Po Toi Islands

Po Toi is a small chain of off-shore islands at the southern end of Hong Kong. I planned a 2-day camping trip over a weekend to these islands with my dad

We left for the islands at the Aberdeen pier at 10 am, I already started seeing birds in the harbour

After about a 30-minute journey, the boat arrived at the islands. The Po Toi islands are composed of 2 sections, the main island and a smaller island at the southern end of this island chain called Ngong Chong. Most of the birds dwell within the forests on the main island while the campsites are situated on Ngong Chong, which has more attractions and more scenic

After setting up camp on top of a hill at Ngong Chong, I wasted no time exploring the island. I started off at Ngong Chong first, where there is a massive rock cliff formation kinda thing called Nam Kok Tsui

Saw the first few signs of wildlife of the entire trip, a butterfly and a pacific reef heron

Stunning **blue moon butterfly** on the rock formations

The time was about 12 pm and we headed to one of the two only cafeterias on the island and enjoyed a quick lunch

Beside the cafeteria that we ate in, there is a small garden next to it. There are some plants growing on some bamboo fences to attract birds

The place was teeming with life, I saw multiple light-vented and red-whiskered bulbuls surrounding the area. There was also this new species of dove that looks absolutely stunning

That was until two very special guests showed up, the first one being a dusky warbler who only stayed for a quick snack

The **dusky warbler** looking for food on the plants

Soon after the warbler left, a very tiny, blue head popped out from the bushes beside these fences and start feeding around the place

This bird did not show up on websites when I was researching about the biodiversity on these islands

This bird is now my favorite, tied with the common kingfisher

This interaction made my day, as I didn’t expect to see such a beauty show up right as the trip begins

It stayed for 10 minutes, in and out of my sight before he went on his way

I decided to then trek deeper into the woods. The forest on the main island has several routes leading to its centre, where all the trails intersect and form a junction. I was walking up one of the trails when I scared off a daurian redstart, didn’t see it on a branch beside me and it flew towards the centre junction area. I turned a corner and boom, there is was, right on a branch so close to me that I could make out the details of its feathers

A very crisp image of the **daurian redstart**

As I continued, I came across bushes filled with red flowers on both sides of a path and they look pretty familiar. Then it struck me, it’s the same flowers that I saw the fork-tailed sunbird feeding on at Tai Po Kau

A shadowy figure was moving about in the bush on my right, and I managed to take this perfect shot of a female fork-tailed sunbird hanging off a flower feeding on it

Just wish that there was more light to illuminate the bird

A **male fork-tailed sunbird** joined the female soon after

There wasn’t much natural sunlight as it was a cloudy day, which led to me using a higher ISO value and caused the grains in these two photos

Always happy to see a familiar face!

This pretty much sums up the results of my first day on the island. On the second day, I woke up early to give myself a head-start with birding. While heading towards the main island from Ngong Chong, I saw these birds

A **blue rock thrush** on an early morning

A **female daurian redstart** on a railing

A **black kite** on top of the lighthouse at Ngong Chong, I digitally zoomed in on the bird as I was too far away, reducing the image quality

After arriving at the main island, I decided to go visit the flower bushes again to see if I can get any better pictures of the fork-tailed sunbirds as I wasn’t exactly happy with the results I got from day 1. And since our ferry home leaves at noon, it didn’t leave me enough time to visit some other spots within the forest

“The early bird gets the worm”, but in this case - nectar. When I arrived at the bush there were already several sunbirds calling out so I silenced my footsteps and approached the bushes from a different and higher vantage point than day 1

And I got another ideal picture of the sunbird

Still quite grainy, but much better than the photo from day 1

Also saw this **striated yuhina**, almost mistook it as a bulbul from afar

At 12 pm, I left the island with a smiling face

This trip was full of surprises, the exact kind of relaxation I needed after a long week of exams

Thanks for reading :)

2nd trip to Nam Sang Wai

Nam Sang Wai