8 backyard birds on a saturday morning

on saturday i woke up to the soft che-che-che-che-che of pied trillers outside my bedroom window. with no agenda for the morning, i decided to do some back yard (and front yard!) birding before breakfast.

1.  a pair of pied trillers flitted from the fire tree to the ylang-ylang giving me excellent (but against the sun) views.

2. a small flock of 5 gerygones wheeze-zeeet'd noisily as they did their skittish dance while gleaning for insects in the canopy of the fire tree.

3. i moved to the backyard where sure enough a couple of fantails were snapping up insects low over the lawn.

4. i was distracted by the cooing of zebra doves... and saw the strange sight of 2 doves "bowing" to each other, tails in the air. i thought it was a courting ritual, when suddenly one of them flew up the golden shower where a third dove was inspecting a possible nest site. no wonder they're also called peaceful doves, even territory disputes were gentle.

5. movement on the macopa tree caught my eye. a very quiet arctic warbler was hopping from branch to branch. not too many of these migrants in the garden this year.

6.  the ornamental banana plant blooms were hidden behind large leaves, so i almost missed this male olive-backed sunbird.  and i would have if it wasn't so cheerfully noisy!

7.  the yellow vented bulbuls had just finished inspecting the capsicum plant, once again getting all of the ripe chilis and leaving none for me! they flew to the cinnamon tree and started preening.

8. and the surprise of the morning: a pair of colasisis were perched on the mango tree!  without the rambutan in bloom, these birds normally just whiz by the house with a high-pitched zeet zeet. it took me several minutes to spot them in the greenery, until a hop gave one away.

strangely absent were the ubiquitous eurasian tree sparrows and the brown shrike.  a flock of lowland white-eyes flew from the neighbors caimito over our house to an unknown destination. from the neighbor's balete, i could hear calling orioles.

but i was getting hungery and my breakfast (fried egg, spicy spanish sardines in olive oil, fried rice, quesong puti and hot malunggay pandesal) was waiting! (no picture of that... i ate everything before i though of taking a snapshot!)

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