Borneo Birds

In Borneo, the Scarlet-rumped Trogon Harpactes duvaucelii is the smallest and also the most common of this family of brightly coloured birds. They usually perch in the understorey of the forest, feeding mainly on insects. We found this male steadfastly defending its territory together with 2 other birds, one of which must have been a juvenile. Despite the birds’s perching habit, it is really quite difficult to get a good shot as they always seem to be partially behind leaves or twigs.

Finally! A pair of Greater Painted Snipe Rostratula benghalensis. A phone call from Denis (thanks, bro!) sent me rushing to a rice paddy by a very busy road just outside Kota Kinabalu. Well what do you know, it was the exact spot I stopped just two days ago and from which I saw nothing. In the scope, in fading light, we saw that the birds were incubating 1 egg and in a most precarious nesting spot. It was right in a corner of a half ploughed rice paddy and in a distance there were 3 tractors which had just called it a day. And tomorrow??? I just have to content myself that these are highly secretive birds and that they are actually more common than they are seen.

Last October I took a photo of the male Rufous-collared Kingfisher Actenoides concretus at the Sepilok RDC and has been looking for a shot of the female ever since. On an extremely slow day at the Lok Kawi Zoological Park today, I got lucky and picked out this bird through a maze of vegetation. The female displays buff spots on dark green wings while the male has dark blue malar stripes and upperparts. Special thanks to my birding buddies.

Many birders have complained of the difficulty of finding the Red-crowned Barbet Megalaima rafflesii. I believe this is because most birders, including myself, seldom go birding in disturbed secondary forest where this is a common bird. On quite a few occasions, I have seen this barbet and also Blue-eared and Gold-whiskered barbets feeding on the ripe fruits of the Vitex (Verbenaceae) and other fruiting plants which are commonly found in secondary scrub.

I have seen many photos of the Crested Goshawk on the net and I thought perhaps one more wouldn’t dampen your appreciation for this superb accipiter. It is fairly common throughout the lowlands of Borneo, often seen circling slowly over treetops. When not in flight, it can be seen perched on even the shorter trees. Race in Borneo A. t. microstictus. Happy hunting!