9 and 17 April 2012: Teluk Air Tawar, mainland Penang

I made a couple of trips to the mainland this past week to try to catch up with the Brown-headed Gull flock before they leave. The first visit was in the afternoon - forgot that the sun would be in my eyes, and the tide was too high to boot, so only saw half a dozen birds distantly.

The next trip, the light and tide were perfect, but the birds forgot to show up - perhaps they're already on their way north. Below are some bits and pieces from the two visits.

There were around a hundred Common Redshanks at the mouth of the river - this was one of the few in any semblance of breeding plumage. Most of the breeders are gone by now.

Most birds look like this - very washed out colours. These are immature birds that won't be breeding this year. Check out the leg colour!

Great Egret at full stretch!

I'm taking more of an interest in these since Chris Kehoe pointed out a possible 'alba' Great Egret in Wong Tsu Shi's blog here (the gigantic one!). This is potentially a new taxon for Malaysia. In Birds of East Asia, Mark Brazil notes that alba is perhaps specifically distinct from modesta (which is the one we get here in large numbers) and is an increasingly observed winterer in Japan and Korea, while modesta winters further south. Alba is larger than modesta and, in the non-breeding season, has pale or bright yellow tarsi and toes, as opposed to the all black legs and feet of modesta. So a bigger-than-usual Great Egret in these parts should be scrutinised, and if possible, photographed alongside others.

A Little Egret sporting groovy pink lores! This is a breeding condition feature, interesting, given that the bird lacked head plumes.

And an Intermediate Egret with breeding-coloured black bill. This species is Malaysia's most recently discovered breeding species. Take a look at Amar's fantastic series of photos documenting this extraordinary find on OBI (here and following).

This is the best time of year to tick off the pond-herons, and the Teluk Air Tawar area is one of the best places to do so in Malaysia. Top to bottom - Chinese, Javan and Indian Pond-herons.

The latter was only recorded for the first time in the country in 1999, but now it's a regular, and has appeared in west coast states as far south as Selangor. Something is definitely afoot with these herons!

This lone Red-wattled Lapwing is probably a sick bird, as they rarely occur singly, and it's largely lacking the  vibrant colours, including the beautiful purple and green iridescence on the scapulars and coverts, of a healthy bird.

I think this is a male 'confusus' Brown Shrike. 'Confusus'  is apparently an intergrade between cristatus and lucionensis. Anyway, it's a good description of my state of mind after reading Tim Worfolk's 2006 paper! I recently came across this extraordinary record of Brown and Tiger Shrike hybridizing in Korea (scroll about half way down). No wonder they confuse us!

Talking of confusing polytypic taxa, here's a stunning male Eastern Yellow Wagtail - tschutschensis. It positively glowed in the low evening sunlight, and made my otherwise abortive afternoon visit worthwhile.

 

It's interesting to see that there are old unmoulted marginal coverts on the leading edge of the wing, and that only the inner 'half' of the greater coverts are fresh feathers. However, I'm not sure what this means, and am hoping that someone can enlighten me!

Where the wagtail was - sunlight under thunder clouds over paddyfields - a visual treat!

26 October, mainland Penang

I can hardly believe that my last visit to this area was 15 August! Whatever happened to the autumn?

This trip was a brief 'twitch' to try to see a pair of Japanese Paradise-flycatchers seen at the weekend and the 6 Ruff which had been around for a few days.

My first stop was Teluk Air Tawar, where the only flycatcher in evidence was this Asian Brown.



Many Asian Browns in fresh plumage have a slightly streaked upper breast, which can cause confusion with Brown-streaked for the unwary.







No paradise-flycatchers, but I couldn't resist scanning the mudflats, and was rewarded with a flock of 50 (exactly!) Black-tailed Godwits and a lone Chinese Egret.

Having given up on the flycatchers I moved to the paddyfields to look for the Ruff.



Lots of egrets, not many waders!







A flock of feeding hirundines gave me a chance to take a few hundred shots, of which I kept about three! These are Barn Swallows.





What interested me most though, was another of 'those' Riparia martins!



I'm pretty sure if these were in Hong Kong they'd be called Pale Martins. They certainly look identical to the birds they photograph there.





The tail 'fork' is negligible and the bill looks tiny. But the problem is, we only seem to get this 'type', so it's difficult to compare them with anything. They're either all 'ijimae' Sand Martins or all 'fokhienensis' Pale Martins! It's difficult to find good photos of undoubted eastern Sand Martins on the web to see how similar or different they are from these. So for now, all records of Sand and/or Pale Martin in Malaysia are 'on hold', till we work out how to tell them apart!

14th August 2010: Teluk Air Tawar IBA, mainland Penang

Today I went back to the place where I discovered the wader roost on August 11th, this time armed with an assurance from the guard that he would let me in.

My excitement at the prospect of seeing the fishpond full of waders at close quarters received a severe blow when I arrived,to find a fishpond full of water! The heavy rains of the night before had filled it to a depth of one or two feet - too deep for all but the longest-legged waders! Still, I figured that the birds wouldn't know this, and would at least come in to look for a place to roost, so I set up the hide and began the long wait.

Birds started arriving almost as soon as I'd entered the hide, but not finding anywhere to land, they flew around for over an hour. As they did so they were wasting precious energy which they will need to continue their onward migration, and I couldn't help feeling bad for them. Eventually, they decided to roost on the bund between two fishponds.





Sand Plovers were the first to arrive... these are Lessers.



And here's a Greater (right).











As the tide rose, more and more birds arrived, but couldn't find anywhere to land.



Once a few birds took the big decision to roost on the bund, the rest quickly followed.





Counting and looking for leg-flags was pretty tricky!



Common Redshanks were the most numerous species.





The adults were still in breeding plumage, although the flight feathers looked remarkably unworn and fresh, making me wonder whether they have completed a wing and tail moult before migration, which would make a lot of sense I suppose.






















By contrast, the first summer birds (below) have extremely worn flight feathers - these are still their first set of juvenile feathers which they've had since fledging over a year ago! The white secondaries and inner primaries, which lack pigmentation and are therefore weaker, are particularly worn.
























This year's juveniles are, of course, still in pristine condition.



A mixed group of adults (dark, streaked below), 1st summers (plain, greyish above) and a juvenile (top right, facing away).





Some late arrivals.



The roost had several distinct species sections. This was the Redshank residence...



The sand plover, sandpiper and stint suburb...



... and the curlew compartment!



There was also just room for a gathering of godwits - a Black-tailed (left) with two Bar-tailed, showing the difference in bill structure nicely.















Aren't Black-tailed Godwits brilliant?!







Asian Dowitchers aren't bad either! There were only two today, and I didn't see them land.



A small flock of Curlew Sandpipers arriving.



This short-billed individual is probably a male.









Eurasian Curlews. Most birds were in heavy wing moult.



A flock of Great Knot flew over but I didn't see them land.



Juvenile Greater and Lesser Sand Plovers side by side. Generally speaking, juv Greaters are much colder brown than juv Lessers, lacking strong peachy colouration.







This young Grey Heron flew in, making the waders uneasy. Eventually it's presence spooked the Common Greenshank at the bottom right of the last picture. I wondered if Grey Herons would ever try to catch waders as prey.