1 July 2011 In the afternoon Simon and I walked across the gravel plain to the base of the hills, much of the water and pools has dried up, seeped away leaving only a few wet spots. No sign or sound of any SBS in the time we were there. It was a warm day and the mosquitoes were active

30 June 2011 Simon and I walked to the shop which was shut, we found out later it was for a stock take and resupply so there may be some goodies on offer soon. We headed for the school to meet up with some of the teachers. We had met them at our Spoon-billed Sandpiper presentation a w

29 June 2011 I woke a few times, every hour and finally checked my clock to see it was now 0440. I had beaten my alarm clock which was set for 0500. I woke Nige and Simon, we had a coffee and got set up for the day. The weather was OK, cool and overcast but dry and not too windy. As w

28 June 2011 Liza visited and we had a very long talk over a plan for tomorrow and some other matters such as flights home and general logistics.  We have been here in Meinypylgyno for 33 days now but thoughts of our tactical withdrawal from our current base with what we hope are heal

27 June 2011 Jochen and Nikolay return to the lake to study the nest that was found great news.. another is found!

26 June 2011 Liza, Jochen and Egor were set to return from the search across the lake. Pavel and Nikolay were using the quad and boat to bring them back. The late news was that Jochen had found a nest.

28 June 2011 We’ve received some good news from HQ this week, the Australasian Wader Study Group of Birds Australia have generously donated approximately $6000 (Aus) towards the spoon-billed sandpiper appeal. It’s great to know that the work we are doing in the field is being recognis

A collection of images of the spoon-billed sandpiper taken by Jochen Dierschke

25 June 2011 I have been wondering how the team are doing across the water, we will find out later. It has been a foggy but still day. I joined Nikolay on the quad bike and we were out from 1000-1720hrs. We headed 15kms away to check a site that was still holding a territorial SBS las

24 June 2011 It was overcast and raining. Liza, Gerrit, Egor and Jochen all headed off 15km away to be boated to the other side of the lake to form a camp. They will check the shore and adjacent hills for new SBS territories and will be back on Sunday night. Nige and I have had a lot