Opel Mok directed me to his images of a pair of Spotted Dove (Streptopelia chinensis) that found his pot of mint plant a suitable place to build their nest (above).

The pair checked out his garden on 7th July 2008, built a simple nest made up of a platform of twigs and the female went on to lay a white egg two days later. A second egg was laid another two days later and on 17th July the two eggs were still in the nest (below).

From past observations on Pink-necked Green Pigeons (Treron vernans), both parents help in incubation and brooding. The male bird usually takes on the duty during the daylight hours while the female takes over the night shift. The Peaceful Dove (Geopelia striata) similarly follows this schedule but as the sexes are not differentiated externally, we simply assume that it follows the same behaviour.

In this case, the different sexes of the Spotted Dove cannot also be distinguished but we can always observe the shift change in the mornings and evenings.

Hopefully, Opel will keep us informed if he continues his observations until the chicks fledge.

Dr. Redzlan Abdul Rahman documented an Oriental Magpie Robin (Copsychus saularis) catching an American cockroach (Periplaneta americana) and eating it.

Although know as American cockroach, the insect originated from tropical Africa. It is now one of the most common domestic pest in urban areas.

The bird forages on the ground catching arthropods mainly. These include cockroaches, mole crickets and termites. Geckos have also been reported to be taken by this robin.

Tan Teo Seng brought me what looked like a larger than usual munia’s nest (1, 2) on 7th July 2008. It had two entrances, one above, the other below. It was inadvertently cut off when his worker did some heavy pruning of his Duranta erecta shrub in his garden in Johor, Malaysia.

The structure was actually two nests, built side by side. The upper was 13 x 19 cm with an opening diameter of 3.5 cm; the lower 12 x 16 cm with a 3 cm opening. Both were ovals, the openings overhung with isolated pieces of grass inflorescence stalks.

After measurements the nests were left on a table in the porch. The top nest was empty as I could see the inside. The bottom nest appeared to be empty also.

In the evening I suddenly heard the chattering of what appeared to be a number of chicks begging for food. The sound appeared to come from the porch roof. As suddenly as it started, the sound ended a few minutes later. I was to hear the chirping on and off the next day. However, I could not locate the nesting area nor see and adult birds approaching to feed the chicks.

On the morning of 9th July, as I was standing by the two nests on the low table, the chirping suddenly started. Again it appeared to come from above. Imagine my surprise when I happened to glance at the nests and saw a chick at the entrance begging for food.

Only then did I realise that the chirping came from one of the two nests. The chicks moved out of the nest entrance to reveal another. The second chick was persuaded to emerge. There was a third but it appeared stuck inside. Only by carefully cutting the nest did I manage to extract it. There were a fourth, a fifth and a sixth. All were crammed inside the 7 x 8 cm nesting space and the cramming obviously caused the sixth and smallest chick to die. The image below (left) shows the five live chicks while the right image the sixth dead chick.

The five chicks were placed in a basin and fed with a liquid mixture of leftover boiled carrot soup. Initially, each chick was hand-held and persuaded to open its bill to accept the liquid food in drops, delivered via a dropper. In subsequent feedings a few of the chicks enthusiastically pushed their throats into the top of the dropper to receive the food.

The chicks were used to huddle together in the tight nest space (bottom left) and when given space to move around in the basin, still huddled together, the larger chicks climbing over the backs of the smaller.

It was easier to feed them thus. As each chick gaped, I was able to place drops of food into its throat. There was always fierce competition to be fed first. All five ate well. After each feed the throat pouch swelled (bottom right).

The scrambling, one on top of the other, apparently caused two other chicks to die on the 10th July, leaving three of the more healthy ones.

Sadly, the remaining three chicks died the next day. Did they die because of the feed? Do they need to be fed solid? Were they weakened because they were left without food during the first two days?

According to Teo Seng, he had earlier observed about six adult munias popping out one by one from the same two nests one evening when he was near the plant. He was not able to confirm from which of the two nests these birds flew out from but he was definite that they flew out of the nest/s. Otherwise all the birds would have flown off together when disturbed.

The literature mention egg dropping by female munias, meaning other females are prone to lay their eggs in an active nest. Normally about six eggs are laid per nest.

Another question that needs to be answered is whether munias roost inside empty nests. And how many birds can a nest accommodate for roosting. Field ornithologist Wang Luan Keng confirms that roosting in empty nests does occur. She further revealed that there may also be nest parasitism but this obviously did not happen here as all six chicks looked alike.

Purple Swamphen (Porphyrio porphyrio) is a colourful large bird common in freshwater wetlands of Singapore and Malaysia.

The bird is predominantly vegetarian, eating a wide range of water plants: water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes), water spangle (Salvinia molesta), water lily (Nymphaea), lotus (Nelumbo nucifera) and cyperus sedge (Cyperus), among others.

It is an opportunistic feeder and will also take fish, frogs, lizards, snakes, birds, molluscs, leeches, small crabs, insects and their larvae and spiders when available.

In the image by Adrian Lim, the swamphen is seen taking a freshwater snail. Unfortunately, it is not known whether it simply swallowed it or break up the shell first before swallowing.

This post is a cooperative effort between www.naturepixels.org and BESG to bring the study of bird behaviour through photography to a wider audience.

Towards the end of June 2008, Tan Teo Seng brought me two old and used nests of the Baya Weaver (Ploceus philippinus).

I was interested in making a detailed study of these nests (left), namely the fibres and strips of leaves used and how these materials were put together. Madoc (1956) reported a total of 3,437 fine strands of grass, varying in length from 2.5 to 60 cm were used in a nest. And this was only the so-called “male” nest - the partially completed nest minus the downward pointing entrance tunnel that is usually added once the female gives her approval.

I sat down and tried to untangle the fibres, count them and measure the longer ones. For a few days I tried to do so but with partial success.

There were a total of 260 fine fibres making up the entrance tunnel. These were easily untangled as they were loosely weaved around one another and the ends never knotted (below left). The longest was 42 cm long.

Untangling the outer layer of the main nest posed much problem. Many of the fine fibres ran the length of the nest, from top to bottom. The top end of these fibres invariably originated around the nest attachment - firmly twisted round and round as well as knotted to a twig or twigs. The other end was simply knotted around other fibres at the lower part of the nest. Along the way, there were a few entanglements as other fibres were twisted round it. Others fibres ran down the nest, to turn sideways or upwards, twisting round others in the process (above right).

Many of the fine fibres ran round the nest, breaking up into two halves way down, each end again knotted, while along the way it may be twined around other fibres and narrow leaf pieces. These fibres were relatively strong and rough along the edge, having come from the edge of grass leaves.

The inner materials were mostly narrow grass strips, placed along the length of the nest and not knotted. However, they were loosely tied together here and there. These leaf pieces were mostly dried and brittle, breaking off easily. Because of the irregular knotting and brittleness of the materials, an accurate count was not possible. I stopped counting after 500, covering only the surface of the nest, not counting the 260 fibres from the tunnel.

The longest fibre was 78 cm, although most were 40-60 cm long.

The inner nest chamber was lined with feathers, below which was a layer of floss from lalang grass (Imperate cylindrical) fruits (left top). A close examination of these feathers showed a total of 26 downs, semiplumes and retrices (left bottom). In nests that were earlier examined, feathers were never found.
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Reference:
Madoc, G. C. (1956). An introduction to Malayan birds. Malayan Nature Society, Kuala Lumpur. (revised ed.)