29th October 2009: Kampung Pertama, mainland Penang

I spent the last couple of daylight hours at the ricefields today, and picked up a 'state tick' - the first Temminck's Stint I have seen in Penang!







There's not much you can say about Temminck's plumage-wise - they're just very plain grey above compared to Long-toed.



They have quite a distinctive unstreaked grey breast band.



And a feeding rhythm that might be described as sluggish, as the video shows.

I spent some time searching the Pacific Golden Plover flock for the colour-banded bird I released 9 days ago, but the birds had moved into a new field with much more vegetation, making it much more difficult to see legs, so I didn't succeed.





I was surprised to see a cracking breeding plumaged male in the flock. It was the only bird with any breeding feathers at all, and it still appeared to be in pristine condition. Very strange!