Dear Friends,

I just took part in the Singapore bird race over the week-end with Martin Daniel and Leong Tzi Ming. Our team STRIX was driven around by Sham who played the role of a non-participating driver. This was my 21st year leading a team in this annual event. Personally, I enjoy doing this once a year as it is fun and challenging… it is like a keen runner looking forward to his annual marathon.

Over the years, the bird race has constantly changed it’s format and rules so we have to adapt accordingly. This year was no different. Registrations and submissions went online; teams could begin and end whereever they liked as you only had to submit your results by today, the 24th October 2006; the timing changed to 6.00am Sat to 6.00am Sun; the end of the race get-together is to be held only a week after, on Sat 28th. There was an insensitive point though as the organiser elected to have the bird race on Deepavali Day… whoever decided this has a lot to answer for.

Despite these changes, the unfortunate Deepavali date and the haze, my team decided to go out and do what we always do… go all out while enjoying the day. Sham was not part of the team this year but played the role of non-participating driver. This allowed her to visit our parents in the morning while we were in the forest. I made it clear that she was only to drive us around and she could not be with us during the birding nor could she point out birds to us.

We chose to do a relatively fast-paced (what was I thinking!) itinerary which would take us on a near complete circuit around Singapore. We made a couple more stops than we usually did and while the day proved tiring, it was also highly successful. We spotted 159 species (and only heard 5 others), which is the highest score that I have ever had on a bird race and, after 15 years of trying, finally broke the existing record of 154 species (which was set in 1991 but also included species on call). Six species on the list required notes, according to the rules, so I wrote out reasonably detailed notes for each of them and have just sent them along with the official forms to the organisers, via e-mail. I see no reason why any of the 6 will be rejected as the notes are quite thorough for a fast paced event like this. Phew!!!

Some of the highlights of the day :-

We started the day in the forest at MacRitchie and Sime and left the area with 59 species seen, including goodies like Grey and Malaysian Eared Nightjar, Inornate and Eastern Crowned Warblers, Dark-sided Flycatcher, Greater Green and Blue-winged Leafbirds, Thick-billed Green-Pigeons, Oriental Pratincole, Eyebrowed Thrush, Forest and Grey Wagtails and Black-headed Bulbul.

We then headed north-east to Serangoon, making a couple of short stops along the way that produced a few more birds including a Common Tern and Chinese Goshawk at Ponggol and Rose-ringed Parakeet and Oriental Honey-Buzzard at Jalan Kayu. Serangoon produced the goods as always with 26 additions within an hour, including Intermediate Egret, White-shouldered Starling, White-browed Crake and Cinnamon Bittern. Our 100th bird, Little Grebe (above), was seen here at 1137 hours.

After picking up the Tanimbar Cockatoo at Changi Village (above), we headed to the reclaimed land at Changi Central. This is always a time consuming site due to the unpaved roads and tracks but holds species difficult or impossible elsewhere. In an hour and a half, we added 15 species including Black-headed and White-headed Munias, Malaysian Plover and both sand-plovers, Sanderling, Rufous-necked Stint, Common Buzzard and quite possibly the spectacle of the day… with a sub-adult and a juvenile Pied Harrier as well as a Crested Goshawk over our heads at the same time! We also had about 63 Oriental Pratincoles!

From the east, we headed south to Marina South to pick up a few common species but a bonus here was a Brown-streaked Flycatcher. Then it was on to Tuas, in the south-west corner, for Red-wattled Lapwing, Savanna Nightjar and Pintail Snipe. From Tuas, we headed up to the north-west. At Neo Tiew, another big surprise awaited us in the form of a juvenile Purple Swamphen (above). We also had Slaty-breasted Rail and another lapwing here. Picking up the missing White-bellied Fish-Eagle at Kranji, we moved to the Sungei Mandai mudflats for low tide. Here, we picked up a few muddy shore waders and a couple more tern species. The highlight here though had to be the Chinese Egret, strolling on the flats alongside many of their Little cousins.

It was now time to head into the centre again and the Bukit Batok Nature Park. Woodpeckers were scarce all day with only 1 species in the bag… so we were pleased to find both Banded and Common Flameback here along with Straw-headed Bulbul, Lineated Barbet and White-crested Laughingthrush. Yet another bonus was seen, in the form of a Grey-faced Buzzard. Our last day spot was the Botanic Gardens where we picked up the only Lesser Whistling-ducks of the day and the Red-legged Crake. We dipped on our namesake again though… the Strix seloputo (Spotted Wood Owl), despite hearing it call from the distance.

We were tied for the record as dusk fell, so off we went to Lower Peirce where a Buffy Fish-Owl was the record breaker. We had dinner and then went on to pick up both common resident swiftlets at their roosts and a pair of Barn Owls. Our final bird was a perched Black-crowned Night-Heron in Pasir Ris, shortly after midnight. We called it a night and ended the race, exhausted but pleased.

The funny thing about having such a high score this year was that conditions were anything but favourable. While it did not rain nor was it too hot… the haze was pretty bad in the morning, though it cleared up by afternoon. The prolonged dry period meant that water-logged fields were dried up, drains and ponds were very shallow or partially dry and the humidity was something else. Yet, the birds showed up well and migrants were quite varied on the day.

I hope that you all do not mind my sharing this with you. I do hope that my e-mail with results and notes is received by the organisers… it should be, and I hope that all the birds are accepted by the arbitrators… they ought to be. We’ll find out this on Saturday. If everything stays the same, I just might be able to take it easy for the next bird race in 2007!

Regards,

R. Subaraj
24th October 2006

Crows are omnivorous. This means that they eat anything and everything, from grain, fruits, flower nectar, insects, eggs and birdlings, small mammals and what have you. They are scavengers, thriving where there are scraps of food available. That is why they are so successful around urban areas.

We have posted accounts of crows attacking and eating a rat and a bat. We also have an account of a White-bellied Sea Eagle (Haliaeetus leucogaster) catching a rat swimming in the sea off Changi. But this is the first time we have an account of a House Crow (Corvus splendens) actually fishing.

Meng and Melinda Chan witnessed a House Crow in Punggol last year quietly standing on a rock by the sea. Suddenly it dived into the water and emerged with a fish. With the fish firmly in its bill, it bashed it against the rock until it was stunned or probably dead. Then it started ripping it apart and eating it piece by piece. It was then about 7.00 pm in the evening and the light was low, so the image they managed to capture was not as bright and crisp as they would like it to be.

For the records, there have been reports of House Crows picking fish from shallow water or even plunging into deeper water to fish.

Input and image by Meng and Melinda Chan. Thanks to Kok Hui we have the correct ID of the bird in the above image.

Reference: Madge, S. & Burn, H. (1994). Crows and jays. London: Christopher Helm.

K.C. Tsang was out birding in early May 2006 when he had a chance encounter with a family of Orange-bellied Flowerpecker (Dicaeum trigonestigma):

“It is very seldom that one is able to get a family picture of the Orange-bellied Flowerpecker all in one morning. The male, which has a very brilliant orange belly, was found attacking the fruit of the Indian cherry tree (Muntingia calabura) (left). He uses the lower mandible to pierce the partially ripe fruit. He only takes the sweet juice of the fruit, unlike other bigger birds that take the fruit whole.

“After his turn is over, the female may also take on the same punctured fruit, or she may do her own harvesting of the fruit (below, left).

“The chicks I think must have been fed somehow as I have not been able to see the feeding action, and they seem quite contented just perching on the branch (below, centre).

“The last bird I believe is a sub-adult male, as one can observe the changes in its feathers (above, right).”

Input and images by K.C. Tsang

We have earlier reported on anting by Javan Myna (Acridotheres javanicus), Common Myna (Acridotheres tristis) and also by Blue-crowned Hanging Parrots (Loriculus galgulus).

In May 2006 Angie Ng observed a Javan Myna anting at the carpark of the Singapore Botanic Gardens (SBG). However, the myna she saw was an albino juvenile (left top).

As Angie recounts: “I think it was a myna; it was with another normal myna. Saw them playing under one of the trees in the upper carpark in SBG. They shied away when I approached them; then when I went closer, I saw the kerengga ants (Oecophylla smaragdina) and guessed they were anting.”

In the meantime Steven Chong sent in this account: “…I was at Nature’s Niche, SBG Saturday weekend 30.10.06 around 2.45 pm when I heard this commotion outside the bookshop…” He went outside to investigate and saw the albino myna grabbing a morsel from the 6-8 other normal mynas, to return to the same spot soon after, “standing behind the aircon compressors behind Nature’s Niche, as shown in the pix (left bottom), again by itself, but it had dropped the morsel. I didn’t think it ate anything, just gazing at what it fought so hard to get at….probably also just realising it couldn’t eat what looked hard and non edible. I showed the pix to Morten Strange who was in the bookstore and he commented that this was one of the two albino siblings that grew up around SBG and apparently doesn’t get along with the rest of its ‘family’.”

Images by Angie (top) and Steven (bottom).

NOTE: Accounts of anting posted between October 2005 and August 2008 have now been written up and published in the 2008 issue of the on-line journal, Nature in Singapore (Vol. 1, pp. 23-25). A PDF file of Anting in Singapore birds is available HERE.

Stephen Lau and his fishing buddies were in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands some four years ago. This is a great fishing safari destination and they were there to fish. But instead of the large sea water fish, they landed a Brahminy Kite (Haliastur indus). Stephen recounts the incident:

“There were three of us in a dingy and we were successfully catching fish using a technique called popping i.e. using our casting rod and a lure (a popper) which makes a popping sound when it is dragged at intermittent speed over the surface of the water. The lure’s motion is a series of short hops and as it dives forward, its concaved front end emits a pop sound. We were catching 1.5-2.0 kg groupers at every cast on the surface of a coral reef at depths of around 5-7 m. “A Brahminy Kite suddenly swooped down and picked up the lure with both feet and as it made it’s get-away one of it’s foot was hooked up by one of the three triple hooks on the lure.
“As it was unable to release the lure we had no choice but to start reeling it down towards us whilst it was airborne. Finally it settled down into the water with its wings outstretched and we reeled it sufficiently close to catch hold of its foot and the lure to perform the unhooking. “It was strange. It never struggled throughout the whole operation. Once freed it sat in the water for a short while before lifting itself off and flying to the nearest tree. There, standing on one leg, it continued looking at us.”

KC Tsang confirmed the identification of the kite.