10th November 2009: Bandar PERDA ricefields, Bukit Mertajam, mainland Penang

Some pics from a short late afternoon visit before rain stopped play!



Couldn't resist this obliging Wood Sandpiper!



This female Pied Harrier was a new Penang bird for me.



In flight the very white underwing and rear body, and the greyish bases to the primaries are distinctive of female Pied.












































I found some tractors ploughing a field, and these are the pick of the Barn Swallows pictures I managed. No Red-rumped or Riparia martins among them today.



This one seemed to be managing OK without much of a tail.



And then the rain came! The flock of Pacific Golden Plovers came down in a field near the road and hunkered down.



The monsoon rains this year are exceptionally severe, so I guess they'd better get used to it!

31st Oct and 1st Nov 2009: Festival of Wings, Kuala Selangor Nature Park, Selangor

I attended the 7th Festival of Wings at Kuala Selangor Nature Park (KSNP) a couple of weekends ago.



In conjunction with the Festival, an official plaque announcing KSNP as part of the North-central Selangor Coast Important Bird Area (IBA) was unveiled by Elizabeth Wong - Selangor State Minister for Tourism, Consumer Affairs and the Environment.



People keeping out of the rain in the exhibition booths...



The delegation from BCST - (Left to right): Chaiwat, Benchapol, Ravee, Koses, Piyawan, Nonchaya and Gawin - with lots of interesting merchandise and those famous Thai smiles!



The team from Burung Indonesia - Left to right: Sutejo, Astrid, Dwi, Yoppy, Henny and Fahrul. They were really good at selling - I bought four of their superb T-shirts!



The Myanmar contingent (left to right): Aung Moe from the Biodiversity and Nature Conservation Association (BANCA) and San San Nwe, from the Nature and Wildlife Conservation Division of the Forest Department, and Simba Chan (ex Hong Kong, now with Birdlife Japan).



About half the Selangor Bird Group Committee are here!



There was some pretty impressive artwork being done on ... people's faces!



Our very own MNS BCC Waterbirds Group had an impressive display...



...put together with much hard work by Ang Teck Hin - here's the man himself!



Hey look - the sun! It was nice to see it at last on the second morning.

On the second afternoon, the exhibitors got a chance to take a break and do some birding - yay!



Hmm - so that's what they look like close up?!



The Burung Indonesia team checking out our Malaysian mangroves.



A rare chance to view the mudflats from the seaward side gave us plenty of views of hunting Lesser Adjutants (more aptly-named in Malay Burung Botak Kecil - Lesser Bald Bird!).







And a good opportunity for us to see at first hand the biological richness of the coastal mangrove-mudflat ecosystem - lots of fish, lots of cockles.



Have we got the message yet? MANGROVES AND MUDFLATS = MORE FOOD FOR BIRDS AND MORE RESOURCES FOR PEOPLE. Cut down the mangroves and we forfeit fisheries, coastal protection from storms and tsunamis, carbon sequestering and a host of other benefits.

Thanks to Raj and a host of assistants and volunteers for making this year's Festival of Wings yet another memorable event, despite the weather!

30th October 2009: Kampung Pertama and Kubang Semang, Penang

I made a short early morning visit to the rice-fields in a failed attempt to relocate the Temminck's Stint.





The stint field still held a few Wood Sandpipers.



And the field with Pacific Golden Plovers was still fully occupied.





I came across this Slaty-breasted Rail wandering along the road. I don't think it's a full adult.

With things otherwise quiet at Kampung Pertama, I decided to take the short drive across to the rice-fields on the other side of the highway at Kubang Semang.



There were more birds here as the fields are still being planted and there is more open mud and water. This shot shows a typical paddy-field vista. Wherever there is a man on his 'kobotor' preparing the field for the next planting, there you'll find flocks of egrets, terns and hirundines in attendance. The grey, fortress-like building in the background is a 'swiftlet hotel' - an increasingly commonly-encountered feature of the paddy-field landscape.







Some of the Barn Swallows following the kobotor. The 'gutturalis' race often shows a white throat and brown breastband in juvenile plumage, a feature not often alluded to in the literature available to me, and presenting a possible identification pitfall for the unwary.



A few Intermediate Egrets mingled with the much commoner Little and Cattle Egrets.






















This photo shows the proportional differences between Intermediate (front) and Cattle Egrets (back). The two species share the same bare part colours at this time of year.



Little Egrets typically show a pale whitish, pinkish, bluish or occasionally yellowish base to the lower mandible during the non-breeding season.



Another arriving.



The waders were in the quieter fields, and included a small flock of around 30 Curlew Sandpipers - mostly first winters.



The mantle and scapulars, one or two tertials and coverts are fresh non-breeding feathers (which look identical to adult non-breeding). I've shaded these purple, but you can also tell them in the 'undoctored' photo above by their greyer colouration and thin white fringing.

The remaining wing coverts are unmoulted, old juvenile feathers. These have largely faded and bleached so that little of the original juvenile pattern is still visible. Generally, the feathers which are most protected from the elements by the scapulars - typically the marginal and lesser coverts - and some inner median coverts (shaded yellow) are the feathers which remain least worn, so these are the most useful feathers for aging purposes. In the unshaded pic above, you can see that these feathers are darker, browner, and retain the (faded but visible) juvenile pattern.

Incidentally, note how short-billed this bird is. Perhaps it's a male.





Lesser and marginal coverts are usually hidden beneath the scapulars, but are sometimes exposed when the bird preens.



This one hasn't yet moulted its juv scapulars, so is much easier to age. From a distance, this bird will look darker and browner than the more advanced birds.



This bird, by contrast, can only be aged by taking a detailed look. You can just make out some juvenile lesser coverts peeking out beneath the scapulars at the 'top front' edge of the wing. The scapulars on this bird are covering almost all the wing coverts.



On this individual, only a few inner median coverts show the tell-tale dark subterminal 'arrowhead' marks which reveal that this is also a first winter bird.










































A first winter Black-winged Stilt. With Stilts, the intensity of the leg and iris-colour is an easy way to age them.



It's not often I get three Common Sandpipers in one shot. Don't ask me how to age them - they're really tough! Moving swiftly on...!



One of a small flock of Grey-headed Lapwings. These were exceedingly wary.



More Grey-headed Lapwings (and a Wood Sandpiper).



A study in simplicity - Wood Sandpiper and water.