Saturday, January 23, 2010

AWC Curtin-Liku 23rd Jan 2010

Area Around Curtin University to Liku Ferry.
23th. Jan 2010
Time 7:10 am – 9:45am
Air temperature 26.5 ° Centigrade. Cold misty morning.
Steve, Nazeri and Musa.


Today's track in brown.

The morning's air temperature was cold, the gauge read 25 degree centigrade taken from moving car. Some 30 little egrets passed us coming from the West while we are driving along the road to the Curtin Lake. The mist was thick and the surrounding appeared very beautiful. It reminded me of cooler climes in Holland with the low lying trees lining the roadside leading to ASEAN Bridge.

We reached the roadblocked area of Curtin Lake at 7:10. There we saw an Oriental Darter flying past. A common green shank flew out of the lake when we move in closer to the lake. A single wandering-whistling duck was seen alone between the reeds. Three tree-swifts flew around us picking up flying insect. Not long afterwards two ducks comes from the west to join the duck in the reed. A purple heron flew westward. A single intermediate egret was seen far out at the eastern side of the drainage area.

We went out of Curtin are and move to the southeast Lake. On the way out we saw a huge raptor perching in the south of the road. We stopped and mount up the scope. The raptor has a rounded hook beak, white feet, yellow lip. It looked rather puffy, probably it had just came out of the water and was drying himself. This raptor then flew passed us very low and only then we realised it's actual size. We tagged is as a juvvy Grey-headed Fish Eagle.


A juvvy Grey-headed Fisheagle. Picture by Nazeri Abghani.

We entered the southeast lake slowly and saw a Purple Heron in the lake as well as 2 Wandering Whistling Duck a short distance away. We have never seen ducks in this area before. Not long after 3 Wandering Whistling Duck flew in out of nowhere. A White-browed Crake was seen flitting about the reeds not far from where the ducks were.

Two Oriental Reed-warblers were also sighted by the reeds. An unidentified black bird passed flew along side. We went further in slightly and spotted another duck flying out of the lake into the reeds.


Two Wandering Whistling Ducks in a pond, video grab.


The little pond harboring the ducks, reed warblers and crakes.

We moved out of the area and headed towards the Go-kart area.

We stopped a while to see a duck on the right side of us, a Common Moorhen was spotted in the distance, no ducks were sighted.

We passed the cross junction and we turn to the west where the big lake is. The big lake was original lakes, but has been deepen to take the sand out. We saw two wood sand pipers. We went into the west outlet. We have never entered this area. We saw some thing like a Cinnamon Bitten on the other side of the lake. There seemed to be no bird activity here.

When we went out and crossed the Adong Besar bridge, we spotted an Osprey in a small puddle of water. We weren't quite sure what it was doing there, perhaps trying to make a late breakfast of some stranded fish.


An Osprey in a small puddle of water.

We went out and moved to the Liku area to the east. There was a White-breasted Waterhen on the road. We stopped at a small opening on the side of the road, remnant of a temporary campsite perhaps that belonging to a fisherman. Here we saw 2 Oriental Darters perched on a distant bare tree. A Chestnut Malkoha flew passed. There were many Spotted Dove flying between trees across the lake. A Crimson Sunbird perched high above our head. Two Magpie Robin was sighted flying among the trees.

We then moved to Liku Ferry area. On a recently cleared field we saw some 30 wagtails and some Pacific Swallow.


A Shikra.

Steve spotted a raptor among the foliage and requested to set-up the scope. The raptor was later id as a Shikra.

We went out of the area and entered a pineapple farm. We saw some Dusky Munia. A large flower pecker passed us. An Ashy Tailorbird, Green Iora and prinias were sighted.

We went out and on our left side we spotted a Dollarbird and an Orange-breasted Flowerpecker. Two White-breasted Waterhen were seen foraging by the side of the road.

We saw a Wood Sandpiper and an Intermediate Egret nearby. We ended our session at 9:45 am.

Bird list:
Little Egrets 35
Tree swifts sp 2
Yellow-vented Bulbul 8
Oriental Darter 6
Greenshank 1
Wandering-whistling Duck 12
Wood Sandpiper 4
Common Sandpiper 3
Swift sp 3
Whited-brested Waterhen 3
Common Moorhen 2
Striated Grassbird 1
Purple Heron 6
Intermediate Egret 5
Grey-headed Fisheagle 1
Oriental Reed Warbler 2
Warbler sp 4
White-browed Crake 2
Osprey 1
Flower pecker sp. 2
Orange-breasted Flowerpecker 1
Crimson Sunbird 1
Chestnut-breasted Malkoha 1
Magpie Robin 2
Blue-throated Bee-eater 6
Zebra Dove 6
Spotted Dove 5
Wagtail 15
Crested Serpent-eagle 1
White-breated Woodswallow 7
Pacific Swallow 7
Shikra 1
Dollarbird 1
Dusky Munia 6
Green Iora 1
Sunbird sp. 1
Ashy Tailorbird 1
Prinia sp. 2
Yellow-bellied Prinia 4

Musa Musbah, Jan 2010

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