Getting up close

Oriental Pied Hornbill

The last day in Malaysia back in March. To be honest it was nothing more than a day of travel back to the airport. We had seen a few sightings of this species on our travels but usually in flight and distant so when Paul shouted stop (in the fast lane of a dual carriageway) we knew it must be worth stopping for.

We pulled off the carriageway and turned around back towards the bird where it was showing at the back of a small cafe in a banana plantation.

With a little stealth we were able to inch closer (much to the amazement of the people dinning who obviously thought we were a little crazy creeping up on a bird that they had probably spent days and days ignoring)

it turned around and for a moment it looked like it was going to fly off

however it weight us up and decided that he could afford us a little more exposure

full frontal! an unuasual angle

sitting pretty

up close and personal

Field craft? or just a stroke of luck?

I think the latter on this occasion

Far out in the East: Week 2 Days 7 - 8

The journey had taken us North of the country to Malaysias national park...... Taman Negara. Since the original planning of the trip this was the bit I had really been looking forward to..... birding around parts of the worlds oldest rain-forest or is that jungle? anyway anticipation was high.

The first full days in the forest

I only had two expectations, one was to see the target bird..... Great Argus, the second was to enjoy countless new species of bird, mammal and insect in the wonderful rain forest environment.

The camp grounds provided the easiest birding: A handy fruiting tree close to the chalet provided some early morning entertainment..... although most of the action happened way up in the tree canopy some species gave good views

Asian Fairy Bluebird

while this pair of Chestnut Breasted Malkoha actually came lower down to check me out

Unsurprisingly we did well for woodpecker species, this Banded Woodpecker was one of a dozen or so seen on the trip



Not all the action happened under the canopy, this Brown Barbet had spotted a fruiting bush along one of the trails

The dappled light and dense vegatation always made photography hardwork, however the wonderful Black & Red Broadbill became quite a regular, we even had a sighting in the garden of our chalet

beakless..... and the only sighting I managed of this Banded Kingfisher

another species that popped up now and again were the Red Rumped Trogans

Plenty of other species were seen, but all too often gone in the blink of an eye, Great Iora, Eastern Crowned Warblers, White Rumped Sharma, a single Banded Pitta that took 3 of us 15 minutes to see while the fourth guy tried valiantly to point it out to us...... eventualy on hands and knees we spotted it through incredibly dense vegatation.... phew!!

Inbetween all this of course we were concious of the wereabouts of the Great Argus.... we past its favoured locations while walking a number of trails..... we even made 2 journies especially to see this species, sadely both days turned up nothing...... no problem we shall try again tomorrow.

of course it didnt stop us picking up more species, Raffles Malkoha, Asian Paradise Flycathers... including the incredible white morph, Black Thighed Falconette, Yellow & Black Broadbill, Striped Tit Babbler, Black naped Monarch, Olive backed Woodpeckers, Greater Coucal and plenty of Bulbul species.

Ashy Minivet

Chestnut winged Babbler

Far out in the east... Day 7

End of week 1 and a day of travel.  We are now heading for the rain-forest of Taman Negara. The weather had given out to be wet, which you dont mind too much while travelling, however it stayed dry until we reached our destination.
A quick check of the hotel gounds before we left Frasers Hill.... a few now familiar faces showed up

Long Tailed Sibia

the funky Chestnut Capped Laughingthrush

but best of all this fella....

Chestnut Crowned Laughingthrush

We had not picked up this species while at Frasers Hill, so to get it as we left the grounds of the hotel was a bonus... even if I did manage to chop his head of the image....

..... however the best was yet to come. One of the target birds for the location was the

Red bearded Bee-eater

we had mangaed to miss it during the 3 day stay, so we were a little disapointed to be leaving without seeing it, by a huge stroke of luck, we had stopped in the town for petrol when a chinese visitor noticed binoculars around our necks and asked if we had seen the Bee -eater...."no"

"Go back upto the town and out the otherside look for a hotel with a checkpoint hut and search around there"

We had 30 minutes before the road opened to leave the site... within 10 minutes were onto a pair

How about that for a spot of luck......

  

we had to drag ourselves away... it was hard but we had a long journey ahead.

We knew we may be able to get Whiskered Tree Swifts somewhere along the journey.... we just wernt quite sure where.... after a few hours of driving Jeff pulled the car up to a halt fairly sharpish and told me to look at the tree we had just passed....

some eye sight or what

Whiskered Tree Swift.... its a stunning bird

in more or less the same location we picked up this brilliant

Thick Billed SpiderHunter

as well as this

Oriental Honey Buzzard

Gey Rumped Treeswift, Needletails and Baya Weavers were all located, although this is as near to a Baya weaver the camera got..... there nests!!

..... SOMETIME LATER!

We arrive at the river.... park the car and get the river taxi with the luggage, its all forest from now on.

Excited? ..... very

Quickly got these characters on the hotel grounds

Thick Billed Green Pigeons

Drop the bags off and have a quick wander into the trees, easy peasy...

female Red Naped Trogan

soon after

Rufous Woodpecked

But be warned..... it wasnt all this easy... the next week will reveal all

However this little charmer was our neighbour every morning and evening for the next week. he roosted in the same branch outside our chalet

Dark Necked Tailorbird

awake

asleep

at home... roosting

this chap also roosted in a tree close to the Chalet.... hover it didnt move for 3 full days

Red Tailed Rat Snake

Far out in the East Week 1 Days 5 & 6

2 more full days at Frasers hill.....  an early start to try our luck for some thrushes. We were fortunate to quickly bag a Blue Whistling Thrush as well as a stunning Orange Headed Thrush, then we picked up a colourful Green Magpie..... it wasnt even light yet.

A drive to Jeriau waterfall didnt get us out target bird of Silver Breasted Broadbill but did get us an Everetts Whiteye and plenty of Grey Wagtails and Drongos.... this looks to be a prosperous area to bird, maybe we were just very unlucky as we found it very quiet.

Back up at the town we tried the well trodden but productive Telecom Loop, here I got my best views of Cuckoo Dove

This Ashy Bulbul was one of many Bulbul species seen

Red eyed Bulbul

Other Bulbuls included Black Crested, Streaked, Hairy Backed, Yellow Bellied, Spectacled, Cream Vented amongst others, however one of the best for me was the

Stripe Throated Bulbul

and yet another stunning Barbert species, this time a

Black Browed Barbet

The bird waves at Frasers Hill were usually productive, today we were fortunate to get a shot of this

Yellow Bellied Warbler

one of the highlights (yet again on the Telecom Loop)

Long Tailed Broadbill

a long drive down the new road brought us virtually face to face with a stunning Raptor.

We accidentaly flushed and disturbed this Blyths Hawk Eagle, however he rounded a nearby corner and was sat perched when we arrived

one of the stars of Frasers Hill has to be this species

Chestnut Capped Laughingthush

some of the other species seen were Siberian Thrush, Speckled Piculet, Lesser Racket-tailed Drongo, Greater Racket-tailed Drongo, Bar winged Flycatcher Shrike and this wonderful

Yellownape

and a rather funky looking

Chestnut Crowned Warbler

Day 7 was going to be a day of travel and a long journey to the Rainforest at Taman Negara

Far out in the East.... Week 1 Day 4

Frasers Hill, a full day of exploration..... I had read up on the place names.... Telecom Loop, The New Road, Jeriau Waterfall and the Smokehouse, now it was time to find out where they where. We eventualy found out that we were driving the Telecom Loop in the wrong direction..... didnt realise it was one way!

It turned out to be a very productive day with great numbers of Bulbuls and Flycatchers along with a host of other beauties.

First off though we were allowed superb views around the hotel grounds of

Silver Eared Mesia

and the funky looking

Chestnut Capped Laughingthrush

along with Long tailed Sibia these birds kept us entertained when we sat on the balcony with a Malt Whisky.

The Telecom Loop provided us with a great variety and a constant tick over of new species, during the morning the Flycatchers were showing particularly well...

Little Pied Flycatcher

Verditer Flycatcher

Hill Blue Flycatcher (taken on the New Road)

The lovely species wernt always easy to spot, but were usually well worth straining your neck muscles for when you picked out species such as the

Blue winged Leafbird

The Lesser Racket Tailed Drongo

seemed to be very common or just conspicuous, but who was complaining, its a stunning bird

If you want a splash of colour, the Grey Chinned Minivets seemed to stand out in most of the bird waves that appeared, the female bright yellow while the males look rather dashing in their red capes

however the star of the show for me was this fella. 

Streaked Spiderhunter

again another species seen in good numbers, and often upside down!

Fire Breasted Flowerpeckers, Lesser Shortwing, Blue Nuthatch, Black Eagle,Golden Babblers, Sultan Tits were amongst the many species that didnt make it onto the DSLR. Frasers Hill is a wonderful place to visit, we were to spend a couple more days here, now it was time to hit the trails.