Baling 100703

A second visit to Baling. After the brief survey done, we found out this place is rather interesting in terms of birdlife. This time i brought Choo Eng  along to help me on the birds checklist.

As we thought, Bukit Palong is indeed an amazing area for birding. There were lots of birds and i bet there will be more if we arrived much earlier. Here are some which i manage to photographed,

A mystery swift, quite big and finally i assume the best candidate would be house swift though i didn't see any white on the rump...any verdict,anyone..

Black Bellied Malkoha, separated fron the green billed by not having a white bordering around the red facial skin and appear to be smaller with shorter tail.

A surprising find, Black Eagle. It suddenly glide in front of us. It was quite low but we were ocassionally blocked by trees when we want to get good photo of it. Maybe next time..

A bulbul which i thought to be grey cheeked but i'm wrong. Any verdict for this bird...

Quite a vocal bird with melodious calls..Grey Headed Canary Flycatcher,

There were two red bearded bee eater chasing each other but this is the best i could get,

Scaly Breasted Bulbul. A beautiful bird,pity angle was too acute..

Another surprising find, Sultan Tit.

A flock of 10 White Eye flying around but they hardly stay still. After reviewing this shot and comparing them to the field guide, i assume this is Everett's White Eye. It doesn't seems to have the yellow forehead to be oriental...correct me if i'm wrong.

Yellow Eared Spiderhunter...

After Bukit Palong (which is in Compartment 4), we went to other Compartments of Gunung Inas Forest Reserve to check our mist nets and harp traps. After only a single individual caught during the the first visit,this visit is quite fruitful for this flying mammal,

Hipposideros larvatus                                                 Hipposideros diadema     

Hipposideros sabanus                Kerivoula minuta            

Murina cyclotis                   Rhinolophus trifoliatus

Some of the none-flying mammals ..

Common Palm Civet

Wild Pig.

This bird was sighted feeding its young. Didin't manage to get a better shot than this as it was always hidden.

Great Iora,

We might come back for the last visit as we found a very nice river in Compartment 9. It might be suitable for some good herpetofauna. Look out for my next write up. Thanks.

Baling 100620

I was invited by Dr Shahrul and his team from School of Biological Sciences to do a small survey at Baling. This is the result preliminary survey...


A view of a nice limestone hill just beside Baling town...don't know the hill name. Baling hill perhaps.

This shot was taken from the hotel we stay, Bayu Hotel.

During this preliminary survey, i didn't really had the time to do birding as we are busy going back n forth in the van to locate all the area the survey to be done. We mainly concentrate on the herpetofauna and bats.

here are some of the catch..

A lame attempt on wide angle of juvenile Tropidolaemus wagleri, Wagler's Pit Viper

Another wide shot of Duttaphrynus melanostictus, Common Sunda Toad

A glossy swiftlet (correct me if i'm wrong)

I didn't know they have feather on the toe...

The nest...

A wide shot of male great anglehead lizard. The lighting was harsh..

The only catch for the harp trap, Hipposideros diadema,

Hylarana labiallis, White lipped Frog,

Quite an unexpected find, Philautus parvulus,

Ptychozoon lionotum, Smooth backed gliding lizard. My lifer...

Triangle keelback,

Xenophrys aceras, Perak spadefoot frog.

 

What a nice place...i'll surely come back to do a proper bird checklist for this area...

Taman Negara

I've been given a chance to give lecture and field training to the University of Victoria, Canada students in the Tropical Field School Programme organized by School of Biological Sciences. It was a great experience but pity i don't have time to do herping in this magnificent forest of Taman Negara. I still remeber, back in 2002, i spent a month in this jungle doing my final year project research on fish diversity along Tahan river. Sleeping in an A tent, with all the tigers n elephants. Kinda creepy! Now this how the place looks like,

With toilets, small cafe, feeding platform and a nice jungle chalet. Last time, my campsite was on the rock at the right....

I'm just glad the Kelah or Malaysian Mahseer still thrive in the area...just like when we first feed them with pellets.

This trip was on 4th June 2010. We stays at Traveller's Home chalet, Kuala Tahan.

We make our way to the Canopy Walkway by boat and head back by trekking through the Bukit Teresek trail to Kuala Tahan.

The canopy walk...

Gonocephalus bellii,Bell's Anglehead Lizard. Sighted at the Canopy walk.

Some of the birds sighted or heard are the wreathed hornbill, blue crowned hanging parrot, long tailed parakeet and many others. For complete list please refer at www.worldbirds.org/malaysia.

Blue Rumped Parrot



Crested Fireback


Green Broadbill,Female



Green Broadbill,male.


We also spent one night at Cegar Anjing Hide. And it produces a lot of night birds for me such as frogmouths and owls. But pity, we didn't see any mammals at the salt-licks except wild boar.

Asian Openbill

After a week of the sighting of the Asian Openbill by Hakim, i decided to search for the bird during the weekend with a hope that the bird will remain in the area. I called Hakim and booked him as my guide, as i'm not really familiar with the area.

We met at Petronas BKE at around 7.30 am. We make our way to the openbill site at around 7.45am. When we arrived, the bird is still around. Thank God!

It was quite far from the main road and we decided to walk a bit to get a closer view. What a nice lifer for the weekend.

 

 

I must thank Hakim for bringing me here. After the openbill there was nothing much to be seen. I was also hoping to see the Aquillas but they were nowhere to be seen. Some other good bird that we saw are snipes, peregrine falcon (too far) and black kites. On our way out of the openbill site, we met with Khoo Swee Seng n wife from MNS Selangor.

After none of the Aquillas showed up, we decided to go to Air Itam Dalam as Hakim said he didn't know where the spotted wood owl tree was. Air Itam Dalam was also quite disappointing, we didn't see the owls! On our way out we met with Mr n Mrs Hum. There were not much bird except green billed malkoha, arctic warbler, black kites, stork billed kingfisher and we heard the mangrove pitta calling but couldn't see it.

After Air Itam Dalam, Hakim and i decided to go to Teluk Air Tawar as Mr n Mrs Hum said there was black headed gull seen earlier in the morning. Hakim also thought he saw a cormorant flying along the new expressway. So another place to check.
When we arrive the tide was coming up and the birds was quite close. No black headed gull but here are some others, i hope my identifications are correct,

Curlew sandpiper, thanks to Dave for id

 

Whimbrel,

 

After 1/2 an hour, no black headed gull showed up. So we decided to go off. I sent Hakim back and drove back to Penang. On my way back i was thinking about the Chinese Egret sighted at the Jelutong expressway. The was quite right, so i decided to stop by for check. I was unlucky coz the bird was not around. This is little egret,

The bird was hunting and i noticed the behaviour as written in guidebooks, it will use its feet to chase the fish to the surface before catching them. Here is the link to the video but it was a bit blocked.
Little Egret hunting


What a weekend....

Bukit Wang (Herpetofauna) 30/1/2010

Now come to the herps n night birds.

While waiting for the honeyguide, i saw this flying lizard which happens to be the rarest of them all. A Draco fimbriatus (was cristatellus, and now the original fimbriatus is called abbreviatus),




After getting a good rest in the hotel we head out for the night hunt. The first one that we saw was a bird, a Javan Frogmouth. It as spotted by Jasmine after 10 minutes of search. Thanks Jas.



After finished with the Javan frogmouth, we suddenly heard a Tockay gecko call. It was quite high and far but the call of this species is distinctive. What a good start!
While moving along the trail we tried to check for owls but none is heard neither seen.

Afterward me, Hor Kee n Evan decided to go in to the riverside while Jas n John was to tired to tag along.

Some of the herps we encountered,

Microhya berdmorei, Berdmore's narrow mouth frog.



On left is the calling male while on right is a couple on amplexus. I manage to record the call of this frog for the first time. Before this all the encounter with this species is voiceless.

A Eutropis multifasciata, Many lined Sun Skink,


Quite weird to see this fella who usually forage during daytime, at night. Its getting more and more interesting when Evan found this,


A Cyrtodactylus macrotuberculatus, bent toed gecko. This is the second record of the species which was thought to be endemic to Langkawi island, on mainland Peninsular. The first record was my encounter with it at Tupah, also in Kedah.

On our way back i saw a reticulated python underneath the concrete path but it decided to hide itself in.

After two hours of herping we decided to go back. On our way back Hor Kee saw a snake underneath a concrete bridge. He thought it was another reticulated python but it turns out to be a keeled ratsnake, Ptyas carinatus. A huge one, Evan was so excited he decide to catch it and pose it for us. What he got, he turns to be one smelly guy coz of the snake musk! Hehe...Thanks Evan.



This snake usually mistaken for a king cobra but a closer look would reveal the prominent stripes along the end part of the body. The scalation on the head is also different.

Other animals that we saw that night was a slow loris and a small toothed palm civet.

Turns out to be a very nice trip for both herps and birds. Thanks to Hor Kee and Evan for inviting me.

Bkt Wang 30/2/2010

After taking the Taiga Flycatcher at Bukit Wang, i was tempted to come again to Bukit Wang. Taiga was only taken outside at the parking lot as i don't have much time to do extra birding.

I received a call from Hor Kee asking whether i'm interested to go for an overnight trip to Bukit Wang. I can't resist as spending the night there means i'll also got the chance to go for herping. Moreover, Evan, my herping partner is coming along.

On birding point of view,this area has many good species in its list after the visit by Choo Eng and Choy Wai Mun earlier.

As i arrive around 10.45am, i heard a banded bay cuckoo calling quite close to the roadside but i didn't manage to see nor to lure it out. While waiting for it i heard a blue crowned hanging parrot call. I couldn't locate it and suddenly i saw a man taking down a trap called 'jebak' in Malay. This trap has a captive bird in it (in this case a blue crowned) which was use as a lure to capture other individual of the same species. So i decided to move on...

I made another stop after hearing a lot of barbets call. Pity i couldn't locate any of them. Some of them are Gold Whiskered, Blue Eared, Yellow Crowned and Brown Barbet. Some other birds from the same area are streaked bulbul, asian fairy bluebird, olive winged bulbul, spectacled bulbul and this yellow breasted flowerpecker. It perched quite low while eating a fruit from 'senduduk' tree.

After continuing my journey, suddenly i heard a malaysian honeyguide calling. I waited for half an hour before i could locate the bird. Quite high up but at least i got a record shot. Here it is,

While looking for this honeyguide lots of others are around. Some of them,

Chestnut breasted malkoha, not the best but just as record,

An asian paradise flycatcher, a male brown morph,

A grey breasted spiderhunter, taking nectar from the flower planted by somebody along the trail,

An orange breasted trogon, but a bit high for a decent shot,



A grey rumped treeswift,




One more high flyer, a swiftlet but not sure which one,



A far far away black thighed falconet,


A tiger shrike,


A black winged flycatcher shrike,


I also saw a pair of wreathed hornbill flying quite low but didn't have the chance to photograph it as i was busy looking for the honeyguide.

After a long stop,i decided to call Hor Kee asking where thay are but the phone coverage is quite bad. I manage to send sms to him and he said they are already far in. After telling him about the honeyguide he insist to come out and meet me. He also said that he met John and Jasmine from MNS Selangor. After meeting them, i showed them the honeyguide which happens to be still on the same perch. It was a lifer for John and Jasmine. Their shots are much better than mine! Hehe..nevermind seeing it is more than enough for me.

They told me there was a bat hawk perching on nearby tree, so i went for a photograph, was still around but a bit high. Good enough for me.




After birding since morning we decided to go to Jitra and check-in to our hotel. It was PJ2 hotel and turns out quite nice for RM80 per night.

I will put out the herping result in next post.