Visits to Mount Silam, Lahad Datu and surrounding areas.

Some birds and a mammal on earlier visits to Mount Silam and surrounding areas.



Green Imperial Pigeon (Ducula aenea). Pied Imperial Pigeons  (Ducula bicolor) and Black-naped Fruit Dove (Ptilinopus malanospila), resident on off-shore islands are also reported to visit Silam coast.

Little Spiderhunter (Arachnothera longirostra)

Rufous-winged Philentoma (Philenthoma pyrhopterum)

Brown Fulvetta (Alcippe brunneicauda)

Moustached Babbler (Malacopteron magnirostre)

Erpornis (Erpornis zantholeuca)

Greater Mouse-deer (Tragulus napu)

White-crowned Shama (Copsychus stricklandii)

White-crowned Shama (Copsychus stricklandii)

Black Eagle (Ictinaetus malayensis)

White-bellied Sea Eagle (Haliaeetus leucogaster)

Temminck's Sunbird (Aethopyga temminckii), generally a bird of higher altitude.

Cream-vented Bulbul (Pycnonotus simplex)

Heard there are other rare treasures there, will try again some other day.

Happy birding.

Pilgrimage to Bornean Peacock Pheasant's shrine.

I visited Sungai Wain Protection Forest in Kalimantan Timur, Indonesian Borneo at the end of March 2014 to try my luck on the super rare endemic Bornean Peacock Pheasant Polyplectron schleiermacheri. I only present some images for the trip here, further info on Sungai Wain Protection Forest are readily available from the Internet.

We flew from Tawau to Tarakan via Maswing and took a domestic flight from Tarakan to Balikpapan, the rest of the journey was by road.

Aerial view of areas around Tarakan on approach, I think these are aquaculture ponds.

 Warning sign before approaching PERTAMINA's water reservoir.  

 PERTAMINA's water reservoir in front of the Kampung Sungai Wain entrance to the Protection forest, I was told this was built during the Dutch colonial era.

 Notice board at the entrance of Protection forest, listing the prohibited activities.

 Boardwalk over peat swamp at the entrance.

 Another section of Boardwalk.

 Resting platform. We need to cross the boardwalk before reaching the forest proper.

 First camp, where we stop to rest and eat.

 Our homestay house.

 View of Kampung Sungai Wain, near the entrance to the Protection Forest.

 View from the back of our homestay house.

Mobile hawker of Sungai Wain

 Malaysian Honeyguide Indicator archipelagicus, a rare bird in Sabah, my 1st lifer.

 Garnet Pitta Pitta granatina, a bird that does not occur in Sabah, another lifer.

 Plantive Cuckoo Cacomantis merulinus

 Dusky Munia Lonchura fuscan, a Bornean endemic.

 Abott's Babbler Trichastoma abbotti, my third lifer. This species is super rare in Sabah.Note its longer tail and different call as both this and the very similar looking Horsfield's Babbler Trichastoma sepiarium occur here.

 Abbott's Babbler

Horsfield's Babbler, sharing similar habitats with Abbott's Babbler, note its short tail.

 Sooty-headed Bulbul Pycnonotus aurigaster, another lifer. This species was first recorded in Borneo in Palangkarya, Kalimantan Tengah in 1984, it has now established itself in south-east Borneo.

Little Spiderhunter Arachnothera longirostra.

 Female Borneo Peacock Pheasant, heavily cropped from the image below (head is blocked).

 Uncropped image of the above image, you can see twigs, leaves, and branches working against you while you try to take a clear shot of the pheasant.

 Uncropped image showing an out-of-focus male.

 Crop of the above image, you can see the unmistakable head pattern of the male Peacock Pheasant here, with its white throat and red eye patch.

This is an in-focus shot of the back and tail of the male with its head blocked from view.

The star of the trip is the Peacock Pheasant, Sungai Wain is may be the easiest place in Borneo to see it. To take a good photo is another matter altogether as all ground birds are tough to photograph, they are more often than not blocked by foliage, twigs, undergrowth and stumps. 

Happy birding.

Photodocument of Wild Birds of Borneo

Standard References for my blog



Whitehead's Spiderhunter Fiesta

Bird photographers and visiting birders in Sabah were all excited since the beginning of December,  as happening somewhere in Sabah, the most elusive of the three Whitehead's, Whitehead's Spiderhunter Arachnothera juliae, could be guaranteed seen and photographed in good light from less than 15 meters away.

At Rafflesia Forest Reserve, along Tambunan Penampang highway, a small tree, less than 10 meters tall, was in bloom with pink flowers at its canopy, and Whitehead's Spiderhunter could be seen feeding on nectar among the flower clusters at regular intervals throughout the day. For each visit, it would  stay and feed on average for a few minutes, hopping merrily from twig to twig prodding its long bill and extending its hair like tongue into the longish bell-shaped flowers, oblivious both to the people watching and to the noisy heavy traffic passing underneath.

The maximum number of bird seen feeding at any one time was three, I was lucky to witness two feeding at the same time. Interestingly, Whitehead's Spiderhunter seemed to be the only bird species feeding there, the Sunbirds and Flowerpeckers busy feeding on the opposite side of the highway were not interested in this flower at all. No other bird was seen feeding on this tree during the intervals when the spiderhunter was away.

Whitehead's Spiderhunter is one of the most sought-after Whitehead's in Borneo, as one could have tried for years before being rewarded with a view of it far away on the canopy of a flowering tree. You can imagine the amount of hoo-ha it generates among the interested people as it can be assured of feeding daily at that tree, occasionally up to three birds at the same time.

The flowering tree is just across the highway from the gate of Rafflesia Information Centre, observers and photographers would set up opposite near the gate which is slightly over 12 meters across the highway from the tree, considering the two-laned highway of approximately 9 to 10 meters wide.

Mr Kong Ket Leong and I drove from Tawau on 14th December (in the third week after first discovery of the feeding), as the pressure was mounting  after being told that the flowers might not last longer than another week, and only God knew when it would bloom again. 

I do not know the name of the tree. I have also not heard nor read about this feeding before as anything of this nature involving a Whitehead's would be big news to people who are interested.

Does the tree flower yearly? I do not know, as I have not heard of this feeding frenzy last year nor the year before. Sabah has been quite active in the birding scene for at least the past six or seven years, so I opine that anything of this nature in this relatively short history of bird watching/photography would have been hotly circulated as it does now, thus I think this has not happened before. The tree just might flower irregularly and erratically, may be once in an unknown number of years or on certain unknown trigger.

On the other hand, as the flowering tree is less than 10 meters tall and its girth not bigger than a power line pole, it might very well be flowering for the first time and hence the lack of any previous observation.

If the tree is indeed flowering for the first time and if it blooms annually, we can have a yearly Whitehead's Spiderhunter Festival there for birders and photographers. We will only know about that next year, and at the meantime we do what good birders do, we wait.

(Note: this is the unedited version submitted for publication in December 2013 issue of Suara Enggang. The flower is subsequently identified to be Wightia borneensis.)

Happy birding.

Photodocument of Wild Birds of Borneo

Standard References for my blog

Gunung Lucia of Tawau Hills Park, Part 2.

Here are the birds that I managed to photograph, the punishing terrains as well as the long jungle trekking preclude us from lugging our usual bird photography gears, hence most images are only good for record.

 Eyebrowed Wren-babbler Napothera epilepidota, my lifer,  scarce sub-montane and montane resident, a small terrestrial wren babbler with very short tail, seen once below Lucia Camp and once above. It can be distinguished from the similar endemic Mountain Wren-babbler Napothera crassa by white spots on tips of its wing covert feathers.

 Endemic Blue-banded Pitta Pitta arquata, one of the most sought-after pittas, my only other lifer for the trip,  an elusive slope specialist, saw it once and photographed under very dark forest cover.

 

 Red-bearded Bee-eater Nyctyornis amictus, resident near Lucia Camp.

 Endemic Bonean Spiderhunter Arachnothera everetti, another resident near Lucia Camp.

 Cinereous Bulbul Hemixos cinereus, feeding on trees next to the Helipad above Lucia Camp.

 Ashy Drongo Dicrurus leucophaeus, most probably the only place to see this sub-montane and montane bird in Tawau is here in Lucia and Magdelena.

 Spotted Fantail Rhipidura perlata, occurs from lowland to montane forests, my second encounter in Tawau Hills Park.

 Dark-sided Flycatcher Muscicapa sibirica above 900 m, a common northern winter migrant to Borneo, from my observation, it is commoner than Asian Brown Flycatcher Muscicapa dauurica.

 Orange-breasted Trogon Harpactes oreskios, a mainly sub-montnae species, quite a number of birds were heard above the Lucia Camp approaching the Summit, but not easy to take good photograph.

 A young Moustached Babbler Malacopteron magnirostre , feeding next to the Helipad above Lucia Camp, around 1,000 m.

 An evidently nesting Grey-chested Jungle Flycatcher Rhinomyias umbrantilis, between Lucia Camp and Summit, around 1,000 m, contrary to 500 m as stated  in Myers.

An endemic female Bornean Banded Pitta Pitta schwaneri,  it had been calling from its road side perch, I mistook its call for something else, as it sounded coarser than those on record.

Other birds heard or seen but not photographed are:-
Brown Fulvetta (heard almost along the entire journey,  to well over 1,000 m).
Yellow-rumped Flowerpecker (the only Flowerpecker seen, feeding infront of the Lucia Camp).
Great Argus (heard and seen a pair crossing the trail).
Spectacled Bulbul (seen feeding above Lucia Camp).
Brown Barbet (seen feeding above Lucia Camp).
Asian Paradise Flycatcher (seen feeding near Lucia Camp).
Verditor Flycatcher (seen feeding near Lucia Camp).
Bold-striped Tit Babbler (seen feeding near Lucia Camp).

Happy birding.

Photodocument of the wild birds of Borneo.

Standard references for my blog.