Biodiversity Diary a trip to Hulun Buir — John MacKinnon, Spike Millington, Tracy Peng Ning

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B I O D I V E R S I T Y D I A R Y

Jurassic Park

Life on the Mongolian grasslands

Gerbil

Covey of Pallas’s sand-grouse

Domestic camels

Mongolian toad

Glimpse of a glories past John MacKinnon and Spike Millington

The town of Hailar is a shock after the heat of sum-mer Beijing. A cold wind blew and rainy squalls reminded us we were a long way north of the capi-tal. The familiar swifts and swallows of Beijing were also present and nesting but here they were outnumbered by the large, white-rumped Fork tailed swifts and delicate brownish sand martins that circled under the bridges and whistled as they sped fast through the grey sky. The reedbeds along the main riverbanks rang to the loud harsh song of Oriental Reed Warblers and at regular intervals that chorus was punctuated by the familiar double noted call of the Common Cuckoo for which the nests of the reed warbler is a depository for their eggs.

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Two days of workshops were concluded and we could not wait to join the field trip to view the grasslands and wetlands of this fascinating corner of China, tucked close against the borders of Mon-golia and Russia. A vast open landscape where once millions of gazelles mi-grated, wolves prowled, eagles hunted and Mongolian horsemen hunted with bows from the saddle and tended their pastoral herds of cattle, sheep and horses. The authors with interpreter Tracy and Spike’s wife Carina took a separate car whilst the main party of delegates went by coach on a two day tour of the Dalai Nurr Lake visiting grasslands, experi-mental grazing and sand-dune reclama-tion plots, a nature reserve and tourism developments within the ECBP project area. John was loaded with both video and stills cameras in the passenger seat whilst the other three took uncomfortable turns at being sandwich in the rear..

Biodiversity Diary

ECBP Newsletter Supplements June 24-27 2009

Ground squirrels

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Birds of the borderlands Highpoint of the birding was undoubtedly finding Pallass’s sand grouse. Neither of us had seen this species before and with perfect lighting and a perfect setting, the event was as rewarding as we could have imagined. The guide had told us they were common in the grasslands beside

Huhe Nurr but our first drive through the area revealed only Mongolian larks, the rare Oriental plover and many Isabelline wheatears. It was only when we decided to swing round closer to the shore to photograph a big flock of curlews and a smaller flock of the pretty demoiselle cranes that we saw out first sand grouse. They live in small parties and waddle about close to the ground but if we get too close they would fly a short distance with a powerful gliding whirr reminiscent of the real grouse from which they get their name. By taking a separate car we were able to avoid the more touristic stopovers of the planned field itinerary and spend longer in the better bird localities. Arke wetland was

B I O D I V E R S I T Y D I A R Y

Herds of horses

Courting sand martins

Mongolian yurts

Horned lark

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B I O D I V E R S I T Y D I A R Y

perhaps a mistake. We were immediately pur-sued by giant mosquitos and the rather polluted waters bubbled with methane and the mating of strange toads. But were rewarding there with splendid views of common and white-winged terns working over the small lake and reedbeds, close up views of the elegant black winged stilt.

Redshank and marsh sandpiper were nest-ing in the reeds and flights of sleek cormo-rants flew overhead in formation. It was wonderful to get out of the cities and enjoy wide blue skies, great views of lakes and distant hills and view the local birds and some mammals but it was sad to reflect on what has already been lost as a result of overhunting, rodent control, fencing of the

Holding back the sand dunes

The entire

grassland

sings to the

tune of a

thousand

larks

International field inspection

Fledgling lark

Pallas’s sand-grouse

Holding back the sand dunes with straw walls Fledgling lark

Mongolian lark

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Flocks of curlews

feed along the lake

shore and take

flight at our

approach

Male Eastern Marsh

Harrier hunts over

the reed beds

Wetland birds and animals grasslands, overgrazing, increasing desertification and plans to remove water from important international wetlands to facilitate gold mining operations. Huge deposits of coal in the region are also not ig-nored and fuel a growing mining, transport and power

station development in-dustry augmented by wind farms that change the skyline’s natural grace. The ECBP pro-ject can do little in the face of such develop-

Hoopoe

with large

ant

B I O D I V E R S I T Y D I A R Y

A T R I P T O H U L U N B U I R

ments. The great herds of Mongo-lian gazelle can no longer migrate across the barbed wire fences that separate the three countries. The colonies of marmots that

Brown shrike

Cormorant

Black-winged stilt

The water and dampness P A G E 7 B I O D I V E R S I T Y D I A R Y

used to dot the grasslands in huge numbers are totally destroyed by deliberate hunting whilst even the modest pikas and voles face chemical attack from what most ecologists believe to be mis-guided agricultural poli-cies. We saw one fox, but local fence build-ers said they had never seen a wolf. We saw few birds of prey and the grasslands are heavily degraded. The future is uncertain and across the fences in Mongolia and Russia, their parallel efforts also face great chal-lenges.

Common tern fishing

Citrine wagtail

Bath White butterfly

Common Shelduck

Sand martins in flight

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Verdent landscape Drinking vodka with the Mongolian delegates to the workshop beside a great lake, whilst horses grazed in the sunset, and a bittern boomed its magical calls in the distance, it was possible to revoke memories of the former wildness of this place. We can only hope that a balance can be reached and policies adopted that will allow enough of nature to sur-vive for both the cultural and eco-logical well-being of this fascinating region.

The fox

creeps

away over

the vast

grasslands

B I O D I V E R S I T Y D I A R Y

White-winged tern in

flight

Scottish lochs far from home !

Demoiselle cranes

Ground squirrel on the run

Of winds, horses and sunsets P A G E 9 B I O D I V E R S I T Y D I A R Y

White-winged terns

Black-eared kite

The vast Hulunbeir grassland can easily turn everything wild. When our four-wheel drive vehicle was racing with the wind in the endless green and blue, the two crazy ornithologists on board would shout “stop” at any time. I soon got used to poising myself in the sudden halt to avoid dashing into the wind shield from the rear seat. After every “stop”, we would go back slowly to the place where the “stop” took place – where they saw some flying or standing ob-jects or even the shadow of these objects – birds. We had to stay in the car to observe these beautiful creatures with binoculars and took photos of them through the open window. Birds are alert and swift animals. Although they were familiar with the noise of engines and passing vehicles, even the tiny sound of our approach would drive them away in two seconds. John said that was because our way to approach them – a sudden stop and then slowly creeping backward – is the typical practice of a predator.

Trip to Hulunbeir Tracy Peng Ning

The driver experienced a difficult time to get accustomed to his new position as a driver for nature photographer, until he learnt the correct way of driving close to the birds from Spike in Wulan Nurr wetland in Dalai Lake National Nature Reserve. Wulan Nurr wet-land is a breeding place for many rare water-birds and important stopover for migratory birds, including swan geese, common shelducks, demoiselle cranes, Pallas’s sand-grouse, etc. With a special permission, we drove along the shore of the wetland to ob-serve and film birds. We adopted a strategy not to interrupt the normal life of these birds. We were observers, and only observers. After several successes in startling the birds, Spike decided to take the driver’s place and dem-onstrated how bird whisperer and profes-sional nature photographer drive to the birds. The two enthusiastic birdmen took control of the car and we spent half a day following swan geese, Pallas’s sand-grouse, curlews and gulls back and forth for a good photo.

Kestrel hovers in search of rodents

It was nearly a miracle to me that they could identify at one glance the species of any flying suspects, even from a very long distance. More impressive was their passion to the birds. If not pushed by the tight itinerary, they might have spent the rest of the day there watching birds. Maybe that’s what set them apart from ordinary people like me. Since I had neither suitable device nor enthusiasm for bird watching, I was more willing to watch the ground squirrel fam-ily by the Morgele River, take pictures of the cows, the sheep and the horses in the summer pastures, or sing by the lake in Huhe Nurr while enjoying the spectacular sunset of the grass-land. In fact, in this wilderness of green, one could choose any way to communicate with nature and definitely grow wild in such circumstance. This was my first time to a world full of unfenced wildlife, a life-changing experience, and I wish I could come back to this wild place and never leave again.

EU-China Biodiversity Programme Add: Rm. 503, FECO Plaza, Houy-ingfang Hutong, Xicheng District, Beijing. 100035, P.R. China Fax: (+8610) 8220 5421 Email: info@ecbp.cn