With Khaleb Yordan, Boas Emmanuel,  Adun Bahrum and Hery Kusumanegara

This was a short trip visiting Bukit Tinggi in Malaysia for just a morning for the Mountain Peacock Pheasant and then a week in Java searching once again for a few species that had eluded me for many many years.

The Mountain Peacock Pheasant is a bird I have previously put in a lot of work for at Frasers Hill, 4 visits over the years since 1995 but without a sniff. Luckily they are reliable now at Bukit Tinggi and here I watched 2 birds off and on for 40 minutes,  they really are brilliant birds. So that was one major nemesis dealt with.

Dusky Woodcock as it was has now been split into two species – Sunda and Papuan Woodcock. The Papuan version I have seen in both West Papua and Papua New Guinea, neither particularly well, the one in PNG was walking around on some grass at late dusk and the West Papuan I saw flying over twice. As for Sunda I have missed it twice on Sumatra at Gunung Kerinci and also missed it at Gunung Gede several times since 1995 and as recently as November 2017. I had planned to go there this September but literally the day before I thought I would try somewhere else. That proved to be a very wise decision as the woodcock performed wonderfully for us on the 2 mornings and 1 evening we were there. The roding call is something else. We saw 3 birds in flight on one occasion just after 0515. Night birding here also produced a very obliging Javan Scops Owl and a Javan Frogmouth.

The Critically endangered Javan Blue-banded Kingfisher had not been seen since the 1930’s, recently it was rediscovered near Gunung Halimun, luckily I managed to see one as it flew past me along the river, despite hanging around the river for 12 hours I never saw it again. It has become more more tricky to see recently as the river level is back lower again. There is thought to be only 250 individuals remaining.

I then visited Eastern Java to see Javan Flameback at Alas Purwo, also there I saw a Javan Banded Pitta and Black-banded Barbet. On the Ijen Plateau I saw a Grey-breasted (White-faced) Partridge, Javan Grasshopper Warbler and a Horsefields Thrush. An afternoon at Baluran produced another Critically endangered species  – Grey-backed Myna as well as over 40 Java Sparrows.

 

 

Species seen

Java Sparrow