• Welcome to BirdForum, the internet's largest birding community with thousands of members from all over the world. The forums are dedicated to wild birds, birding, binoculars and equipment and all that goes with it.

    Please register for an account to take part in the discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.
ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Ultimate Indonesia: 4 month search for endemics (1 Viewer)

R

Rgallardy

Well-known member
Hi all,

My wife and I have just started our four month trip to Indonesia. The first section of the trip focuses on the Lesser Sundas where we started out on Sumba. My original game plan was to spend 4-5 days on the island, but after just 2 1/2 we had already seen all the endemics and other targets! It was a fantastic few days starting out with Sumba Buttonquail near the Yumbu bridge and then a fantastic morning near km51 with Red-naped Fruit-dove, Sumba Green-pigeon, Chestnut-backed Thrush, and Cinnamon-banded Kingfisher. Our second morning was spent scanning a hillside at km88 where we managed to find our last four remaining targets, Orange-crested Cockatoo, Sumba Hornbill, Marigold Lorikeet, and Sumba Myzomela.

Check out the blog for the full report and pics!

https://budgetbirders.com/2017/06/16/sumba-indonesia-where-everything-went-just-right/#more-3237

Best,

Ross
 
Hi Ross,
Thanks for posting. Brought back memories of an independent trip I did to the Lesser Sundas in 2012, especially of that National Park on a main highway where they want to charge you to be on the road! Otherwise I liked my visit there, and managed all the endemics, though not as quickly as you did.:t:

My trip report is at:

http://burung-nusantara.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/Lesser-Sundas-May-Jun-12_Aidan-Kelly_v2.pdf

I look forward to reading more from you as your trip progresses.

Aidan
 
Ross

Enjoying your reports - brings back memories of my trip to Sumba with NB in 1992. A trip camping and on the bus! We managed excellent views of all endemics (including the small owl, undescribed at the time) but Sumba Boobook was a heard only - maybe I'll get back one day.

Good luck in the rest of the Lesser Sundas.

cheers, alan
 
Great report Ross. Definitely deja vu for me having stayed at the same place and visited the same sites just last year! And the same hassle about having to pay to walk along the road in the national park. If they were doing something in terms of investing in park infrastructure I'd be more amenable... Have fun in Timor!
 
Yea, the National Park ranger was a huge annoyance. It's bad enough trying to charge us to walk along a very busy narrow road to bird, but even worse that there's garbage all along the road and that the ranger had all afternoon to follow us on his motorbike, but couldn't find the find to pick up a single piece of trash. At one point, an Indonesian couple parked on the roadside threw a plastic bottle onto the ground in front of the ranger and he didn't even say a thing! Hard to demand money for a National Park when you can't even correct the locals!
 
Birding Timor

Hi all,

The second island we visited was the island of Timor. Our luck continued and we were able to clean-up (except Timor Figbird) in 4 days. The first afternoon we spent around Camplong, followed by a morning at Bipolo/afternoon at OleNase, and then two days in the Fatumnasi/Mt Mutis area. Overall, the birding was good, but we both enjoyed birding Sumba more. Luckily our bet to head to Rote without the Timor Figbird paid off as we were able to see a pair on Rote, but I'll leave that for the next blog post...

Here's the link to the post about our time on Timor

https://budgetbirders.com/2017/06/21/timor-indonesia-lots-of-birds-not-a-lot-of-pictures/#more-3286

Best,

Ross
 
Sounds like you got everything! At least you came back down on a potato truck--we did it on a truck full of green onions and smelled of onions the whole of the day...
 
A quick trip to Rote

Hi all,

After finishing up with Timor, we took the fast ferry over to Rote arriving around 1100. We found a taxi, but it took longer than expected to make it to the northern part of the island, since the drive thought he knew where he was going (and refused to let me show him a better way). Regardless, we arrived with a little time to bird and was still able to find one of our main targets, Jonquil's Parrot.

After dark we had great looks at Rote Boobook and then the next morning was able to cleanup on our remaining targets and also find Timor Figbird, the only bird we had missed on Timor!

Check out the blog for the full report

https://budgetbirders.com/2017/06/26/rote-indonesia-and-the-most-cooperative-owl-to-date/#more-3319

Best,

Ross
 
Nice reports. My days of potato trucks and mud huts are probably over, but its nice to see the rewards are still there for those willing to suffer for the cause.

Cheers
Mike
 
Birding Alor

Hi all,

After our return ferry to Timor from Rote, we boarded a plane and headed off to Alor. We only spent 3 days on the island, but luckily this was plenty of time to see of the endemic targets. Although Alor Boobook was very cooperative, both the Alor Cuckooshrike and Alor Myzomela took much longer to find. The biggest highlight of the visit though was an extremely cooperative pair of Flores Hawk-eagle that had recently nested in the area. During the course of the day we were able to enjoy the pair on a number of occasions including a few times at eye level!

Check out the blog for the full report and pictures!

https://budgetbirders.com/category/trip-adventures/indonesia-2017/

Best,

Ross
 
24 hours in Lombok....

Hi all,

With our trip to the Lesser Sundas going very well, we ended up 7 days ahead of schedule only three weeks into the trip! Luckily changing flights in Indonesia is fairly inexpensive (for two people the one flight cost $3 to change, while the most expensive change was still only $40 for two people) so we decided to add in the islands of Lombok, Bali, and East Java.

Our first stop on this mini extension was Lombok and although we ran into some logistical issues on arrival, we still managed to find our biggest target Rijani Scops-owl. Unfortunately, having only one morning on the island proved to be too short of a time to find Lombok Drongo which is supposed to be fairly common in the area. It was inevitable, but we finally had our first dip of the trip!

Read more about it on the blog...

https://budgetbirders.com/2017/07/04/lombok-indonesia-the-biggest-snake-of-our-lives/#more-3379

Best,

Ross
 
great report

Really envious of the coverage of your trip. Best we can manage is 23 days in Java, Sulawesi and Halmahera later this year
 
dandsblair said:
Really envious of the coverage of your trip. Best we can manage is 23 days in Java, Sulawesi and Halmahera later this year
Click to expand...

Thanks. Let me know if you have any questions of Java/Sulawesi/Hal. Just got done with Halmahera. Will be visiting northern Sulawesi in about another week. Not going to central/south though.
 
Bali: Land of the mynas

Hi all,

Sorry its been a while. Haven't had much internet in the last week as we cleaned up on Halmahera and Morotai (more on that later though!).

Anyways, after Lombok, we had a single day in Bali. Due to access issues with the National Park and not having been able to do much research, I decided to hire a bird guide for the day. I'm not usually a fan of guides, but I'm also not a fan of dipping birds that will be extinct in the wild the next time I can visit! (i.e. Black-winged Starling...). Long story short, the guide did a great job and we had a nice day seeing a lot of good birds including Bali Myna, Black-winged Starling, Javan Flameback, Javan Plover, ect.

We actually ended up having another day on Bali after visiting East Java, so I visited the Bedegul Botanical Gardens hoping to connect with Sunda Thrush. Unfortunately the little bugger was no where to be found despite a few hours of searching.

Read more about it on the blog!

https://budgetbirders.com/2017/07/13/bali-indonesia-a-duo-of-rare-mynas/
 
East Java: Mt Ijen and Blue Fire

Hi all,

Wrapping up our "extra week" in the middle of our Lesser Sundas trip, we spent two days birding Mt Ijen in East Java. I can't say it was a total success and a few target birds frustratingly remained heard onlys (i.e. Grey-breasted Partridge and Pink-headed Fruit-dove), but it also wasn't a complete failure with good views of White-bellied Fantail, Javan Bush Warbler, and Horsfield's Thrush.

Read more about our time on Ijen and a visit to see the Blue Fire on the blog

https://budgetbirders.com/2017/07/14/east-java-indonesia-would-you-like-chips-with-your-dips/

Although it was fun to explore a bit west of Wallace's Line, I was also happy to get back to the original itinerary with our flight to Flores, but more on that for the next post!

Best,

Ross
 
Flores: Finding all the owls!

Hi all,

After our short stint across Wallace's line, it was good to be back on schedule in the Lesser Sundas. We flew into Ruteng in the middle of Flores and had set aside a few days dedicated to finding the endemics in the area. Overall, this section of the trip went very well and we managed fantastic views of both endemic owls (Flores and Wallace's Scops-Owls) as well as Moluccan Scops-Owl. Other interesting birds included the bizarre Bare-throated Whistler, Wallace's Hanging Parrot, Leaf Lorikeet.

Once again we manged to clean up a day ahead of schedule and headed west to the coast to pick up our last remaining targets (Yellow-crested Cockatoo and Flores Monarch), but that will be covered in the next post.

Read more about our time in central Flores visiting Pocko Ranaka, Golo Lusang, Pagal Road, and Kisol Village on the blog!

https://budgetbirders.com/2017/07/20/flores-indonesia-friendly-little-owls/

Best,

Ross
 
Another enjoyable installment.

Kelimutu (a volcano with three crater containing lakes of different colours) was actually the final stop on a 5-month birding trip I did around SE Asia in 1989. I went there from Ruteng and remember the bus driver being drunk. His idea of fun was and hanging out of the door trying to kick dogs as we drove up the mountain.

Much less was known about Flores' birds back then and you certainly saw many more than we did. However Bali Starling was gettable and Black-winged Starling was common - and we did get the cockatoo on Komodo!

Cheers
Mike
 
MKinHK said:
Another enjoyable installment.

- and we did get the cockatoo on Komodo!

Cheers
Mike
Click to expand...

As did I in 2000, it was pretty much THE place back then

Just for curiosity, how are independent birders doing Komodo these days and at what cost?

I did it from Labuanbajo on Flores where I chartered a boat on my own for two days with just two crew. They provided meals and I slept on deck on a roll mat, cost, c50 pounds, I've heard that it's waaaaaay more these days?

It was an amazing experience, we first visited the island of Rinca on day one where we saw more Dragons than we did on Komodo. Dusk at sea on the small boat was amazing as thousands of Fruit Bats screached over us as they left their roosts for the night, a scene repeated as they returned at dawn, magical.

A
 
Last edited:
Warning! This thread is more than 6 years ago old.
It's likely that no further discussion is required, in which case we recommend starting a new thread. If however you feel your response is required you can still do so.

Similar threads

lgonz1008
Jamaica: Birding the Land of Wood and Water
Replies
13
Views
511
lgonz1008
lgonz1008
E
Car and Driver for Flores, Indonesia
Replies
0
Views
377
E_Skakoon
E
dandsblair
Natural Wonders of Chile - 27th January to 19th February 2024
Replies
9
Views
1K
dandsblair
dandsblair
lgonz1008
South Texas: Mexican Specialties in the US
2
Replies
22
Views
2K
pbjosh
pbjosh
S
Ecuador, Mindo & Antisana - August 2023
Replies
3
Views
1K
Shumi
S

Users who are viewing this thread

Total: 2 (members: 0, guests: 2)
Back
Top