Image by Prof. Ng Soon Chye
Image by Prof. Ng Soon Chye
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Oriental Birding ID Forum |
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Recently with the advent of 'digiscoping', (using a digital camera to capture wildlife images from telescopes) a number of mailing-lists have sprung up on the internet which deal with wild birds and some specialise in images of these. One of my favourites...the Birds-Pix mailing-list Birds-pix@yahoogroup.com was launched jointly by Victor Yue of Singapore and Laurence Poh of Malaysia ( It was launched on 6 Nov. 1999 with a membership of 2, as on Jan 2002, now more than 850 members from over 30 countries ) others such as WildbirdSingapore, Asian-Raptors, and Birders (Malaysia) have plenty of participants who spend their weekends birding and also recording their sightings digitally and sharing them with the rest of us, these are but a few and at the end of this page I will try and create a list of links to as many as I can find. During the past few months some interesting finds have come to light in Asia and I've created these pages to try and spread them to a wider audience, there are web-pages dealing with similar subjects in North America, Europe and South Africa but to my knowledge relatively few on the Oriental (and to my mind, the most exciting) region. Most of the people responsible for the images are relatively new to birding and admit to being novices in the area of bird identification and welcome the opinion of others, please feel free to make constructive comments and let us know your opinions. These will be useful in making decisions regarding their taxonomy. Hopefully we can bring the subject to a wider audience and make a difference to a part of the world where the natural world is under a very real threat. Please email all comments to me where they can be cross-posted to the relevant mailing-lists. |
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Cuckoos |
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1. Plaintive/Rusty-breasted Cuckoo (Cacomantis merulinus/ sepulcralis)
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The first two pictures were taken (from video) by Prof. Ng Soon Chye at Mt Faber in Singapore and were originally thought to be an hepatic female Oriental Cuckoo (Cuculus saturatus) although Rusty-breasted Cuckoo (Cacomantis sepulcralis) has also been suggested. Note: tail and breast pattern and eye-ring. The following two images are from John Lynn of Singapore and may be the bird as they were taken days after the previous The third pair of images were taken by Laurence Poh in Malaysia and are thought to be hepatic Rusty-breasted (Cacomantis sepulcralis) and Plaintive Cuckoos (C.merulinus) |
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Image by Prof. Ng Soon Chye |
Image by Prof. Ng Soon Chye |
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Image by John Lynn |
Image by John Lynn |
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Image by Laurence Poh |
Image by Laurence Poh |
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2. Indian Cuckoo (Cuculus micropterus) The first bird was observed in Singapore in January 2002 by Alan Yeo and the second (possibly the same?) was seen in early February 2002 by John Lynn |
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Image by Alan Yeo |
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Image by John Lynn |
Image by John Lynn |
3. Large Hawk-Cuckoo (Cuculus (Hierococcyx) sparveroides)
| This Large Hawk-Cuckoo was taken by Ooi Beng Yean 1st Jan 2002 at Genting, Malaysia at the first telecom station, with an elevation of about 5500 ft |
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Image by Ooi Beng Yean |
Image by Ooi Beng Yean |
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3. Hodgson's Hawk-Cuckoo (Cuculus (Hierococcyx) fugax nisicolor) This Hawk-Cuckoo was seen at the same location as the previous species and was originally thought to be a Large Hawk-Cuckoo (Cuculus (Hierococcyx) sparverioides) but is now thought to be a juvenile Hodgson's Hawk Cuckoo (Cuculus (Hierococcyx) fugax nisicolor) This sub-species breeds in NE Asia (Korea, China and Japan) and winters in SE Asia ( Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore). The bird in the bottom-right is a Hodgson's Hawk Cuckoo of the race hyperythrus and was photographed at Happy Island near Beidaihe, China by Bjorn Johansson in May 2001 |
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Image by Prof. Ng Soon Chye |
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Image by Prof. Ng Soon Chye |
Image by Bjorn Johansson |
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Here is a list of useful links (all in english language) These will accept images as attachments:
These may not necessarily accept images as attachments but may be interesting and useful sources of information:
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| I would like to thank all the
'digiscopers' who have graciously agreed to let me show their work to the
world and hope that they receive plenty of feed-back for the benefit of
nature and bird-life in their respective countries, long may they continue
to give pleasure to those not so naturally 'well-endowed'. Good birding and 'scoping, Tom Tarrant, Samsonvale, Queensland, Australia |
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Web Page created by Tom and Marie Tarrant 2002 |
