nightjars, probably both were females. In addition to Nightjars I saw one Common Whitethroat (probably spruce singers are just they), one female Turkestan Shrike and singing males of Greenfinch. [...... read more ]

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Today I saw Magpie running the Sparrowhawk. And also I saw the pair of Hobbies. It's interesting that I saw Hobbies on Republic Square not first time, probably Hobbies nest in this place. [...... read more ]

Today I tried to wait the Warblers' flying off from spruce, but unsuccessfully. I think that it's possible to obtain of Warblers' flying off only by the bait on sound. Stonechats still not fly out. Yesterday I tried to bait the Scops Owl by sound record. At first the Owl sang together with my record but later flew off. Probably anything troubled the Owl. [...... read more ]

Stonechats are still on migration pass. Today I saw 4-5 birds. Inside the spruce trees the little warblers sing but it's impossible to watch them. I propose that they are Lesser Whitethroats but I am not sure. Grey-headed Goldfinch today sang in Samal. [...... read more ]

The sunny warm day. Birds were a bit, probably on account of our late arriving (9.50 am). In first I noted the singing White-bellied Dipper. In addition to Dipper also Greenish Warblers, Coal Tits and Tree Pipits were singing a lot. Greenish Warblers were singing among the spruce-trees branches, but Tree Pipits were singing from the top of spruce-trees. Also today I heard very perfect song of Blue Whistling Thrush. The Black-throated Accentors already didn't sing so actively, today I heard them twice only and noted one only pair hid in spruce-tree. Probably Accentors have clutch already. As songs of birds were everywhere hearable, but singing birds (Tree Pipits and Greenish Warblers) are small, not bright and so not well visible birds. On the northern slope of gorge, especially in the spruce-trees shadows there were the snow; on the border of snow and wet ground I saw feeding Red-rumped Rosefinches, Coal Tits and Mistle Thrushes.My trying to find birds in the juniper thickets was unsuccessful. [...... read more ]

The sunny day. Not all of my waiting from the trip to Ushkonyr gorge measured up. I wanted to watch the Rock Bunting and the soaring birds of prey. But the raptors were a bit and they were soaring very high. We saw one Lammergeyer, one Long-legged Buzzard and one Black Kite. Birds were a bit but the resting people were a lot. The majority of birds we saw in very short time, so short that we couldn't identify them. So I can only presumably tell that we noted Black-throated Thrush. The Chiffchaffs were identified mostly by the sounds, the quickly flying by Grey-headed Goldfinches were identified by the calls too. But we also noted both Goldfinches and Chiffchaffs perching on trees. Other noted birds: Stonechats (2 males), Hoopoes, Pied Wheatears (2 females), Jackdaws, Magpies, Chukar Partridges, one flew by Raven. Twice we saw singing Rock Buntings. Some time we watched the pair of Grey Wagtails which presumably were building the nest. [...... read more ]