Vietnam Report

Well, there were many jobs competing for my time besides the report on the Vietnam trip, but the report is finally available. See https://goo.gl/ZdhirL

Report on Cambodia Portion of Recent Trip

The PDF version of our trip report is available online: https://goo.gl/q8JDq7. Linda still hasn't reviewed it, so changes are possible. Comments are welcome.

Vietnam Laughing Thrushes

We have a rare afternoon off today, which is a good thing as there is a torrential rain going on, despite this being the dry season.

We are finding the birding in V difficult. Many of the species are shy and skulking. Yesterday, we focused attention on two species of Laughing Thrushes. We saw our first LT in Bhutan years ago, the spectacular White-crested LT. This turns out to be the easy one to see. All the others have proved either impossible (Orange-bellied) or difficult (the others).

We saw the first of the pair, Black-collared Laughing Thrush as we watched 10 of them fly across the road one at a time. We did have good looks at some of them as they neared one side of the road before taking off.

That was a prelude to the main event, the search for the Chestnut-eared. Our guide, Bao, heard the bird and played a recording to lure it closer. Eventually, we saw one zip across a trail in the forest from right to left. Then, we saw it zip across the trail from left to right.

This bit of teasing lasted for about an hour, during which we saw one, or probably two, birds repeatedly. I was beginning to wonder if we would ever see them well. Bao put some meal worms on the trail as an additional lure. That worked. One bird stopped for about a second during the zip to snatch a treat.

We continued watching, catching tantalizing glimpses of the birds at the edge of the trail. Finally, one bird stopped for a few seconds at the meal worm spot, long enough to provide everyone in our group a "countable tick."

High fives all around.

Nguyen Bao, our guide for the trip, was one of the people to rediscover this bird in 1998, and his photo from 2010 is the gold standard for this species. Needless to say, we did not get a good shot of either of these two Laughing Thrushes.

We did get a wonderful photo of two Crested Treeswifts as the female preened the male. Photos in Vietnam have been few. I'll try posting some later.

Joining the Women's March in Oakland

Here's what the Oakland Police had to say about the March:

About 60,000 people in #Oakland. Ogawa Plaza near capacity. Pedestrians should consider using 14th and 20th to reach Broadway. Pedestrian and vehicle traffic heavy #womensmarchoakland Later they added: The large Women’s March in downtown Oakland has stepped off. Motorists are advised that traffic along & near the March route will be impacted as the group makes its way to Frank H. Ogawa Plaza. Map below shows the planned route. Five of us from the neighborhood (3 women, 2 other) joined the throng.  Started by driving to the Rockridge BART. Realized the size of the crowd immediately. All cars heading in the direction of the March were overfull. This is the scene at the Lake Merritt BART station. We were all trying to get out. We got to the starting point in plenty of time. Milled around until everyone seemed to be ready to set off. No way! The crowd simply exceeded the capacity of the streets. We couldn't march. I commented, "I've seen better organized riots." At least everyone was in a good mood. Here's a shot of the crowd: In 2 hours, we had moved from the start to the OMCA museum. If you check back on the map you'll see that we weren't very far along the route. Fortunately, we were able to pop into the museum for a quick potty stop, then we headed home. The crowd in the Lake Merritt BART was still immense. BART responded to the circumstances by putting on special trains that bracketed the Lake Merritt stop by two stops in each direction. That seemed to work well, but everything was still crowded. We went to eat at someplace in the Rockridge area. Almost everything was jammed. Finally settled on Jules Thin Crust, a great choice. Pink pussy hats were everywhere. Best Sign of the Day: "My Grandma already did this!" Glad we added our voice to the clamour.

Another special birthday

My 72nd birthday falls on Thanksgiving Day this year, as it does every six or so. I have taken to celebrating all week, along with everyone else. This year is particularly interesting from a mathematical POV. Its prime decomposition is

72 = 8*9 = 2³ x 3²,

a pattern that won't occur again in my lifetime, at least if m,n > 1 and prime. The next candidate would be

2⁵ x 5² = 32 x 25 = 800.

Moreover, this birthday comes between two twin primes (71 and 73), so we have a nice series of interesting birthdays before we hit the doldrums at 74.

Birding milestones

Linda and I just returned from a trip to #Japan, a private tour with #MarkBrazil and some friends. In #Hokkaido, we both saw our 5000th world bird. Mine was a typical brown bird that I seem to have for milestones: several Eurasian Woodcocks displaying overhead while we waited for the Blakiston's Fish Owl to show up. (That would have been a spectacular bird for a milestone, and my companions suggested I fudge the numbers. I prefer my brown nondescripts.)

Linda hit 5000 on a stunning view of a singing male Siberian Rubythroat that used a nearby post as a perch for the display.

I have posted some photos at https://goo.gl/photos/EyhEvUGDRXzuZrf57, including the owl and rubythroat.

Coincidentally, Mark Brazil showed me my 4000th world bird on a trip to India a few years ago, a delightfully nondescript Blyth's Reed Warbler.

Comments are welcome.

Another Milestone

No, not a birding milestone this time. That we can expect later this year as we [finally] tally our 5000th species. We have 4915 species on our shared sightings list.

No, this is somewhat more mundane: Today Linda and I have been married for an amazing 50 years!

Claire, our daughter, who has some skin in the game, figured it out sometime ago, "It's lucky that you two found each other. No one else would put up with either one of you."

Au contraire, I think that almost everyone loves Linda, with the possible exception of her two sisters.

After thinking it over, I have come to the conclusion that there is only one good explanation: good sex.

Well, maybe birding figures in there somewhere. We've been doing it together for most of those 50 years.