The July outing started at 6:00am on 16 July 2011. We didn’t expect much as all the pelagic birds show be on their Northern nesting grounds. And sure enough, we saw mainly just resident birds. The usual numbers of swiftlets, a Brahminy Kite, a White Bellied Sea Eagle, several Grey Herons. The only terns seen where several Little Terns and Swift Terns, but there were no terns perched on the usual buoys. The bird of the day was a single Great billed Heron on St. John’s island.
Noteably absent from the July outing were Colin Poole and Subaraj who have been on most all the outings, but joining us was Lim Kim Seng. With the lack of birds we had some time to enjoy the abundant ship traffic in the Staits of Singapore.
One interesting sight were several barges loaded with hulls of ships heading to be scrapped.
We also observed several ships with a flag of convenience in the Marshall Islands, Majuro being the capital. The Marshall Islands was also the flag of convenience for the drilling rig, Deepwater Horizon, which blew up in the Gulf of Mexico creating a huge oil spill. But this particular vessel looks okay.
