you will hop no more
swift but untimely your death
your spirit moves on
dedicated to the latest victim of backyard brown shrike
Tuesday, October 18
Thursday, October 13
the annual rambutan-fest
Perhaps among the most popular of trees in our garden are 3 rambutan trees. They are the favorite of everyone in the family and the envy of the neighborhood when their fruits start to ripen a bright red and we get Christmas trees in September.
My mom acquired the trees in the late 80's from a local grower. Two of them are of the tuklapin (the flesh easily falls off the seed) variety, while the third is supsupin (you have to suck on the seed to get the most of the flesh, it's almost impossible to get all the flesh separated from the seed). We have one in the front yard, one in the backyard, and one at the side of the house. They were already fruit-bearing when my mom got them, through the years they have grown bigger and so has our harvest of fruit. The whole family has looked forward to baskets and baskets of red fruit, picked and eaten during Sunday family lunches, given to neighbors and officemates, and several even picked by the passersby from the sidewalk - since all 3 trees are planted so that half the tree (in other words half the fruit!) grows over the fence. My labs had even learned to peel and eat the fruit that fall to the ground, seed and all!
I had heard from Ned L, (bird club founding member from Quezon province: rambutan and lanzones country) that the departure of backyard migrant brown shrike is timed with the start of the flowering of the rambutan early in the summer, and that his (in our case, her) return is associated with the ripening of the fruits in September. What a wonderful way to welcome the change in seasons! This is probably well known to those who live or grew up in the provinces, but I'm glad that I actually experience this annual event in our garden in the city.
Beyond signalling the onset and conclusion of the migratory season, there is another very wonderful "bird" reason I look forward to the rambutan fruiting. It's because the fruit attract a wonderful jewel of a bird to come to the garden - the colasisi. I hear these little parrots throughout the year, high pitch zzzwitzitzits, zipping past. On lucky days, I may spot one perched in the shade of the fire (a.k.a. flamboyant) tree. But when the rambutan are ripe, it's like a welcome sign for them to stay and eat the juicy fruit. Even with their noisy chatter, it's sometimes difficult to spot them... they blend in perfectly with the green and red of the rambutan tree. Sometimes they are very quiet, landing with a loud zweeeeet, then silence. I know that they are in the tree somewhere, clambering and hopping from branch to branch, nibbling away at the thick red skin to get to the juicy ivory flesh.
The colasisis aren't the only birds interested in the fruit. The yellow-vented bulbuls, who eat anything - fruit, insects, nectar, enjoy the rambutan fruit too. My mom has often complained that half of the fruit we pick are just empty shells of skin with the fruit eaten out by the birds. Of course half is a great exaggeration (except in my mom's mind), and I have to argue and convince my mom to leave some of the fruit on the tree for the birds.
Last Sunday, it was finally the last rambutan harvest for the season. The supsupin tree is most often the last to fruit, and so the last tree to have fruit left on it. The bulbuls were hard at work at the already over-ripe fruit, picking out the flesh in small bits. They aren't the neatest of eaters, drops of sticky-sweet juice squirted out in fine spray as the struggled with the fruit. Wasps and other insects hovered at the fruit which had holes on the skin, revealing the soft flesh underneath. (I have a feeling that at night, the bats get more than the birds do from the rambutan, and they help out the birds by biting off most of the skin). All the insects buzzing about made the pied fantails very happy, and they hopped and swooshed from branch to branch as they caught these insects on the wing. While enjoying this sight, Adri and I heard a familiar high-pitched call. A colasisi had landed somewhere on the tree!
Luckily, Adri spotted it at the top of the tree, a female which had landed in the middle of a bunch of fruit. Unfortunately, our quiet observation was given away by my exuberant lab Maggie, who seemed to feel and imbibe our excitement. After a half-hearted attempt at breaking the thick skin of the fruit, the little green parrot must have realised that she was in full view, out in the open, and calmly hopped out of view to disappear into the foliage. (See the video below, if it doesn't load, just refresh this page please)
After Sunday lunch with the family, my brother, who was smoking his cigar in the terrace, excitedly pointed to 3 more colasisis on the rambutan tree, one of them seemingly the same female we had seen earlier that morning. The commotion made everyone in the dining room become conscious of the fruit remaining on the tree still to be harvested, and so down came the last of the fruit. Thankfully, they left some fruit on the tree for our feathered friends.
With this years' fruit almost gone, there is always next year's rambutan season to look forward to.
(thanks to adri for the video, all photos are by me... yay! i love our new equipment!)
Monday, October 10
langgam paluparon!
i had never missed a birdfest before and i didn't want to miss this one! so against better judgement (and possibly a crime against the earth), i hopped on a plane to dumaguete on saturday morning just to spend the weekend and to catch the last day of the 7th philippine bird festival!
the festival this year was held on the grounds of historic silliman university, in the beautiful seaside city of dumaguete.
the mood for each birdfest has been unique... and true to the setting, i found this one quite laid back and relaxed.
i think the best thing i look forward to each birdfest is meeting friends, old friends and new. it was another chance to share birding stories and a love for our wild feathered friends and the earth we share. langgam paluparon, lasang palambuon! (birds in the wild, help forests thrive!)
the birding adventure philippines booth
and even in the short time i was in dumaguete, i got the chance to go birding. a spotted wood kingfisher spotted at the centrop and was fast becoming the star of the day. a few minutes away by tricycle, who could resist? after all, the spotted wood kingfisher was not a bird you could see so easily (and this race was endemic to negros and panay!)
drew, adri & i hopped on a tricycle with our bins and scope, and spent a good half an hour at the center enjoying great views of a very friendly kingfisher. not a bad first bird to baptize my new bins and to try out digiscoping with the new scope!
hello there mr. spotted wood king fisher!
testing the new stuff... thanks to swarovski for sponsoring bap!
(& to drew for taking this picture)
a very accommodating kingfisher!
when i checked the time stamp on my camera, i realized we had spent 33 minutes birding (or should i say.. twitching?!?!?) at centrop. what a coincidence, i spent exactly 33 hours in dumaguete!
Tuesday, October 4
look what the typhoons blew in...
as the wind and rain of back-to-back typhoons pedring and quiel blow and pour, there is an uneasy truce in the backyard.
the migrant brown shrike has arrived in the garden, much to the dismay of the current ruling species, the pied fantail (well, at least i imagine the pied fantail must feel something akin to dismay). yesterday, i saw a pair of fantails still whizzing across the garden to catch insects from their favorite pot perches, while the brown shrike picked at something it had caught and impaled on the kafir lime bush. a noisy skirmish would transpire when they would meet up at the gumamela bush and the swing base, ending with both parties retreating to their secured territory. the bulbuls must be amused at this tug-of-war for dominance over the backyard.
unfortunately, if all goes the way of previous years, the resident fantails will be relegated to the next door empty lot and the high canopy of the mango tree while the brown shrike will rule over the yard for the rest of the season until summer.
the pied fantail's days of lording of the backyard will soon be over... until summer that is
the brown shrike, the new boss of the backyard, back with his old murderous ways
hardly a week since it arrived, adri and i already caught the shrike with a victim. another poor tree frog slaughtered into choice meat sections strung up on the thorns of the kafir lime. once again the small head was pierced thru its eye socket, and limbs suspended at the joints. flies and the stench of death surround the crime scene.
flies hovering over a poor decapitated tree frog's head, pierced thru its eye socket
the brown shrike making the most of its latest victim/meal
(try to ignore the panting dog in the background... it's just maggie)
small animals of the backyard beware. the butcher is back.
Saturday, September 3
4 pittas & a 1 thrush
a couple of weeks ago, wbcper from northern quezon city alain reported red-bellied pittas at the la mesa eco park. within the week, several birders and photographers descended on the park, and despite the bad weather, confirmed the sighting.
adri and i, being the unwilling twitchers we are, waited two whole weekends before we decided at the last minute to check it out. la mesa eco park is less than half an hour from my house. this small, but well-forested public park is part of the la mesa reservoir which supplies most of metro manila's water. although it can get crowded on weekends, it is still a good place for introductory forest birding. because of it's proximity, i didn't bring my usual belt-bag full of supplies, just a small tote for my bins, my wallet and insect repellent.
at 630am, there were already a few joggers at the park, and we were greeted by calls of black-naped orioles and pied fantails. we stopped by a bridge where we heard and saw a white-breasted waterhen at the water's edge. while adri was taking photographs, i spotted tere and alex hurriedly walking on the concrete path.
a white-breasted waterhen feeding by the side of the lagoon greeted our entry into the park
"have you seen it?" they asked, and i assumed they were talking about the pitta. "not yet, let's go!" and we walked towards the dirt path where the others had seen the colorful ground bird.
in just a few minutes of walking around and scanning the ground for movement, we heard a familiar mournful call. "alex, was that you?" tere and i asked almost simultaneously, used to alex's pranks. "no! that wasn't me!"
"whuuuuuuuuuuuuup whoooooooo!"
"there it is!" adri motioned towards a mound of earth just outside the path. sure enough, standing proudly, its blue breast and scarlet belly conspicuous in the dark understory.
red-bellied pitta!!!
unfortunately our ooooh and aaaah moment was short-lived as noisy teenagers came up the path. the pitta did what pittas always do... it nonchalantly walked away and disappeared into the underbrush.
alex grumbled like a grumpy grandfather, frightening the kids into a subdued silence. but, the pitta was gone.
we decided to stand our ground and wait, and the pitta... well, the pitta decided to play hide-and-seek with us. little movements here, little flashes of red there. how frustratingly pitta-like.
adri and tere then spotted a rustle to our right. "what was that?" "was that a frog?" "it was brown and sort of hopped." adri patiently adjusted his bins on the dark shadows, while alex and i looked up, down, all around, from where we stood.
"wait!"
and a bird flew, not five feet away from us and landed a few more feet away across the path.
"it's an ASHY GROUND-THRUSH!"
and the bird was gone, flying back across the path to our left.
"you said it was a frog!" "well, it hopped!" alex and tere argued in hurried whispers. this time, it was the thrush playing hide-and-seek.
now the ashy ground thrush is probably one of the ultimate nemesis birds. we had spent countless hours over the years scouring mt. makiling for this shy and uncommon endemic. i finally spotted it at mt. banahaw near bangkong kahoy, adri had recently seen it while guiding in makiling, and it was a would-be lifer for alex and tere.
a surprise find: the uncommon and hard to find ashy ground thrush
we decided to follow the trail and eventually circle back to the same spot. mangrove blue-flycatchers sang cheerfully, pied fantails jumped noisily from tree to tree, munias zipped by carrying nesting material, a white-eared brown dove and a common emerald dove flew silently across our path. all around us the tailorbirds were calling out their repetitive pump-needing-oiling calls, and now and again we would spot one clambering through the vines and tangles. a pair of philippine pygmy woodpeckers crept up and down thin branches, while black-naped orioles, collared kingfishers, crows and yellow-vented bulbuls flew by on occasion. lowland white-eyes buzzed about the canopy. butterflies were coming alive as the morning temperatures rose.
an immature mangrove blue flycatcher and some adults filled the air with cheerful song
and finally we were back at the pitta crossing. we had another futile attempt at better views of the ashy ground thrush, which promptly walked back into the undergrowth and disappeared. again.
while we were talking about how nice and birdy it was, and how the red bellied pitta and the ashy ground thrush had often (well in the case of the thrush, ALWAYS - except for adri) eluded us in makiling, what should appear in the middle of the path in front of us but the red bellied pitta!
pitta crossing: see that little red spot? that's the red-bellied pitta as seen through my point-and-shoot!
"there it is!" "there it is!" as we admired the bird through our bins, and as adri was talking photographs, another red-bellied pitta ran across the path just in front of the first one. "did you see that?!?" "another one ran across," not taking our eyes off the red-bellied one still on the path. i suppose we were whispering but with the adrenalin in our voices we might as well have been shouting.
"ghost" pitta - while we were watching one pitta, another crossed the path right in front of it!
to add to our excitement, a dark-headed turquoise bird with white wing patches flew across the path, a few inches from the ground, right in front of the pitta.
"that was a hooded pitta!" we all exclaimed almost simultaneously.
i did a little joyful dance. it was already much more than i expected. after all, i was less than an hour from my house! and i didn't have to wake up at 4 (or even 5) in the morning!
after a while, we decided it was time to go. a few groups on a company team building activity had arrived at our stake-out and it was getting noisy. as we walked back to the park entrance, we noticed a little movement on the side of the path, quite close to us again.
"immature red-bellied pitta!" i said excitedly, "there! there!"
"are you sure?" "why is it all brown?"
"yes, i've seen that before! back in 2005 in boso-boso!"
the immature bird scampered away, the color of the earth, so when it stopped, it looked like the ground had swallowed it up. it's instinct was probably to freeze, and a very good strategy that was! although just a few meters from us, it was so difficult to spot! finally, we all figured out where it was standing, looking like a little mound of mud on dried leaves on the ground. if it were not for an occasional stretching movement and the pale gape of its beak, we would have probably thought it had gone.
the immature red-bellied pitta blended perfectly into the background making it difficult to spot
yahoo!!! the adult pair probably had their nest nearby, and this young fledgling was still being cared for. it was a wonderful thought to end a productive birding morning. four pittas and an ashy ground-thrush in the city.
(now if only we could do something about those cats...)
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