Due to my current hectic working schedule, I have not gone into the field for quite a while. I did managed to squeeze a couple of hours of birding on a couple of days to this site as the project I am working on is located not too far away. All those long working hours over the weekends were starting to take its toll on me and these short birding excursions are a welcome relief.
A brief encounter with a Greater Racket-tailed Drongo following a troop of foraging Long-tailed Macaques produced record shots only as the lighting was quite dim and the bird was always at a distance from me. This common but attractive species is one of the first few birds I came across in the field when I started birding back in the old days. It made quite an impact on me with its rather unique racket tail and in a way, it played quite a significant role in convincing me to embrace the religion known as birding.
This Stork-billed Kingfisher perched quite motionless, hoping that I would miss it. But it is pretty difficult to miss anything with a beak like that...
As the breeding season is now on full swing, there were also quite a few nesting birds in the vicinity like this Common Iora...
Pied Fantails are no way easy subjects to photograph due to their extremely active nature. This is a lucky shot of a juvenile bird as it was making its way across the boardwalk.
A foraging female woodpecker awaken my senses as it was either a Laced or Streak-breasted Woodpecker. I am still trying to obtain my first image of the latter which is a rather uncommon resident to the northern parts of Peninsula Malaysia. When it finally alighted on an exposed perch, it turned out to be a Laced Woodpecker.
However after posting this blog, Dave and Hor Kee commented that it is a Streak-breasted Woodpecker after all. Thanks guys - my bad...
On both days, the splendid Mangrove Blue Flycatchers were rather confiding and provided me with good photographic opportunities. On the first day, I was greeted by a foraging pair. The female bird was more wary of my presence and kept her distance from me.
The male, on the hand, was exactly the opposite of his mate and came rather close to where I was standing on the boardwalk.
On the second day, only the male bird was present in the vicinity and again, it provided a good show for me. Thanks, buddy...
