May 2014

Another month has slipped by and life goes on in Penang. May seemed to be a woodpecker month.

After the heart by-pass patient left we had another four people including a dog for 2 nights. They consisted of a young couple and their respective mothers. The dog was a teacup poodle which is the size below Coco. If anything the poodle was half an inch taller….so someone has been sold a pup. A few days later we had four young university students who were well behaved. There has been nothing since. It is currently the local school holidays.

Helen has been pretty steady with teaching and now has 12 students. Life is made a little difficult because two of them have the same name. Both Helen and Coco became a year older during the month. We went to an Indian restaurant for Helen’s birthday….the food was nice but the place was rather like a hawker centre or Indian Railway station.

The photography has proceeded steadily as it is still in the busy season. I have had a few Sunday excursions with a keen young local lawyer. His knowledge of birds is extensive. On one occasion we went to a place called Ulu Paip which consists of a forest surrounding a small fast flowing river. There are three elusive species that are pursued there. We sat in hides for an hour trying to lure one of them in but to no avail. We wandered down the road and my friend called in a Rufous Collared Kingfisher by mimicking the call himself. It sat around for a while and at one time a small ray of sunlight lit it beautifully. 

The most recent expedition was a 1.5 hour trip up towards the Thai border. The target was a nesting Bushy-crested Hornbill family. Unfortunately they fledged sometime during the prior week. We did get 4 fairly rare Checker-throated woodpeckers hang around in the vicinity for over 30 minutes. They even inspected the empty hornbill nest. Photography in a sunlit forest is difficult because of the dappled light and large differential in exposure values between light and shade. They do pause in reasonable places at times.

The Bee-eaters continue their nesting program at the Motocross track. Most nests are being fed now with a supply of dragonflies disappearing into cavities. 

My other current favourite place, Air Hitam Dalam is quite active too at the moment. I have said hello to the Barn Owl on several mornings before he goes to bed for the day and a pair of Blue-winged Pittas are an attraction there. One had a big tug-of-war with an earthworm. There is also a pair of Common Flameback Woodpeckers that appear to be nesting. They are not feeding the nest at the moment but are spending quite a long time in and around the nest. The male appears to do most sitting and was quite concerned when a squirrel got too close …..chasing him for some time around the trees.

Male Common Flameback Woodpecker (female below)

Male Streak-breasted Woodpecker

Hitam Dalam also has a variety of other birds....with various migrants through the season. The following are; a Black-naped oriole, a Black and Red Broadbill, an Asian Paradise Flycatcher (male) and a Squirrel gathering nesting material.

We have even had a bird performing locally at the end of the estate. A Red-billed Blue Magpie was seen performing mating flights. This species is not normally found in Malaysia. The nearest location would be Vietnam. It could be a vagrant or an escapee. Naturally his mating flights were a little fruitless with the nearest female in a cage or in the Indian sub-continent.

Helen and I went to a quiz last Friday night at a Mexican restaurant. There were four in our team with one passenger but we managed to get second.

Coco, now two, is doing well and enjoys her long walks and especially a run off the leash. The shot below was her first time at home

Dani has finished her year in Spain and goes back to the UK to work until the final academic year starts. Nikki will be with us for a couple of weeks at the end of June and we look forward to that. David and Lyn will also be here for some of that time. Finally someone will understand what I am swearing about during rugby matches,

Lastly we send our congratulations to David's granddaughter Holly for her great result in the World Yoga event in London and to the rest of the family and friends for their support.