Kinabalu National Park, Sabah - May 2014 (Part 3)

13th May: After a better night sleep, we woke up at 5am, quickly freshen up we headed out with the car. The plan was to drive straight up to Timpohon Gate and get there before sunrise. Timpohon gate is the main entrance for hikers who wish to challenge the summit to go through, you can walk the first part of the summit trail without any guide, as long as you pay the entrance fee, however if you go any further permission is needed and they require you to get a guide. We however have no intension to go up there, and since most endemics except the Friendly Bush Warbler can be found below the gate we decided not to go in. Looking at past reports, I have heard that Everett's Thrush may forage along the roadside before dawn, however we saw nothing of that sort for the few days we were there, only Whistling Thrushes.

Upon arrival, we waited at the metal platform of the Timpohon Gate, this is a good place because it sits above the trees and is bright enough to see the surrounding areas. The first birds that appeared were a flock of Sunda Laughingthrush and Chestnut-hooded Laughingthrush. A Bornean Whistling Thrush decided to make an appearance at the platform, eating up some leftover biscuits someone have left on the railings from the day before. This individual we saw at the gate seems to be quite tamed, however there's an infection with it's foot which might explain it's unusual behavior.  Another individual was observed at the public toilet.

Sunda Laughingthrush

Bornean Whistling Thrush

As the sky brightens up, we heard Red-breasted Partridge calling, this is one of two endemic partridges you can find on Mt. Kinabalu. With some playbacks we managed to drew a pair close towards the platform, suddenly they appeared! right beneath us, foraging away and seems very much unbothered by our existence. After some satisfying views for ten minutes (behind metal fences!), they disappeared into the jungle.

Red-breasted Partridge

More birds joined in as the sun rose higher, including Mountain Blackeyes and Mountain Leaf Warblers, others include Grey-chinned Minivets, Chestnut-crested Yuhinas, Black-capped White-eyes and White-throated Fantails.

Mountain Blackeye

Mountain Leaf Warbler

White-throated Fantail

We decided to walk down the Liwagu trail, it's the longest trail so we thought we would walk the first part down the hill and back up to our car. The first bird we saw here was a Sunda Bush Warbler, it was very curious and came within a meter to us upon hearing a playback. We heard Orange-backed Woodpecker calling, but it didn't want to show, staying a long distance away. A flock of Yellow-breasted Warbler, Bornean Whistler and Grey-throated Babbler however were more cooperative.

Sunda Bush Warbler

Grey-throated Babbler

Yellow-breasted Warbler

A Mountain Wren-Babbler called very close by, a little playback reveal it's location, but it mostly stayed in cover, however gave us prolonged views of this modest looking endemic.

Mountain Wren-Babbler

We turned around when we got to the river, the steep hike back up was just as productive in a form of a fine male Crimson-headed Partridge! It was not bothered by our presence and called from a log to it's mate. Feeling lucky to have seen both endemic partridges close up on one single morning, we headed back down the hill. On the way down we spotted a female Snowy-browed Flycatcher in the car, which allowed us to get a pretty close look at it.

Crimson-headed Partridge

Snowy-browed Flycatcher female

Our car stopped at the entrance of the Mempening Trail, which we decided to take a short walk into the trail. About 20 meters in, a bird flew and perched on a branch close-by, and what a bird it was! A male Fruithunter! What a smart looking bird, gathering moss for it's nest. It perched for a minute or so, allowing some photographs to be taken and flew away out of sight. At the same location, a pair of Orange-backed Woodpeckers started calling and perched above us, obviously curious to our playbacks, they moved on shortly leaving us with just their calls echoing. Things quiet down a little after that, seeing little except a Mountain Tailorbird, which I think give a slightly different call to those we have in Hong Kong, there is an extra note in their wobble, but other then that pretty similar.

Fruithunter

Orange-backed Woodpecker

Mountain Tailorbird

After lunch at the Liwagu Restaurant, we birded at the garden outside again, rain started to fall but a few birds still decided to make an appearance, including Black-capped White-eyes, Black-sided Flowerpeckers, Chestnut-hooded Laughingthrush and a Golden-naped Barbet; a bird we hear constantly but only showed itself this one time. We wanted to walk the Silau-Silau trail again, however the rain didn't stop so we called it a day.

Black-capped White-eye

Black-sided Flowerpecker

Golden-naped Barbet

Chestnut-hooded Laughingthrush

To be continued...

Kinabalu National Park, Sabah - May 2014 (Part 2)

12th May: The next day we woke up at 6am, the first night of sleep wasn't too great, so we simply walked up to the park HQ and first birded along the Power Station Road. We got greeted by a group of laughingthrush, comprising of Sunda and Chestnut-hooded Laughingthrush, then further on a pair of obliging Indigo Flycatcher stood for as long as we wanted to watch, further up the hill at Grace Hostel we heard a group of Bornean Green Magpies making their way up hill, we waited and saw them through the trees, below them a small flock of Temminck's Babbler made an appearance (the ONLY!). Highlight was a little further up the road just before the bend leading to the Liwagu Restaurant, a female Whitehead's Broadbill made a brief appearance! It first made it's distinctive call and was then spotted on a fruiting tree ahead. 30 seconds later it flew uphill and out of sight, we waited a little longer but it never returned, making no calls at all.

Chestnut-hooded Laughingthrush

Indigo Flycatcher

Bornean Green Magpie

Temminck's Babbler (record shot)

Whitehead's Broadbill

We walked the Silau-Silau trail back down, with little sucess except for a flock of Chestnut-crested Yuhina, we heard the Bornean Whistling Thrush but it never showed. Walking back down to the hostel we noticed the swiftlet nests under the roof of the HQ buildings, these are "supposedly" Bornean Swiftlets, with their greenish rather then bluish sheen.

Chestnut-crested Yuhina

Bornean Swiftlet

After lunch it started raining, once it subsided a little we headed out again. First were a few Bornean Treepies right outside our hostel, you can hear them pretty much constantly in the mountain. We again followed the Power Station Road, outside the Botanical Garden and Liwagu Restaurant were these fruiting bushes, here you can find Black-sided Flowerpeckers, Ashy Drongo, a family of Indigo Flycatchers and Chestnut-hooded Laughingthrush. This spot proved to be quite successful on the coming few days as well, as different birds tend to show up here if you give it some time.

Bornean Treepie

Ashy Drongo

Indigo Flycatcher

Chestnut-hooded Laughingthrush

Black-sided Flowerpecker

On the way back we encountered a bird wave with Bornean Whistlers, Yellow-breasted Warblers, Mountain Leaf Warblers, Ochraceous Bulbul and White-throated Fantail. Most were too quick and I couldn't get any good photographs, however the Whistlers were slightly more cooperative, willing to stay long enough for us to take some photographs.

To be continued...

Kinabalu National Park, Sabah - May 2014 (Part 1)

Ever since I visited in July 2012, Sabah have always been at the back of my mind as a place to go back for more! The biodiversity is simply so vast that it will take a life time to get bored of the sheer number of species; both birds and other wildlife you can find here. As I didn't visit Mt. Kinabalu on my last visit, I thought it's only fair for me to visit this endemic rich mountain range in the North Western of Sabah. This was planned as a self driven leisure bird watching trip (on a budget), with no intention on hiring a guide. Therefore, a lot of pre-trip studies must be made before hand especially the bird calls...Though I am sure we still missed a ton of birds due to lack of knowledge of their habits and sounds, but overall we did fairly well, connecting with two of the main targets at Mt. Kinabalu and got a fairly good selection of lowland birds at Poring including two species of Trogons. With camera gears, photographing birds in tropical rain forest is never easy, it's nearly constantly dark and rains a lot, rain cover is highly recommended and a tripod comes in handy, but I do shoot hand held half the time since the trails are too narrow for tripods to stand straight. Expect ISO to be above 3200 a lot of the time!

Our itinerary are as follows:

11th May: Arrived > Tanjung Aru Beach - Kinabalu Park
12th May - 14th May: Kinabalu Park
15th May: Kinabalu Park - Poring Hot Spring
16th May: Poring Hot Spring
17th May: Poring Hot Spring - KKIA > Hong Kong

11th May: We took the 9:25am flight to KK, Air Asia flights can be very cheap if you look for them in the right time! We pre booked a car with "Extra Rent a Car", their online booking services was superb and their admin replied within hours. Their agents waited for us at the gate of KKIA terminal 2, the whole process was done on the bonnet of the car as they don't have a proper office at the airport, but everything went smoothly and you pay onsite. The car was a Proton Saga 1.3, fairly new and adequate even for going up hill at Mt. Kinabalu! We got our phone cards at the airport as well, the only telecom company at terminal 2 was DIGI so we went with it, the one week internet plan was fairly good, just 15RM for unlimited data and limited minutes, this proved very useful as our phones was served as our GPS as well! Reception was generally good and we even got 3G signals at Timpohon Gate.

Once we got kitted up and ready, we skipped lunch and drove straight to Tanjung Aru Beach for our first spot of birding. This is a popular tourist spot and the beach was packed with people on a Sunday afternoon, however a walk around Prince Philip Park gave us a good introduction into birds we won't find in "better" habitat later on. Plus this is a good place to see the Blue-naped Parrot, a bird difficult to see anywhere else on earth except here. Pink-necked Green Pigeon made a short appearance only, so did the Copper-throated Sunbird. Once the shower sets in we decided to eat at the food-court next to the beach, it's not the cleanest place but quite good value.

Pied Triller

Zebra Dove

White-breasted Woodswallow

Dollarbird

Asian Glossy Starling

Oriental Magpie Robin adamsi

Green Imperial Pigeon

Collard Kingfisher

Long-tailed Parakeet

Blue-naped Parrot

The drive to Kinabalu Park was longer then expected, it's about two hours to get from KKIA to the Park HQ, roads are generally good and traffic was not as bad as I expected. It was 6:30 by the time we arrived and was all dark. However we did got to stop by the roadside and got some species such as Grey-rumped Treeswift and Ashy Drongo. The scenery driving up the mountain was enjoyable as well, as we admired the sun setting and the lights turned Mt. Kinabalu red! We stayed at Tahubang Lodge, a budget hostel right outside the Park HQ main gate, a twin room is just 100RM per night, considerably cheaper then living inside the park. Rooms are clean and staffs are friendly, the only complain is that rats seems to run on the roof all night, other then that it's actually pretty acceptable. There's a small restaurant and store right next to the lodge.

Grey-rumped Treeswift

Mt. Kinabalu

To be continued...