KC Tsang and Johnny Wee were at the Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve on the morning of 15th November 2007 when they were rewarded with the sighting of an uncommon raptor at 1130 hours.

“Had a long walk with Johnny Wee this morning, and found this fellow perching up a bare branch …

Would greatly appreciate if some one can confirm the ID of this bird. The closes I can get is Chinese Sparrowhawk (Accipiter soloensis), but the eye and bill colour is wrong…”

The side shot by KC makes it less easy to identify the bird, if only the frontal is visible…

The distinct yellow-orange cere seen in the image indicates that the bird is an adult – in the juvenile it is yellow-grey to yellow.

This small accipiter is an uncommon passage migrant and winter visitor that has been regularly sighted at various locations during October–November and March. It breeds in Northern China, Korea and Taiwan. During the northern winter, it migrates south to reach Singapore, Indonesia and West New Guinea. The bird makes the return flight during March-mid May.

Ferguson-Lees & Christie (2001) reports that it migrates along two separate routes. The main route is from the Korean Peninsula south along Nansei-shoto through Taiwan and the Philippines to Sulawesi and Moluccas. The other route is from southeast China through the mainland Southeast Asia to Sumatra, Java and Bali.

Image by KC Tsang.

Reference:
Ferguson-Lees, J. & Christie, D. A. (2001). Raptors of the world. London: Christopher Helm.

When I fed the Little Heron ( Butorides striatus ) chick fish in a glass bottle, it tried desperately to peck at the fish from the outside. Obviously it could not know that it was looking at the fish from outside the glass. It kept on pecking at the glass side and getting frustrated with each try.

I managed to urge it to the perch whereby it could look down into the fish inside the bottle. It then picked at the fish one by one from above. However, as soon as a fish was caught, all the rest swam to the bottom. And the bird was not willing to submerge its head into the water to reach them. It was only willing to go as far as the base of its bill and no further.

I then placed the bottle of fish outside the cage and the bird encountered the same problem as it was standing on the cage bottom.

A perch inside the cage was provided in the form of a water-filled plastic container. It immediately perched on the edge of the container and looked into the fish contained in the bottle outside. It surveyed the bottle containing the fish for a while before making its next move (left).

It took some time to decide what to do but eventually it solved the problem. It poked its head between the wires of the cage and dipped its head into the water to get at the fish.

Looking at one of the images, I was surprised to learn that it dipped its head totally into the water to get at the fish swimming at the bottom.

This further proves that the Little Heron is an intelligent bird. An earlier post shows it’s “fishing” trick, using bread tossed into the Singapore Botanic Gardens’ Symphony Lake by visitors to do its very own fishing.

“Murder! Murder!” shouted Shazam, the black caterpillar, as she found herself waffled by a red, giant pair of beaks. She was carried along in a wild goose chase – by whom? She knew not.

I finally caught up with Cicero, the Short-tailed Green Magpie (Cissa thalassina). He was restless and prancing from fern fronds to branches of trees, trying to conceal his big catch and throwing cautious, side glances through his masquerading black, eye band onto a bird wave of Chestnut-capped Laughingthrushes (Garrulax mitratus) while cradling Shazam in his jaws.

“Put me down… put me down!” Shazam screamed.

Cicero was then seen swinging the poor sort dizzy as she came close to being piked onto a thorny bit of tree branch.

“Wait! Wait! I have good grub prospects for you. Hear me before you eat me for breakfast, ok?” Shazam was pleading and sweating away in anticipation of death by torture of a thousand cuts and swallowed whole.

The pirate of the cool, Bornean forest feathered in Yuletide colours decided to release his grip on Cicero onto a branch, leaving the victim dangling on the edge in a daze.

“Ouch! You sure hurt me bad….” Shazam complained looking a bit pitiful yet saucy.

“Now just what you think you are ranting about, my hairy one?” questioned Cicero. He rolled his big eyes at Shazam suspiciously, yet with a little bit of marshmallow look onto his ‘breakfast’. His brain was screaming, “I want my breakfast! I want my breakfast!”

Do you think Shazam, the witty, black caterpillar managed to talk her way out in saving herself from being eaten by Cicero, during this festive season of Christmas like the Fairy Tale story in Thousand and one Night?

Or was Cicero in not engaging the spirit of giving and forgiving, was preparing a gourmet of black caterpillar whilst looking for a high altar to sacrifice poor Shazam-a worm is just a worm?

Cicero’s encounter with Shazam was observed for half hour. They were seen an hour later. Cicero was still toying with Shazam in his beak.

The Short- tailed Green Magpie is like a cousin of the Common Green Magpie, with bold, raiding behaviours. Their large size of approximately 40 cm in length make these species intimidating to small passerines and their overall green plumages make excellent camouflages in forests of high altitudes.

Attached is an image of Common Green Magpie (Cissa chinensis) for comparison (right). Is he trying to meditate himself into invisibility?

Despite their gorgeous bright- red beaks and feet, it is difficult to spot Green Magpies even at close range when they remain still unless their calls give them away. Swift in their inspections and foraging movements, hopping in middle storeys of forests and occasionally on floor, make digiscoping such birds ever so challenging. Yet…observing their rogue behaviours are never dull moments.

This article is written catering specially to include junior readers above 10years of age for which several viewing names have come into mind.

MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU NIGEL NG, Senior and Junior readers!

AVIAN WRITER DAISY O’NEILL, PENANG, MALAYSIA.

The nesting of at least two pairs of Oriental Dwarf Kingfishers (Ceyx erithacus) in June 2007 in Panti forest, Johor, Malaysia allowed many photographers to document the food habits of this bird, especially the food fed to the chicks.

Irfan Choo is sharing with us his images of the variety of foods brought back for the chicks that include amphibians, reptiles, crustaceans and fishes.

In Singapore, the food fed to the chicks of the Collared Kingfisher (Todiramphus chloris) include forest cockroach, beetle, earthworm, centipede and gecko, among others.

A pair of White-throated Kingfishers (Halcyon smyrnensis) was also observed bringing different species of lizards, frogs, insects and even a big spider.

Generally, kingfishers do not necessarily feed fish to their chicks, preferring a wide range of foods, including invertebrates like worms, centipedes, insects, molluscs and crustaceans. They also eat vertebrates like amphibians, reptiles and mammals.

Images courtesy of Irfan Choo - www.irfanchoo.com

Hornbills nest in cavities that develop naturally in old and dead trees. These birds are not capable of excavating them, maybe only in enlarging the entrance and the inside. However, such trees are never plentiful in a healthy forest. In urban areas dead trees are not tolerated as they pose a danger to life and limbs. Old trees with naturally developing large cavities are also deemed potentially dangerous. Due to this shortage in nesting cavities, there is always a fierce competition whenever there is one available.

On the offshore island of Pulau Ubin where most of our Oriental Pied Hornbills (Anthracoceros albirostris) are found, and there are about 20 birds or so, there seems to be no problem at the moment. With an increase in population, competition for nesting cavities will invariable develop.

Two pairs of these hornbill have moved to Changi on mainland Singapore. They have started breeding, although they have so far been unsuccessful in raising any chicks - see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.

Limited number of these birds are also found inland (1, 2).

The Singapore Hornbill Project has been experimenting with nesting boxes at the Jurong Bird Park. Because these birds are caged, they are receptive to these boxes and are breeding inside. These boxes are now being tried in Pulau Ubin under natural conditions (top).

In Thailand, nesting cavities are excavated from pieces of tree trunks to specifications, hauled up along the trunk to be firmly attached to the tree (below left). These have proven successful. The image below (right) shows the Great Hornbill (Buceros bicronis) making use of such a contraption to breed.

Image of nesting box at Pulau Ubin by Angie Ng, those from Thailand courtesy of Prof Pilai Poonswad, Hornbill Research Foundation.