Borneo ‐ Invitational 2015

Field Guides Tour Report Borneo ‐ Invitational 2015 Feb 26, 2014 to Mar 16, 2014 Rose Ann Rowlett & Megan Edwards Crewe (with Hazwan, Paul & Adrian) For our tour description, itinerary, past triplists, dates, fees, and more, please VISIT OUR TOUR PAGE. One of the foremost (of many!) highlights of our tour was watching a pair of beautiful Whitehead's Trogons in the humid cloud forest of Kinabalu Park. Endemic to undisturbed montane forest above 900m in N Borneo, this species was but one of an amazing 6 species of trogons we saw on the trip; that's all the trogons of Borneo! This male was photographed above the Silau-Silau by participant Bob Rodrigues. The island of Borneo is a magical place. Though acre after acre of the Malaysian state of Sabah is continually being converted to oil palm plantations, there are still vast swaths of primeval forest, cloaked with some of the tallest trees on earth. For sixteen days, we explored luxuriant, tangled lowland jungle and hill forest, venturing even into the heady heights of its great canopy, thanks to a series of fabulous canopy towers and walkways. Via tidal rivers and tiny, meandering streams, we poked into otherwise inaccessible seasonally flooded forest near Sukau. For the final quarter of our stay, we climbed into the cool highlands of the spectacular Mount Kinabalu massif, where we wandered through a beautiful cloud forest with its masses of mosses and ferns and epiphytes. Throughout it all, there were so many sights and sounds and experiences to enjoy.... Our adventure began at Sepilok, where we spent several days recovering from our long flights and coming to grips with some of the more common lowland species. From the wonderfully sturdy towers and walkways at the nearby Rainforest Discovery Center, we watched an ever-changing cast of characters, including a Banded Woodpecker clinging for minutes to a nearby branch, a Black-bellied Malkoha rummaging through nearby foliage, a stunning male Violet Cuckoo displaying at close range, a Verditer Flycatcher that returned again and again to the same branch, a spiffy Black-and- yellow Broadbill that approached to within arm's length, and Red Giant Flying Squirrels sailing through the canopy at dusk. Along the trails below, we watched two male Fluffy-backed Tit-Babblers arguing over a (presumed) female (with much flaring of bright blue eyebrows and gular patches), a pair of Rufous-collared Kingfishers swinging on their viny perches, a tiny Rufous-backed Dwarf-Kingfisher perched beside a meandering stream, calling male Red-naped and Diard's trogons, a host of colorful sunbirds visiting a patch of equally colorful flowers, and a Large-tailed Nightjar hovering right overhead and then singing from a distant snag. En route to Sukau, we detoured slightly to visit the Gomantong Caves (which we would visit again in the coming days). Though most of the edible nests in the cave we toured had been harvested recently (resulting, sadly, in a lack of renesting Black-nest and White-nest swiftlets), we did see Mossy-nest Swiftlets sitting atop their distinctive moss-incorporated nests (they're too messy to warrant cleaning for bird's nest soup). And a host of additional highlights awaited us between the cave and the beginning of the Gomantong entrance road. Among them were: a female Orangutan nursing her baby on the slope above the cave; a gang of seven Bushy-crested Hornbills snuggling shoulder-to-shoulder on their roosting branch; a dazzling Black-headed Field Guides Birding Tours • www.fieldguides.com • 800-728-4953 1 Pitta whistling from a shadowy perch in the understory and a striking Hooded Pitta that sat surprisingly high for scope views; a pair of scarce Spotted Fantails flitting nearby, their tails waving jauntily; a small flock of Endangered Storm's Storks circling overhead, one even parading right down the road ahead of our bus; hunting Bat Hawks in the sunset, picking off victims from the thousands of Wrinkle-lipped Free-tailed Bats exiting the caves; and a dramatic pair of Helmeted Hornbills whooshing overhead after delivering their maniacal calls. From our base at Sukau Rainforest Lodge, we explored the Kinabatangan Wildlife Sanctuary, by day and by night, via a network of rivers and streams and a conveniently close boardwalk. Among our highlights there were a pair of tiny White-fronted Falconets making repeated hunting forays from atop a tall dead tree; a family of White-crowned Hornbills that called from a great distance and then came to the river's edge in the late afternoon; pairs of big Wrinkled Hornbills bounding through the riverside treetops; a tree full of scarce green-pigeons (including Large and Cinnamon-headed) in the afternoon light; a beautiful Ruddy Kingfisher that sat for scope views off the Sukau boardwalk; the various Buffy Fish-Owls hunting from low perches along the rivers and the dramatic Brown Wood-Owl that flew in close while we were owling along the Menanggul; an abundance of big Water Monitors basking in the sun (of which there was plenty!), a black-and-yellow Mangrove Cat Snake cryptically coiled in an overhanging tree, and a big Reticulated Python foraging along the riverbank one night; the many primates in this primate-rich refuge, from a big male Orangutan to the playful macaques and the iconic Proboscis Monkeys that inhabit the forest corridors along the rivers. But our foremost highlight in the Kinabatangan may have been watching a cow Bornean Pygmy Elephant and her calf feeding at leisure on "elephant grass" on the banks of the Kinabatangan. At Borneo Rainforest Lodge, a family of monotypic Bornean Bristleheads appeared and disappeared as they moved through the canopy, their bizarre, featherless, red-and-yellow heads bright against the green leaves. A singing Bornean Wren-Babbler lured us up and down a VERY steep hill before finally hopping right out onto the trail. Handsome and confiding Whiskered Treeswifts made frequent short forays from their favorite perches, where they constantly turned their heads left and right, seemingly covering 180 degrees in each direction! Crested Firebacks nibbled tidbits in a patch of tall grass behind the staff quarters. A Bornean Banded-Pitta calling from its song post was like a displaced bit of sunlight reflected through the trees. From the canopy walkway we scoped Yellow-crowned Barbets and Orange-backed Woodpeckers and watched a procession of sunbirds and spiderhunters sip nectar from the blossoms of an eye-level canopy vine. Winding along trails through the forest interior, we watched fabulous Asian Paradise-Flycatchers, Green Broadbills, and Cinnamon-rumped Trogons. And our night forays produced an array of critters, from big tarantulas and sleeping lizards to flying frogs, a Barred Eagle-Owl, and the amazing Horsfield's Tarsier! We welcomed the cool, refreshing highlands, where we finished the tour amid a host of montane endemics. We watched Golden-naped Barbets above blooming rhododendrons at Gunung Alab, scoped Mountain and Bornean barbets at premontane levels in the Crocker Range, where we enjoyed a rush of other new species, from Bornean Leafbirds to elegant Long-tailed Broadbills. Our first morning at Kinabalu Park was a highlight in itself, with dozens of species showing well in the calm, sunlit trees right outside our rooms! A quartet of Mountain Serpent-Eagles screamed and circled in cloudless skies right overhead at a Kinabalu vista. BIG, green Whitehead's Broadbills burst from the forest, crossing the road, and posing briefly on mossy branches. Whitehead's Spiderhunters proved surprisingly responsive this trip, flicking into some roadside trees and chasing each other around. And a pair of highly prized Whitehead's Trogons--among the fanciest of the world's trogons--gleamed from the forest understory. Whitehead's Pygmy Squirrels charmed us as they scrambled through the vines, their fluffy, white ear tufts exposed. Tiny Bornean Stubtails--Urosphena whiteheadi, also named for Whitehead--belted out their incredibly high-pitched song, their mouths opened wide, exposing their yellow mouth linings. One group watched a Friendly Bush-Warbler dance back and forth across a mossy stretch of ground at the tip of our boots (!) on the Summit Trail; while the other group watched a pair of tail-teetering White-crowned (Bornean) Forktails on a rushing stream at Mesilau, where we climbed the Nepenthes Trail to see four species of pitcher plants, including the world's largest. Together we made an afternoon trip to Poring to view a spectacular blooming Rafflesia, on its third day open, and to bird a bit near the hot springs, where we ended the day with a wonderful Crested Jay. Back at the Hill Lodge, we marveled at-- and photographed--the wondrous array of moths that gathered each night around our porch lights. On our return to KK, we made a final birding stop in an open-country marsh near Tuaran. There we sorted through rafts of Wandering Whistling-Ducks, finding a scarce drake Garganey in breeding plumage and a vagrant hen Cotton Pygmy-Goose, as well as Cinnamon and Yellow bitterns in lovely afternoon light. It was a nice way to end a wonderful trip with a wonderful group of participants. It's been fun reliving the trip while sorting through photos and annotating the list. Hopefully, the comments below--and the media embedded in the online version--will enliven your memories and contain a few new "gee whizzes," as well as identify some of the many "other critters" we enjoyed in the field. In the following list--which we've annotated jointly--SNR refers to Sepilok Nature Resort, RDC refers to the Sepilok Rainforest Discovery Center, and BRL refers to the Borneo Rainforest Lodge. Taxonomy follows the Cornell/Clements checklist with online updates, including the most recent version (6.9, Aug'14).

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