BIRDS SPOTS IN FRASER'S HILL

 

Hello all birders. Gong xi fa cai to all birders who celebrates the Chinese New Year in Malaysia and around the world. For my part i am taking the opportunity to spend the holiday at my favorite location which is Fraser's Hill tomorrow.The good thing is that I will be there for five days to do some birding, the bad thing is that it will be crowded with families who are celebrating the new year at the hill station. All of the hotels are fully booked in advance especially during weekend. I only managed to get a room with the help of a lady friend who happens to be the daughter of the hotel owner. Well, what is a friend for right?

Anyway, i have been going to Fraser's Hill numerous times over the last few years and have recorded quite a number of bird species all over the hill. I have always wanted to map the locations and species that i have encountered so i can share with all birders especially those who visit Fraser's Hill for the first time. 

The above map is the observed locations of various bird species by me on Fraser's Hill up to today. It will be updated from time to time. Please keep in mind most species do not stay still at any one place as they would go around looking for food and insects in the early morning and late afternoon,but they have the habit of visiting certain spots that they had tried before and successful in finding food. There seem to be certain patterns with some species based on my observations like the Fire-tufted Barbets which seem to visit certain trees with orange colored fruits in certain areas, while the Black-throated Sunbird love to visit certain red flower plants for nectar while the Drongos like to perch deep in the shade of the forest along the roads. The Blyth's hawk-eagle like to fly high in a certain flight-path over the hill looking for prey and at certain times can be seen if you just hang around the Fraser's Hill golf course during the afternoon. The Spectacled Laughingthrush, Silver-eared Mesia and Long-tailed Sibia like to come in wave just next to a food stall near to the Paddock area practically a few meters only from the eating area, probably attracted by the smell of fried banana. The time of the season has a big impact on the appearance of certain species. A certain spot can be good in some months of the year but can be lousy in other months.

I hope this map can help the first time birders at Fraser's Hill where to look for the species that they are interested in. Currently this map has only 40 species that i have encountered so far which is a small percentage of the total 255 species of bird recorded in Fraser's Hill.

Happy birding.

FIRST 2014 BIRDING IN FRASER'S HILL

Last weekend (17 to 19th January) i went to Fraser's Hill for my first 2014 birding there taking advantage of the Thaipusam Holiday which was celebrated by the Hindus nation wide. Unfortunately, that means everybody else was also doing the same thing, so as expected the crowd was heavy. There were the normal folks, families, kids; then there were organized convoys of car clubs, heavy bikes, scooters and dirt bikes. The hotels were full which was good for business. Unfortunately, it was not so good for birders and birding as the sound of cars, big bikes and people scared away the birds. Add to that the heavy mist and cold weather birding was miserable. It was very rare when to have heavy mist that would not go away for two straight days with visibility around 30meters in some places and the temperature dipping to around 15celcius with strong wind in Fraser's Hill specifically and Malaysia generally as we are in the tropics.However, birders being birders come what may we have to make do with the weather and still try our best to get a few shots of the birds unless there is a very heavy rain which make the whole thing pointless.

Heavy mist throughout the trip

DAY 1 - I managed to get a few shots of male and female Little Pied Flycatchers,Striated Spiderhunters and Crimson-breasted Oriole within a few hours of available light to me due to the heavy mist. Fortunately, they came quite close to the roadside so the visibility was good even though it was quite late in the afternoon.

Male Little Pied Flycatcher

Female Little Pied Flycatcher

Striated Spiderhunters

Striated Spiderhunters

Crimson-breasted Oriole

Crimson-breasted Oriole

DAY 2 - Very poor birding due to the weather. I managed to shoot a Drongo in the pine forest area behind the horse paddock but the exposure was very bad due to the weather despite using a flash gun, not worth posting the photo here.

DAY 3 - The weather improved in the morning with much less mist however occassionally they came back, you know how it is like in the mountain(almost 5000 feet elevation from the sea) which is very unpredictable. However, this last day was the most productive as i managed to capture photos of one of the most elusive species - the Green Magpies, and a female Leafbird, along with Fire-tufted Barbet and a Fire-breasted Flowerpecker. I had to resort to using ferns cut from the road side to camouflage my tripod and camera as the Green Magpies are a bit of a shy species. Using camo gave me time to get good shots and get closer to them without scaring them away. However, i should not wear jeans the next time i go birding as you can see no amount of camo can cover the blue color unless i use a lot of leaves which is troublesome in case i need to move to better spots.

using ferns for camo helps

The birds would come to the edge of the road looking for insects

The area where the Green Magpies came out looking for insects

The beautiful Green Magpy

My favorite Fire-tufted Barbet

Fire-tufted Barbet

Fire-breasted Flowerpecker

Female Leafbird

Black-throated Sunbird

Black-throated Sunbird

My third day birding finished with a few shots of Black-throated Sunbird. All in all, it was a good trip considering the nuisance of the weather, bikers and car club convoys and the folks coming to me asking what i was doing, that i managed to get almost a dozen species( Silver-eared Mesia, Longtail Sibia, Chestnut Laughing Thrush and Oriental Magpies was not included inside this post) photos for my blog. It was a good beginning for birding for 2014 and i hope the next trip will be as productive if not more.

I hope you enjoy watching the photos. Happy birding. Cheers.

FIRST PHOTO Of 2014

Blue-tailed Bee-Eater