| Where to Watch Birds in Korea: a few good hotspots.. |
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West coast
• Seosan, Cheonsu
Bay
Seosan City is located a little north of one of Korea's and
East Asia's best birding areas, Cheonsu Bay and the Seosan reclamation lakes and
rice-fields. Unlike other reclaimed areas, this vast artificial wetland is owned
privately (by Hyundai) and therefore, although the situation is slowly worsening
year by year, there is still limited infrastructure and disturbance, and much
potential to convert this into an eco-tourism center of excellence. You will
need a car to cover the area properly: concentrate your one or two days' efforts
on Reclamation Lake A and on the tidal-flats that stretch south of the lake.
-Star birds
In summer this is the core of Korea's fast
disappearing Watercock population, and the only nesting site for
Black-winged Stilt. In autumn and winter, Peak counts of 300 000 - 400
000 ducks and geese regularly contain over 200 000 Baikal Teal; the
massive geese flocks also often have a mix of rarer species in them (such as one
or two Snows or Canadas); and species such as Oriental White
Stork and Hooded Crane are regular. The range of raptors is
exceptional too, and in recent winters has included annual Steller's Sea
Eagle. Buntings, larks, pipts and wagtails are numerous in the open
rice-fields, while reedbeds support numerous Chinese Penduline Tits and
Pallas's Reed Buntings. The remaining tidal-flats too are excellent,
supporting 100-200 Saunders's Gulls in winter, Chinese Egrets in
autumn (up to 50) and several thousand shorebirds in spring and autumn.
• Geum River and Estuary
Like many places in Korea, the
habitat is significantly degraded, but still supports excellent numbers of
birds. Here at the Geum, local and national initiatives (under a
UNDP-GEF-Ministry of Environment wetlands Biodiversity project) are being taken
to begin to reverse habitat loss and involve local people in conservation. The
habitat here is divided into two: the reclamation lake and rice-fields
(especially near Napo Ri, where there is a birdwatching center of sorts), and
the tidal-flats downstream of the barrage, stretching to the fantastic Yubu
Island west of the river mouth.
-Star
birds
The reclamation lake usually holds 20 000 - 40 000 Baikal
Teal in the mid-winter period, and several thousand geese, including very
small numbers of Swan and Lesser White-fronted. From the barrage,
occasionally White Spoonbills and usually many Whooper Swans give
good views. The tidal-flats downstream of the barrage are excellent in April and
May for shorebirds, such as Sharp-tailed Sandpiper and Black-tailed
Godwit, but also including a wide diversity of the more regular species.
Ducks and gulls are very numerous in winter, including several thousand (or
nearly 50%) of the suspected population of the Eastern Oystercatcher, and
up to 500 Saunders's Gulls.
• Saemangeum
This is one of the most important areas for
shorebirds anywhere in the world, and though the government is still planning to
reclaim the entire area (comprising two estuaries, 25 000 ha of tidal-flats and
15 000 ha of shallows), some small hope remains that the project will be
cancelled before the sluice gates close, probably in 2006 or 2007.
-Star birds
When you think of birds in Korea,
you think big numbers...and
for big
numbers of shorebirds nowhere in the
Yellow Sea is better than
Saemangeum.
Up to 50 000 roost here at Okku. |
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This is the best place in the world to see the fast-declining
Spoon-billed Sandpiper and Nordmann's Greenshank, with recent peak
counts of 200 and 61 respectively. Up to 100 000 shorebirds are present at peak,
including seasonally several thousand Lesser Sand Plover, 40 000 articola
Dunlin and 60 000 Great Knot (the largest count in East Asia), as
well as small numbers of other endangered East Asian/Yellow Sea specialties,
such as Black-faced Spoonbill, and Chinese Egret and 650
Saunders's Gulls, or near 10% of the world's population of this species.
In recent winters, Red-crowned Crane has proven to be regular here too,
along with several thousand geese and often a huge number of other ducks.
Raptors can be numerous, as are other smaller birds, including hundreds of
Lapland Buntings as well as thousands of Rooks, carrying smaller
numbers of Daurian Jackdaws in their
flocks. |
• Haenam
The Haenam area north towards Mokpo contains 3 large and
one medium-sized reclamation lake, and a huge area of recently-created
rice-fields. Unlike Seosan, the area is being built up rapidly, and it is
difficult to predict the future value to birds. The Kochonnam Lake area, only 10
km out from Haenam, now tends to be the best area, though until 2001, the other
lakes were also extremely important for a wide range of wintering waterbirds and
raptors.
-Star birds
Here at Kocheonnam Lake, perhaps up
to 350 000 Baikal Teal have
been
"counted": the tiny dots are
just a very few of them... |
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Haenam has a similar range of birds to Seosan, until 2001 in even
larger numbers especially during the mid-winter freeze. Baikal Teal can
number 350 000 plus in this area (most of the world's population) and there are
usually several thousand geese. Such large concentrations of birds always
attract raptors: Eastern Imperial Eagle, Northern Goshawk and Eastern
Marsh Harrier are all regular, while Cinereous Vulture, Steller's Sea
Eagle and Saker Falcon have all been recorded. The tidal-flats
northward from the southern end of Kochonnam are always worth checking too: they
often have 1 or 2 Nordmann's Greenshanks in May and again in
October, and several thousand other shorebirds, especially in April. |
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