A dragon by any other name

My monsoon birding tour participant, Phillip Johnson has bagged the outrageously beautiful Wilson's Bird-of-Paradise in West Papua as his 5,000th lifer. I would like to congratulate him on this amazing achievement! He should be feeling very happy to have reached this memorable milestone, seeing such a crippler.

Wouldn’t it be nice to read about his birding adventures in a book one day? I think he should start chipping in, while chasing after the remaining half of the birds of the world. And if he does so, I hope he will not ignore all those NFFs! (catch all category that Phil lumps non birdie subjects in, standing for No #@*!ing Feathers). Phil is a teacher and a terrific storyteller. I am sure such a book filled with his anecdotes will prove interesting reading for many of us.

Last week, I stumbled upon a few NFFs myself on two trips to two rain forests. Special among them were four Hump-nosed Lizards. This is a scarce reptile found in moist rain forests in Sri Lanka, distributed up to altitudes of 1,650m. I don’t know about you, but my heart beats faster whenever I stumble upon one of these amazing reptiles. May be it’s because it reminds me of those ancient reptiles, famously celebrated. Some of those first feathered reptiles evolved to become the earliest birds. May be it is due to that. I wonder what Phil will do if he accidently spots such a feathered reptile now. Surely he cannot ignore it as another NFF?

Coming back to reality, the last of those four individuals that I found was a mature male. It was the most strikingly coloured of the four, the reason why I have promoted it to the very top. The gular pouch which it uses for displays when threatened and courting to pose an apparent increase in size, is well developed in both sexes but is more pronounced in the males. When threatened it also opens the mouth to display its red interiors as shown here, which to me appears like a fiery mouth of a mythical dragon.

There are 18 species of lizards belonging to the family Agamidae (for which reason they are commonly termed as 'Agamid lizards') in Sri Lanka out of which a whopping 15 are endemic. The Hump-nosed Lizard is one of the earliest animals to be described from Sri Lanka, named in 1758 by none other than the farther of modern taxonomy, Carl Linnaeus. Its present scientific name is Lyriocephalus scutatus. This generic name translates to 'Lyre-shaped head/face', which can be seen well in the first image. It earns its most often used vernacular from the globular knob of the snout in the adult, which is absent in the juveniles. Lyriocephalus is a monotypic genus, which means it contains only a single species, which in this case, is endemic to Sri Lanka.

My reptilian brain says that this species should be called as "Lyre-faced Dragon" as opposed to its rather lame sounding popular name used at present. Having said that, my primate brain says that it is best left unchanged as ‘dragon’ is likely to attract too much unwanted attention detrimental to its well-being.

Do you have different parts of your brain talking to you like this?

This immature was found close to the above individual and was the 3rd in the order seen by me. This lizard is capable of changing its colour quite remarkably and when I first found it in the evening before (when I carried no camera to be a better bird watcher) it was coloured similar to the green and yellow adult above.

I got the above photograph after returning to its site in the following morning. It was then that the above adult caught the eye.

Hump-nosed Lizard is an iconic species in Sri Lankan herpetology, with the country's leading herp. journal being named after its genus.

Here’s the second individual found – a record shot. It first appeared like a stump coming out of that tree. This one has almost completely shed its old skin, and the bits that remain attached it is lower body gives it a disguise as lichen patches of a tree.

And lastly, here’s the very first Hump-nosed Lizard that I stumbled upon during last week. It was crossing the road at Gilimale. I hurriedly escorted it to the forest before a bus came our way. That was not before I took this record shot, showing how it tries to hide from me, cleverly assuming the tones of the tarred road. Not bad for a reptilian brain, eh?

Hump-nosed Lizard is the only Lizard species that I have seen in a dream. In that, I found it in my home garden.

Related posts:

In search of a Drongo

Israel chasing targets in Sri Lanka

Monsoon Birding

I guided three avid birders on a monsoon birding trip from late June to early July. The main organiser, Pieter van der Luit from Inezia Tours, and his colleague, Teus (Dr. Teus Luijendijk) came from the Netherlands. They both were terrific birders and had 3,138 and 3,777 birds in their respective life lists. Pieter won one of the books that I gave away at a quiz that I did in the “IATB #75”—birding blog carnival.

The third person, Philip Johnson, was a client of Pieter's. Phil is a Professor at the University of Alabama in the department of civil engineering. He was determined to reach 5,000 birds before he turns 60—on the 30th December. After visiting five other countries in the oriental region since May, birding, Phil’s life list stood at 4,897 birds when he arrived in Sri Lanka. He left Sri Lanka with a tally of 4,950. Pieter and Teus bagged 138 and 51 lifers respectively.

The monsoon really had a dampening effect at some of the key birding sites we visited. Nevertheless, we trudged along and achieved a tally of 194, which included thirty-one endemics, and eight of the fifteen resident night birds. We missed out on two endemics: Sri Lanka Spurfowl and Serendib Scops Owl—both were stubbornly silent.

We did quite well with mammals, seeing a total of twenty-six species including Sri Lanka’s big three: Elephant, Sloth Bear and Leopard. Being a target-driven world birder, non-birdie subjects to Phil were as unattractive as non-estrous females to a Silverback.

Of course, he did not resort to chest-beating and grunting to show his displeasure, but instead he conveniently lumped them in a catch-all category named NFF—No F***ing Feathers! And moved on to find his next life bird.

Despite his avowed indifference to creatures with no feathers, Phil kept on stumbling some rarest non-birdie gems—for people like us. And he was nice enough to share them. The star among these serendipitous finds by him, was an adorable Red Slender Loris, that he spotted while it was moving slow and low in a thicket in the amazing Sinharaja rain forest. This nocturnal endemic mammal is rather rare, and all of us had great views of it.

His next best exploit was chancing upon a Muntjak at Welimada, which is not as rare, but cool nevertheless.
Moving on to birding specifics, our search for the Sri Lanka Bush-Warbler near a pool at the cloud forests of Horton Plains National Park (2,100m) to me was the most memorable birding experience of the trip. It was in a very cold morning with temperatures in single digit ºC, when intermittent downpours, and foggy conditions conspired with high gusts to spell very little hope for our cause.

Yet we stood there tenaciously, with bins firmly in our grips, ready to lift them at the slightest detection of a movement in the low-vegetation that stood before us. A movement that would betray the presence of this endemic LBJ – that can prove pain in the neck at elevations lower down. Our agonizing vigil was interrupted by my pep talk how I have shown cracking views of it at this site before on previous tours. And how we should not call off play, on account of the elements. And stay positive just like this Sambar.


Fifteen minutes on, there was no let up; it was bitterly cold.

I then I decided to take a stroll with the team to see whether we could pick its metallic call in the low shrubs. No hope. Even the bubbly Yellow-eared Bulbuls remained stubbornly silent. And the gregarious Sri Lanka White-eyes too seemed to be on a token strike, protesting the weather. Not even a Dull-blue Flycatcher sang its sonorous call—which would have been fitting for the moment. We didn’t need that Flycatcher. Phil spotted it the day before at Welimada to give great views for all of us. In fact, we had three individuals, which included a newly fledged one. One good view is just enough for hardcore birders. The name of the game is to move on to look for new birds.

With little success from the walk, I called that we should go back to check the pond.

Minutes after arriving back at the original position, our hopes were raised when Phil detected a movement of something birdie, in the low thickets, but lost it before he could find it in his binoculars. It was too misty and gloomy. Phil finds it a bit difficult to see things in low-light. And the optics gathered water droplets whenever we took off the protective covers to scan the surroundings, impairing our vision further.

With this being the state of affairs, seconds later, the bird rematerialised in a reedy patch at the edge of the pond—seemingly on transit. It was good enough for the Dutch duo to get their fills of this rare skulker. But, Phil was not on it, still struggling with his bins, wiping the mist on his glasses, and all that. Quite frustratingly, before we could show him this LBJ, it flew off across the pond, and disappeared into the bordering thickets. Only UTVs—Un-Tickable-Views. That means, it will not be counted as seen.

I alerted to stay focused as it might pop out again. Soon, as predicted, I picked up a slight movement across the pond—bingo—I got Phil on it this time. I could read its details just enough through my Swarovski EL 8.5 x 42. But then, Phil claimed he could still see only the dark blurry profile of the bird just to say that it looked like a Bush-Warbler but nothing beyond. That hinted that it was still a UTV as far as he was concerned!

I then gave him my bins to try. And that worked.  He at once claimed to see its details much clearer than through his 10 x 42s, (which were pretty worn out). The Dutch duo too were sporting Swarovski EL 10 x 42 binoculars. Pieter and Teus too took turns to look through my bins at a now preening Sri Lanka Bush Warbler, out in the open— to confirm what Phil observed. The superior light gathering ability of Swarovski EL 8.5 x 42 does have its uses in low-light forest birding.

Although the weather improved very little thereafter, birds, however, began to come out as the day wore on. It seemed like they had resigned to the fact that things will not get any better. Raising our hopes, Sri Lanka White-eye, Velvet-fronted Nuthatch, Indian Blackbird, Orange-billed Babbler, Grey Tit, Dark-fronted Babbler, Sri Lanka Scimitar Babbler, Common Tailorbird, Dull-blue Flycatcher, all came in quick order as we pressed on.

A short respite from the rain, brought a couple of Sri Lanka Bush-Warblers to an eye-level perch for much improved views. Shortly afterwards, another one low-down. Way better.

Due to weather induced misfortunes, the Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush kept eluding us until our final morning at Nuwara Eliya, when I gambled to check a new site. It worked. And the male Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush that I found for everybody not only gave jaw-dropping views, sitting on an open branch, but also entertained us with its song—which I heard well for the first time. Teus and I got decent sound recordings of it.
Whistling Thrushes are ultra-elusive birds and seeing them involve a sound technique.

I parted some tips in Finding the Malayan Whistling Thrush to Phil whose next stop was Malaysia.

Bagging the Blue Whale

Sri Lanka is one of the best places to see the Blue Whale Balaenoptera musculus—according to Marine Biologist Dr. Charles Anderson. He is based in Maldives since 1983 and his research on whales in the Indian Ocean led him to believe that Blue Whales should be present off the south coast of Sri Lanka in April—a hypothesis he confirmed with pelagic trips done in April 2007 and 2008. In the last of these trips, he has had Blue Whales on all 14-days he spent looking for them, with an average of 4.5 sightings per day!

Sri Lanka, as you may be aware, is a continental island, which had been connected to India for much of the geological past through epocs of lowered sea levels. The continental shelf that it sits on begins to slope after 3 nautical miles off Dondra in the southernmost tip of Sri Lanka, which is also the southernmost point of the whole of Indian subcontinent. Because of this oceanographical reality, ships plying between east and west have to circumnavigate Sri Lanka, passing by Dondra instead of cutting across the northern Sri Lanka, where seas are shallower.

According Dr. Anderson, the cetaceans migrating between feeding areas in the east and west of the Indian Ocean also take the same route as the ships. This, according to him, happens between December to April—with clear peaks in December and April.

With this beging the state of affairs Peter Kaestner, who at present is the world’s 7th ranked birder, came to Sri Lanka on a 9-day holiday with his family in early April—with wathcing the Blue Whales being central element of the tour. According to the latest numbers listed in Surbirds.com, Peter has got a whopping 8,180 species of birds, out of 10,000 or species found in the world.

In 1989, he was fortunate to discover a bird species entirely new to science, from Columbia, which came to be known as Cundimarca Antpitta Grallaria kaestneri.

This was Peter’s second trip with me. The first was in Sep, 2007 when he came on 3-day weekend birding trip wanting to clean up 8 Sri Lankan endemic birds missing in his world bird list. Before this, he had been on a solo birding visit to Sri Lanka in 1981—round about the time when I was getting ready to go to the kindergarten!

In the 2007 trip, we managed to see 7 of those 8 targets: Serendib Scops Owl, Ashy-headed Laughingthrush, Red-faced Malkoha, Sri Lanka Spurfowl, Green-billed Coucal, Sri Lanka Bush Warbler and Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush—the toughest endemics, with two being in the “endangered” club.

The one we missed out was the not-so-elusive Brown-capped Babbler. This miss was because some of those rare species we sought were found in two ecological zones – the lowland wet zone and highland wet zone respectively, and because some of them being rare birds didn't show up easily, demanding more time.

Oh! And because, we encountered foul weather throughout in this particular tour due to the period of travel coinciding with a monsoonal high.

We commenced our 2009 trip in the southeastern Sri Lanka with two game drives to the spectacular Yala National Park hoping to go 1-nil with the Leopard. Unfortunately, we drew a blank with this big cat this time.

But, to make amends, I managed to find the Brown-capped Babbler!

Next came the pelagic leg—the most important one—of the trip to see our main quarry, the Blue Whale.

Having started from Mirissa at 7.15 a.m., on 5 April, we had the first evidence of our first Blue Whale after travelling 4 nautical miles, towards—well—Antarctica. It was a distant but unmistakable view of a characteristic high vertical blow.

Tickable views were obtained around 5.5 nautical miles off. We had at least 4 good sightings of just an individual after we reached the hotspot and started looking intently. We knew it was the same one as it had a characteristic white marking in the tail, which showed up clearing with each surfacing. Here's a crude video of our Blue Whale. I should stress the word: crude.



At one point it was seen as close as 20-30m from our boat as it surfaced to breathe, almost taking our breath away. It performed well for us as well as for people aboard 3 other boats that converged at this hotspot for the same purpose. One of those was full of familiar faces with members of a local nature club. They, at one point, were pretty close. By the way, the terra firma you see in the picture below is Sri Lanka, just in case if you are wondering whether it is Antarctica.

I did not take my dSLR for this trip. That's because all my lenses are macro types. And the Blue Whale was not really a macro subject.

So, all these pictures shared here were taken by my trusty Panasonic Lumix FZ-18, which is also the model that Peter currently uses as his carry on camera. I bought mine after seeing this amazing shot he got by photographing the Serendib Scops Owl at night (using an older Lumix version).

A day trip we did following this to Sinharaja rain forest to see Sri Lanka Scaly Thrush and Crimson-backed Flameback was successful. The former responded aggressively to my rendition of its contact call by flying straight towards my head, indicating it may be busy nesting. These two birds together with Sri Lanka Woodshrike and Common Hawk Cuckoo seen on this tour by Peter went as ‘bank birds’—ones which do not get added to his bird list immediately as the ‘Clements' checklist’ that he uses to keep track of birds species seen, has not yet accepted these recent taxonomical splits/potential spits as valid species yet; and now that he has seen them, they would increase his tally once they are accepted as valid species in the future.

I nearly forgot, Peter became the first birder to see my garden's roosting Brown Hawk Owls.

A related post: Finding lifers for Peter Kaestner

Birding with Keith and Julie Ellis

I led an 18-day 'birds, wildlife and culture tour' with Keith and Julie Ellis from Kent, UK from 23 Jan – 9 February. Keith was a serious birder with over 3,000 world birds in his life list. He knew most of the species that he wanted to see by their scientific names and was a sharp birder. Julie had broader interests, which included culture. She was supportive and tolerant—two traits that I admire in non-birding spouses accompanying serious birders! A cultural extension added to the tour to please her took us to several Unesco world heritage sites that included Anuradhapura—the first capital of Sri Lanka from 4th century B.C to early 11th century AD, Polonnaruwa—the medieval capital from 11-13th century A.D, Sigiriya—popularly, a pleasure capital of a single king named Kashyapa in the 5th century A.D, and Kandy—the last Sinhalese capital from 16th to 19th century A.D, which is home to the Temple of The Sacred Tooth Relic, where a Sacred Tooth of the Buddha is encased in jeweled caskets that sit on a throne. In Anuradhapura, we also visited Mihintale—the cradle of Sinhalese Buddhist civilization and birded in the world’s first declared wildlife sanctuary, announced as early as in the 3rd century B.C.!


We were quite lucky with the weather, and experienced nice dry conditions throughout the tour, which was perfect for birding. In total, we bagged 253 species of birds including all thirty-three endemic birds currently recognized. Nineteen of these endemics were bagged during our first two days at Kithulgala—in the "power play" stage of the tour. And this reduced the ‘asking rate’ during the rest of the tour considerably!

Some of the high-profile endemic targets bagged at Kithulgala included Serendib Scops Owl, Sri Lanka Spurfowl, Crimson-backed Flameback, Red-faced Malkoha, and Sri Lanka Blue Magpie.
The latter two species are usually considered as Sinharaja specials, but we made good ground by bagging them in advance to free up time to look for bonus birds. Our last endemic to be seen on the trip, Sri Lanka Bush Warbler was the one that gave us the hardest time. As it was proving elusive at my regular sites at Nuwara Eliya, a pre-dawn visit was undertaken to the cloud forests of Horton Plains National Park just to see it. The temperature at at the site we settled to look for this LBJ at the Horton Plains was just about 3 degrees centigrades! Not my cuppa tea! It was so cold that there was ground frost. Jesus Christ!

After 45 minutes of searching, I managed to spot one Sri Lanka Bush Warbler skulking in low bamboo thicket, thus making a clean sweep of the endemics. I suspect the reason for its inactivity at elevations low-down probably may be due to the very dry weather experienced at those sites.

Painted Stork

A special highlight of the tour was seeing ten out of the fifteen resident night birds—with most offering multiple orgasmic views! This figure comprised of seven owls, two nightjars and the only frogmouth species found in Sri Lanka. This night bird number beat a previous high recorded on my tours of nine—seen on a 15- day birding tour in February, 2008 with four crack team of British birders.

Touching in the specifics of the haul of night birds and other things, our first owl of the trip was Chestnut-backed Owlet (shown below), and it was spotted by Keith while it was actively foraging at daytime close to our accommodation. The same species was seen moments later in another patch close by, with its characteristic call betraying its hide-out in the dense vegetation.


Our second species of owl for the trip, a roosting Indian Scops Owl was picked by me quite by chance moments later, when I was looking for the skulking endemic, Green-billed Coucal in a thicket. We got decent views of the hoped for coucal and as dusk approached the scops owl cooperated at a more open branch to present us full view of its profile. Indian Scops Owl was recorded again at a nest hole towards the tail end of the holiday (that's like, work, for me) at Anuradhapura during the cultural leg.

Our day 2 at Kithulgala saw us getting cracking views of the highly-sought-after endemic, Serendib Scops Owl. This rain forest owl was discovered in 2001 and is one of the 2 ‘endangered’ endemics (which I believe should go up to 3 with Sri Lanka Bush Warbler added to it!). The other endemic bestowed with this conservation status, Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush gave an untickable view on our first dusk vigil, but did not disappoint us on our second attempt when a female showed up over 10 minutes. A change of strategy adopted by me did the trick for us: Keith and I occupying two different spots, at several metres apart, covering two vital angles. Both of us got it almost at once when the bird emerged secretly.

Our fourth Owl species for the trip and second for day two came in the form of a vocal Brown Fish Owl in flight. The same species gave cracking views at Nuwara Eliya, Sigiriya and Anuradhapura, the last at daytime courtesy of a mob of smaller birds harassing it.

Our fifth resident night bird for the trip came in the form of a brooding male Sri Lanka Frogmouth (shown below and again, at the very top) at Sinharaja on day three. Rather sadly, we learnt the on the following day from our local guide, Ranjaka, that this nest had been ‘predated’ under mysterious circumstances. A Human involvement was suspected, which if true, was very very sad.


The day three also brought us the ultra-elusive Brown Wood Owl, which was our fifth owl and sixth night bird for the trip. We manage to see the same species on the following day too courtesy a mob of short-tempered Sri Lanka Crested Drongos. They dive-bombed it with no mercy at dusk pin-pointing us of the exact location!

Several Indian Jungle Nightjars seen at Udawalawe on day six proved to be our seventh night bird for the trip. This species offered very good views at close range at Yala too. Our eighth night bird and sixth Owl for the trip seen at Sigiriya saw us cleaning up all three Scops Owls of Sri Lanka, when Keith expertly zeroed in on an Oriental Scops Owl on day thirteen. It was calling teasingly close for over fifteen minutes. Its location remained hidden in the dense foliage for most angles available. When we found it, we had to make do with unsatisfactory back views of it due to the location of its perch.

The following morning saw us making a return visit to this site for it. After a bit of hardwork, I spotted a pair of this cute little Owls at dawn to give absolutely stonking views within three metres. Sadly, we had no camera with either of us to record this moment of magic. (Isn't that typical!).

Crested Hawk Eagle
Jerdon’s Nightjar spotted by Keith on a snag high up became our ninth night bird of the trip. That was again seen on day thirteen. A prolonged sighting of the same species in a low perch bettered this sighting three days later at Anuradhapura. Our last night bird for the trip was Common Barn Owl, a pair of which was recorded in a stake-out inside shrine in Polonnaruwa.

Concerted attempts at seeing Spot-bellied Eagle Owl, Brown Hawk Owl, Jungle Owlet and Sri Lanka Bay Owl failed on this tour. However, we came agonizingly close to seeing Sri Lanka Bay Owl, twice, but it just did not show up being vocal but staying uncooperatively hidden in dense foliage despite our best efforts to obtain an angle of view. This ultra secretive owl caused a mega twitch in Sri Lanka when it turned up in a daytime roost at Sinharaja in 2007. It is in public domain that at least one local bird watcher took a tuktuk tour all the way from Colombo to see it.

Great Thick-knee

Our other birds of note recorded during the trip included Grey-headed Lapwing (vagrant & lifer for me seen at Yala thanks to US of Ceylon Bird Club who conveyed the news), Western Reef Egret (white morph one picked skilfully by Keith at Bundala, shown below), Legge’s Hawk Eagle (formely Mountain HE, great overhead views at Sinharaja), Chestnut-winged Crested Cuckoo (a lone individual outside a flock at Sinharaja), Fork-tailed Drongo Cuckoo (spotted expertly by Julie at Kithulgala), Black-backed Dwarf Kingfisher (seen & photographed at point black range at Kithulgala), Indian Reed Warbler (in song at Bundala), Slaty-breasted Rail (Scarce resident with possible migrant populations supplementing resident populations during migratory season, seen at Tissamaharama), White-naped Woodpecker (punctual!), Kashmir Flycatcher (at least 4 sightings with the first being of an adult male), Pied Thrush (great views at Nuwara Eliya) Common Ringed Plover (a scarce migrant, not too exciting to Keith), Dollarbird (seen thanks to G. de Silva Wijeyeratne at Kithulgala) and Eurasian Collard Dove (a scarce resident in Sri Lanka seen at Annaiwilundawa RAMSAR wetland, not too exciting to Keith). A Slaty-legged Crake at Sinharaja, seen only by yours truly, was the only bird species that eluded Keith.


We had exceptional views of the ultra-elusive Sri Lanka Spurfowls when a female followed by a male were seen over five minutes, walking in the dimly-lit forest floor, totally unaware that we were observing them from a ridge higher up! Such heart-melting sightings of this game bird are rare, and this was one of the best views that I have had of it for quite a long time guiding an overseas birder. Before that we had brief view of it at Kithulgala. It was a case of BVD.

Moving on to non-birding matters, the Leopard shown below (same individual as in the previous post) was clearly our top non-birding highlight. We were the only jeep at the site when we found it. It was first sighted at 5.30 p.m., while resting in a shady spot near a water hole named rawung-wala (meaning circular water-hole) at Meda-para at the Yala National Park—the premier site for Leopards in Sri Lanka. The cat was about 25 m away when we found it first. Soon after we killed the engine of our jeep to observe it, the cat stood up and walked towards the track in front of us. It then continued to walk along it for a while like this, soon going out of view in the bend ahead.


We then approached it to find it again, this time within 5 meters or so from it, enabling us to photograph it at close range. Finally, after giving a good long glance at our jeep, it retreated into the jungle and disappeared out of radar.

More non-birding specials, we saw a pair of Barking Deers (Indian Muntjak) at Welimada. My previous sightings of this deer species has always been at the massive Wilpattu National Park. We exchanged glances with a pair of these before they retreated to the woodier interiors.

Christmas Birding

Happy New Year!

I am back after a successful Christmas Birding tour with Richard and Ann Bishop—two worldlisters from Britain living in Kenya for last twenty years. They both had over 4,300 species of birds in their individual lists, and were pretty serious birders. We were joined in the last quarter of the trip by Mike Watts, a keen British birder with plenty of 'other' interests.


As the Bishops had travelled to northern India and southeast Asia several times, priority was given for the Sri Lankan and South Indian specials. This explains why we ended up with a relatively modest tally of 222 species of birds—about 10-20 short of usual numbers recorded on a 15-day bird watching tour during November to early April—the peak birding season in Sri Lanka when migrants supplement resident birds.

Bishops scored 32 of the 33 endemics currently recognized. We missed out on the scarce and “endangered” endemic, Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush. However, it was scored by Mike on our second attempt (out of a total of four)—in rugby terms, that was one blind-sided try by Mike!


Sri Lanka is home to two endangered endemics, and the other one: Serendib Scops Owl, discovered new to science in 2001, did not disappoint us. It gave exceptional views at the Sinharaja ‘world heritage’ rain forest during a profitable owling session, which also yielded Sri Lanka Frogmouth.

The sought-after western Himalayan delight, Kashmir Flycatcher, which almost exclusively winters in the highlands of Sri Lanka, afforded  five sightings at three different sites. This was special as it was the highest number of sightings ever of this scarce migrant on a 15-day birding tour for me! Another himalayan special, Pied Thrush showed well on our second attempt at its regular site at Nuwara Eliya. It was the most-wanted bird for Richard, and he was quite elated about it.

The ultra-secretive Sri Lanka Spurfowl showed up “unsatisfactorily." It was when a silent female that crossed the track at Sinharaja was followed seconds later by a silent male, about 10 m ahead of us. Heart-melting sighting of this game bird is usually rare. Anyway as far as the Bishops were concerned, this was a case of BVD: better views desired!

Apart from endemics and specials mentioned above, some of our other birding highlights were as follows.

Dollarbird, Black-backed Dwarf Kingfisher (topmost pic), Malabar Trogon, Indian Pitta, Besra, Indian Blue Robin, Common Hawk Cuckoo, Black-throated Munia, Grey-headed Fish Eagle (bottommost pic), Hill Swallow, Malabar Pied Hornbill, White-naped Woodpecker, Jerdon’s Bushlark, Blyth’s Pipit, Forest Wagtail, Citrine Wagtail (local rarity), Indian Silverbill (3rd from top), Spot-billed Pelican (5th from the top), Crested Hawk Eagle (4th from top), Small Pratincole (6th from top), Watercock, Black Bittern, Yellow Bittern, Indian Reed Warbler, and finally, the Blue-faced Malkoha—scored at the "injury time" on the final day!


The only lifer for me on this trip came at Tissamaharama in the form a Slaty-breasted Rail—a record shot of which is shown below. Very important, this was also a lifer for my visitors, which made it a good tick for all of us.


As usual, we had plenty of natural history delights on this trip. These included “Zumala” (probable Zumala robusta, thanks to Dr. D.P Wijeysinghe)—a bizarre looking Long-horned Grasshopper. We also had Hump-nosed Lizard, Leaf-nosed Lizard (seen at Knuckles), Sri Lanka Krait (seen at Kithulgala) and butterflies: Blue Admiral and Painted Sawtooth.

An Eurasian Otter seen while trying for Sri Lanka Scaly Thrush at the wet lowlands, a Giant Grey Flying Squirrel seen at the highlands while trying for Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush and an unidentified feline (which Richard and I agreed to disagree on) seen at dusk at the dry lowlands while trying for Indian Nightjar were some of the noteworthy highlights of a nineteen or so mammals seen on this trip.

We also did a few frogging forays whenever it was possible. These and other non-birding highlights seen on this trip will be blogged in a separate posts to come.


In other news, yesterday I received my complementary copies of Thayer Birding Software’s Gold Edition DVD Birds of North America with my Brown Hawk Owl image in it plus Thayer Birding Software’s Guide to Birds of North America version 3.9. They both look absolutely fantastic! You North American birders are so darn lucky to have such great birding resources available for you!
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Birding with Yong Ding Li & friends

Yong Ding Li, 23, a Singaporean birder, had seen 1,217 species of birds in Asia by the time he visited Sri Lanka for a birding trip. Ding Li was determined to break the record of Ben King—who has seen the most number of birds in Asia. He was referred to me by Enoka Kudawidanage who is doing a PhD studies at NUS (National University of Singapore), where Ding Li is a student. Although Ding Li first wanted to do a very low budget backpacking style trip, inviting me to join him at a few key birding sites such as Sinharaja rain forest, I was able to lure him to accepting a more structured itinerary. It was good a group tour—to keep costs low.

Chestnut-backed Owlet photographed at point blank range at Kithulgala

The result was a birding trip done between 10-19 Dec 2007 with 5 other Singaporean birders joining in. They included Ding Li’s birding buddy: Albert Low, 21, who had seen 1,107 bird species in Asia and 1,500 species in the world by the time he came to Sri Lanka.

The group from left to right: Willie Foo, Ding Li, Albert Low, Alfred Chia, Pah Liang, and Alan Owyong,

Others were Alan Owyong—a keen videographer, who had visited Sri Lanka a couple of times; Alfred Chia—a serious birder and a keen photographer with a sharp eye and an even sharper wit; Willie Foo—a keen videographer; and Yang Pah Liang—a keen birder who had travelled extensively.

I spotted a pair of Jungle Owlets from a moving vehicle, and this is one of them; it caught a prey item when we were watching it.

We combined several key birding sites: Kithulgala, Sinharaja, Morapitiya, Udawalawe National Park, Tissamaharama, Nuwara Eliya and a host of local patches, and a bit of sight-seeing at Kandy, before heading back to Katunayake for the final night.

Ding Li and Albert Low stayed on for two more days of birding and cultural explorations. During this extension, Albert and I did a "water birds day tour" combining a few wetlands north of the airport: Chilaw sandspits, Annaiwilundawa Ramsar wetland, Palawi saltpans, and the massive Nawadamkulama tank.

Our final bird trip list stood at 221 species—seen. Our top birding highlights were Green-billed Coucal, Chestnut-backed Owlet, Sri Lanka Grey Hornbill, Sri Lanka Green Pigeon, Red-faced Malkoha, Sri Lanka Blue Magpie, White-faced Starling, Sri Lanka Spurfowl, Ashy-headed Laughingthrush, Spot-winged Thrush, Brown-capped Babbler, Sri Lanka Scimitar Babbler, Malabar Trogon, Sri Lanka Frogmouth, Brown-backed Needletail, Besra, Sri Lanka Scaly Thrush, Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush, Sri Lanka Bush Warbler, Sri Lanka Wood Pigeon, Dull-blue Flycatcher, Kashmir Flycatcher, Pied Thrush, Indian Blue Robin, Slaty-legged Crake, Indian Blackbird, Hill Swallow, Blue-faced Malkoha, Osprey, Jungle Owlet, Brown Fish Owl, Jungle Prinia, Yellow-crowned Woodpecker, Indian Nightjar, Blyth’s Pipit, Indian Scops Owl, Malabar Pied Hornbill, Sri Lanka Woodshrike, Spot-billed Pelican, Thick-billed Flowerpecker, Indian Pitta, Lesser Cuckoo, White-naped Woodpecker, Indian Think-knee, Indian Pygmy Woodpecker, and Yellow-wattled Lapwing.

Albert’s water birds tour with me produced Eurasian Oystercatcher, Sanderling, Great Thick-knee, Caspian, White-winged, Little and Lesser Crested Terns, Lesser Sand Plover, Curlew Sandpiper, Little Stint, Grey Plover, Pacific Golden Plover, Kentish Plover, Brown-headed Gull, Garganey, Watercock, and Indian Reed Warbler.

On the main tour, we managed to bag 31 of the 33 endemic birds; plus many of the sought-after migrants and sub-continental specialties. Our notable miss was Serendib Scops Owl. The closest we got for this endemic bird discovered in Janurary, 2001 was when we heard it across a shallow stream at Kithulgala. It was rainy, yet I could have shown it had my visitors been willing to following me in cross that stream. Our second attempt at Morapitiya ended up in failure with heavy rain and greatly swollen streams hampering our movements.

A spread of Sri Lankan rice and curry at Kithulgala.

On account of our missing this rarity, Albert thought it should be named Serendip Scops Owl in our final bird list! The other endemic that eluded was the Crimson-backed Flameback.

As mentioned above, we had to contend with rainy weather—at times rather heavily on certain days because the period of our travel coinciding with a untimely monsoonal peak. Leading to this trip, I was quite surprised as to how many dry and sunny days I enjoyed in November this year, which is usually rainy due to the onset of the North-East monsoon. This monsoon brings rain to the dry zone (3/4 of the island) as well as the wet zone (the balance 1/3). The intensity of rain expected in November was clearly not there this year. (During a trip done in November, I spoke to a farmer in the dry zone, and was concerned by the delayed monsoon.)

A Malabar Trogon at Sinharaja rain forest.

It seemed to me the rain overdue had been delivered with interest December this year!
The heavy monsoonal rain caused extensive floods in some areas in the north-central and eastern districts in the dry zones after a lapse of many years. This was especially due to spill gates in certain tanks (reservoirs) having to be opened due to very high water levels.

Such bad weather encountered on birding tours do not always dampen the spirits completely as some people use that time wisely to follow other more ebullient indoor pursuits. In an evening in which rain called off play, few of us were gathered at Martin’s balcony to drink tea. We enjoyed the rain forest in rain. We kept our binculars with us anyway, lest the rain would ease and bring the birds out again. And then somebody suggested that we played Scrabble. There were a couple of English visitors who were marooned at Martin’s balcony with us. They were to travel to Galle to see the cricket, which was to start in a few days. They joined us too to form three teams. The Englishman and Ding Li were the first one. Albert and the English lady were the second one. And I battling alone.

As usual for a game of Scrabble, there were plenty of disputes. Some resorted to sledging and 'mental disintegration' tactics. Yet, I came from behind to thrash both the combined commonwealth teams just in my last word scored by dropping an 'O' next to 'Z' to make ‘ZO’—earning 26 in the process. And this was challenged straightaway. The final score was Ding Li’s team – 177, Albert’s team – 196 and yours truly 209.

I have never come across an overseas birder who knew all the Sri Lankan birds by their scientific names. That was until I met Ding Li. He constantly dazzled me with his ability to remember scientific names of not only of the Lankan birds we saw on this tour, but also birds across Asia, which I thought was pretty amazing. Ding Li and Albert discussed day’s sightings lengthily, and took extensive notes at the end of the day.

The Scrabble board at the end.

Our non-birding highlights came in the form of Yellow-striped Chevrotain Moschiola kathygre, which we encountered on the trail while driving up to Martin’s at night and Bear Monkey Trachypithecus vetulus monticola in Nuwara Eliya.

Considering rainy weather we ha and us not visiting three national parks usually visited on standard birding tours (Horton Plains, Yala and Bundala), overall we could be happy of what we achieved in such a short span of time.

Sri Lanka White-eye at Nuwara Eliya.

Ding Li left Sri Lanka boosting his Asian tally by 63 ending up at 1,280 seen. Albert Low left Sri Lanka high, raking in 91 lifers to stand at 1,198 Asian birds seen.

Edit: The newly rediscovered Sri Lankan breeding resident Marshall's Iora was seen briefly on this tour at the Lunugamwehera; and made it to the final trip list. After this, I had very convincing views of this bird on my Absolute Birding tour in Feb, 2008. A detailed report of it is here here.


The pair of Jungle Owlets that I spotted from a moving vehicle at Tanamalwila.

A Lifer For The Fat Birder

I went birding with Bo Beolens, the Fat birder on 22 October, 2007. By the time I met him, he and his wife Maggie had completed a birding trip arranged through a competitor. He has done a trip report of his full tour. Picking Bo up from his hotel close to the airport, I took him out to the newly established Horagolla National Park, which comprises of a secondary patch of lowland rain forest covering little over 13 hectares for half a day's birding. This fragmented forest doesn’t hold any special birds that you cannot find in the regular sites visited. But, the presence of a few endemics such as Spot-winged Thrush, Chestnut-backed Owlet, Sri Lanka Myna, Yellow-fronted Barbet, Sri Lanka Hanging Parrot, and Sri Lanka Grey Hornbill and its proximity to Colombo airport (appox. 45 minutes) make it a decent back up site.

Brown-breasted Flycatcher aka. Layard's Flycatcher.

We had unfortunately picked the worse day in the whole week to travel because the day turned out to be an unusually rainy. This was because of a depression  in the bay of Bengal, we learnt later. So we couldn't get much birding done. But, it gave us a good opportunity to know each other well. 

We had some trouble in finding the turn-off due to poor signage with the heavy rain not helping it either. When we did reach the little ticket office, the rain was not showing any sign of letting up. Expecting such conditions, I had strategically packed some important accessories that usually go with my birding gear for longer tours—my Travel Scrabble!

Being a weekday with no other visitors, we had the entire visitor area to ourselves to play literally, an absorbing game—what with the open sides of our seating area and all.

I ended up inflicting Bo’s first scrabble defeat (home or away!), thrashing him with a resounding 372-258 score line! My highest individual score was 61 for TWITTING, scoring all 7. In the little respite we had from the rain during our stay, we did venture into the forest briefly, and I had the pleasure of finding a lifer for Bo in the form of the migrant, Brown-breasted Flycatcher aka. Layard's Flycatcher.

Bo was kind enough to send me a signed copy of his book Whose Bird? Men and women commemorated in the common names of birds, which was co-authored by Michael Watkins. I greatly enjoyed reading the bits relevent to Sri Lankan birds in this.

Bo later wrote to me to inform that in Layard's Flycatcher Muscicapa muttui, the species name species name: muttui had been named after Muttu—the Tamil cook of Layard's who had collected this bird.

Edgar Leopold Layard spent 22 years in Sri Lanka during the mid 19th century adding an astonishing 136 species of birds to the island's inventory. It stood at 182 bird species at the time he began collecting.

Finding lifers for Peter Kaestner

Ranked 4th in the all-time World Listers, Peter Kaestner had seen 8,128 species of birds out of the 10,000 or so species in the world by the time he came to Sri Lanka to bag 8 of his missing Sri Lankan endemics. He came to me through Jon Hornbuckle who is currently the 2nd ranked birder in the world with over 8,400 birds seen. Peter is also the discoverer of a new species of bird in the world—Cundinamarca Antpitta, which he had been fortunate to stumble upon in 1989 while birding in the East Andes in Columbia in South America. This species had been named eponymously in honour of him as Grallaria kaestneri by Gary Stiles, the ornithologist who described the species. By 1986, Peter Kaestner famously became the first birder to see a representative of each bird family in the world—a feat which took his name to the Guinness Book of world Records, although the list of bird families recognized by science has changed considerably since then. Peter had been a birder since childhood and cannot remember not being interested birds in his life. Instead of taking up Ornithology professionally, he had heeded a sagely advice of one of his teachers, and had turned a diplomat instead—a job in which he'd have scope for extensive world travel. This has worked and it has enabled him to amass a great species list of birds over the years.

Peter is currently working in the US embassy in New Delhi in India as consul-general and came here on 21 (Friday) September, 2007 at around 2.00 p.m., and was dropped off at the airport on the 23 (Sunday) Sep at 1.30 p.m., to catch the return flight. During this period, we judiciously combined: Morapitiya Rain forest, Sinharaja Rain forest, Kithulgala, Hakgala, and Bomuru-ella Forest Reserve to bag seven out of his eight target birds. And we achieved that in trying conditions during a monsoonal peak!

The endemics that boosted the burgeoning life bird list of Peter Kaestner, in the order of seen, were Serendib Scops Owl (discovered in 2001) at Morapitiya; Ashy-headed Laughingthrush, Red-faced Malkoha, and Sri Lanka Spurfowl at Sinharaja; Green-billed Coucal at Kithulgala; and Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush and Sri Lanka Bush Warbler at Nuwara Eliya. We tragically dipped out Brown-capped Babbler!

Anyway, considering the adverse weather we had to contend with, and relatively short time we had to combine the lowlands and highlands, and above all rarity of his targets (some of which consumed time),
I was personally happy to have got those ticks for Peter who left Sri Lanka, content, with 8,135 birds.


Our Serendib Scops Owl was seen at around 7.40 p.m. at Morapitiya; on 21 Sept, after intense tracking as it was raining in stops and starts. Which didn’t help our course. When it was finally spotted by me, Peter took a great photograph of it using his Lumix FZ 8, which is shown above (note the wet feathers of its head).

Before this, we had a good look at a Sri Lanka Frogmouth at dusk—not a new bird for Peter.

In Sinharaja, we had Thandula Jayaratne as our local guide who came in the morning to join us. By the time we met him, we had narrowed our list of wants by two: Ashy-headed Laughingthrush and Red-faced Malkoha, the latter which was spotted by Peter in a mixed-species bird flock (at a site in Sinhraja named "Leopard rock"). He also photographed it.

After meeting Thandula, we made a call to go for the tougher endemic, Sri Lanka Spurfowl. We reached a site in which we have previously had success with this elusive forest dweller. Here we remained seated on a boulder, which was covered with leaf litter, looking down a flat area of the forest for a good half an hour amidst constant rain and steady flows of leeches: conditions which would have put most bird watchers off. But not Peter Kaestner!

Our collective team work and perseverance finally paid rich dividends and Peter first had great views of a male followed by a female Sri Lanka Spurfowl, which was extremely satisfactory. These were accompanied by a flock of Ashy-headed Laughingthrushes. Since both these species disturb leaf litter while feeding, they may be mutually extracting foraging benefits in locating prey by flocking together. That's something that occured to us.

While birding in Sinharaja, I was able to make yet another interesting feeding observation involving a couple of regular flock-associated birds. This was when a flock of Ashy-headed Laughing Thrushes was seen feeding on the fruits of the pioneer, Macaranga indica (Boo-kenda in Sinhala), as I did on the trip with Shiromi Lazarus in August. Rather interestingly, during this observation, a Sri Lanka Crested Drongo also joined the laughingthrushes in the feast, which was very special as the latter is deemed to be an insectivorous species. (This was my first observation of this species feeding on fruit.)


It was 11.00 a.m., and the rain was getting heavier at Sinharaja. Rather than attempting to attempt for the two missing lowland targets: Brown-capped Babbler and Green-billed Coucal in this weather, we gambled to drive on to Kithulgala to improve our chances there; and thereafter to hopefully reach Nuwara Eliya in the highlands in time for overnight stay to squeeze in some montane birding on the following morning! And thereafter, heading to the airport for departure.

Soon after arriving in Kithulgala, I was able to hear a Green-billed Coucal, and would you believe, within 5 minutes we were in business, bagging this somewhat elusive endemic!

No Brown-capped Babbler though—not a breath of it as Jon Hornbuckle writes it in his bird trip reports.

Having stayed overnight at a cosy hotel, and started very early on the following morning—day 3, and our last day—with packetted breakfasts. First, we reached a site near Hakgala Botanical Gardens for the Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush. No luck despite a thirty-minute vigil. This site had been good for Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush at dusk, and this was the first time I attempted for it at dawn. (Later on, I have had success in the mornings). Tad disappointed, we reached Bomuru-ella forest soon, hoping for the Sri Lanka Bush Warbler. While I was searching low for this LBJ, Peter lagging back had scanned the water fall below a valley. And he had picked up the elusive Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush—a very fortunate sightings!

Our final montane target Sri Lanka Bush Warbler was threatening to give us some tough time. So I decided to veer off the main trail. Soon, I was able to spot one for Peter at 8.00 a.m. That brightened my day!
This bird was flitting at ground level in a bamboo thicket, and the views we had were very good.

Soon, we set our wheels in motion to reach the airport, as Peter had an afternoon flight to catch. I was hoping to make a stop for Brown-capped Babbler in on the way at Kandy, but the heavy torrential rain we had by the time we passed this area and the traffic in the busy Kandy road in wet weather prompted me to change plans. So we mutually decided to drive on—not risking missing the departure flight.


Peter was kind enough to bring me a wonderful gift in the form of the latest edition of 'The Book of Indian Birds' by the great Indian ornithologist Dr. Salim Ali. What I admired mostly of Peter’s style of birding is he always goes out with a very positive frame mind that he is going to find the bird that he wants. Which I believe, is one of the magical ingredients of his success. He is also tremendously lucky. Which I believe also helps! Peter was a true gentleman and I really enjoyed his company- especially listening to some of his great twitching anecdotes from around the world. My special thanks to Jon Hornbuckle for passing my contacts to him! A special thanks is also due to our driver Nihal Weerasinghe who did an exceptional job in taking us around safely to meet our deadlines.