A Plaintive Cuckoo in plain sight

View of the park  18 Dec'16

 It looks like a lazy Sunday.  At around 7 am I took a walk around the park to check out the greenery and nature.  The mix of leaves, branches and colour are a delight to my eyes, as I wander around the park to seek for surprises.  This year the month of December has been a let down.  It should be raining on daily basis but for about a week now the rainy monsoon left no down pours. The ground thus remain dry where ever I walked.  Have the global climatic changes elsewhere resulted in a drier monsoon for Bintulu? I am fortunate to be engulfed by massive structures of greenery as I walked underneath the canopy of tall trees of various species. This is the kind of living world that I seek, a silent walk in nature to help  re-collect my mind as often as possible.  The surrounding landscape makes me admire nature for the many stories it want to tell me. And today nature gives me a rare insight into one of its bird species.  For about an hour I was hearing the familiar call of the Plaintive Cuckoo, a bird more heard than seen in Bintulu.  In my mind it must have signaled me to hunt for the bird and perhaps photograph it.  I was camera ready when I saw the Plaintive cuckoo in plain sight.  It was perching on the branches of a dying Cempedak tree.  I took several shots of it from various angles to capture what was once a tremendous challenge for me.  This morning walk was well paid for with the capture of the bird and the music it made.  The Plaintive Cuckoos utters an ascending call which I hear every day in the morning and evening but fail to capture the origin until today.  The call sounds like " teet- teet- teet -teet ta ta tay".  In zooming the pictures, I noticed it has a grey head, neck and upper breast.  Its lower breast to under-tail coverts has a pastel orange colour.  Its feet yellow and has a black bill.  What strikes me was the position of its perching, as if it was sitting upright and  parrallel to the branch.  Indeed this morning walk was a moment of truth for me with the sighting of the Plaintive Cuckoo.

Plaintive Cuckoo seen at a distance 

Close-up of the Plaintive Cuckoo.
Location : Zone E

A pair of Chestnut-breasted Malkoha

Chestnut-breasted Malkoha - male

 Today is the third time the malkoha birds dropped by at the park within this year.  They are the largest malkoha species on this great island of Borneo and fortunately can be viewed at the Kambatik park. However, what's significant today is the fact that the Chestnut-breasted Malkoha came in a pair.  The malkoha birds moved silently.  I only noticed them when I was walking near Botanic Island One.  I saw something big passing in front of me in colours of blue.  I immediately focused my camera lens on a moving object among the thick cover of leaves.  It was the female of the species that I managed to photograph first.  Later I walked to Botanic Island Two to watch the male of the species hopping from branch to branch .   I am glad that I have preserved the original lowland rainforest ecology at the park by creating three ecological enclaves termed Botanic Island One, Two and Three.  In the islands are thousands of insects like bees, caterpillars, and small animals like lizards that the malkohas can feed on.

Chestnut-breasted Malkoha - female
The female malkoha has red-orange iris and a broader band from chin to ear-coverts.

Chestnut-breasted Malkoha - male
The throat and underside of body is a rich chestnut colour.
It's back, wings and tails are a glossy blue-green.

MY facebook cover page depicting the Chestnut-breasted Malkoha