On arrival back at the restaurant I met up with Ryan and his group who had been treated to an orangutan near the restaurant who had apparently built a nest to bed down in close by, so he was hopeful that we would see the individual again in the morning.
The rain began to fall and it was touch and go whether there would be anything going on that evening. A night drive had been scheduled for Ryan's group but not everyone wanted to go so there was one seat free for me which was in the front next to the driver. As usual, Paul was more than happy to do his own thing. Being in the front was not really ideal as I soon found out when looking for creatures up in the trees, so whenever we stopped to look at something high up, I would, if I could jump out of the cab and crane my neck skyward to see what we had stopped for. Thankfully most of the tree-dwellers stuck around long enough for this approach to work and it was an excellent drive!
First we saw what the guide told us was a masked palm civet, which seemed to be very similar (in other words identical!) in appearance to ones that had previously been identified as common palm civet, so much so that we could not be 100% sure that the guides had ID'd it correctly. In fact having seen further common palm civets in Tabin, I am convinced that this one is also a common palm civet. Whilst both civets have a mask, like a raccoon, masked palm civet appears to be quite a different looking animal with a distinctive white stripe running down the forehead, white under the eyes and around the sides of the temples, down towards the cheek with a dark shoulder and back of the neck, giving it a more badgery appearance (do a Google search and you'll see what I mean). So I do not think we saw a masked palm civet at all!
As we carried on we stopped again and further investigation revealed a small-toothed palm civet feeding up in a tree. This was followed by a black giant flying squirrel. We carried on along the service road and I began to feel rather grateful that I was in the cab because the rain was now beginning to come down again.
All of a sudden the most beautiful little creature bounded into the middle of the road. It was low slung like a genet with an elegant neck patterned with bold black stripes, it's pale tan body was also heavily marked with bold black blotches and it trailed a spectacular long ringed tail behind it! Before I could really even consider getting off a shot it carried on across the road into the shrubbery.
I asked the driver what he though it was, and he commented that it was a young banded palm civet. I didn't buy this identification for a minute as we'd already had great views of the banded palm civet near the restaurant and this was clearly a completely different animal. Something in my mind told me it could only have been a banded linsang and a quick consultation with Paul's library of books confirmed this ID. I was stoked! This was undoubtedly the mammal of the trip for me!
:t: