LANGKAWI BIRDWATCHING TOUR: Burnice's Bird Blog

Burnice's bird wishlist for Langkawi would be the Hornbills, all three of them. She wasn't chasing after the Brown-Winged Kingfisher as she has already seen it while kayaking nearby Pulau Dayang Bunting. That would mean the priority was to head up to Gunung Raya, the highest peak of Langkawi.

Burnice and Hans are currently on their sailing adventures with their sailing boat all the way from Australia. Having to spend some time at Rebak Island, they made their way to Pekan Rabu after sailing through rough wind condition. We met at the Pekan Rabu pier on our birdwatching morning.

The birdwatcher is Burnice and Hans will enjoy whatever that is presented to him. Little did I know that Burnice is also a blogger like me and I got lots to learn from Burnice's blog. Like me, Burnice will take photos of birds so she can share her images via her blog:  https://burneysbirdblog.wordpress.com/

Below are some snapshots of her blog. Please click here to read Burnice's entire post about her birdwatching experience in Langkawi and her bird list. 

The leaping lizard that Burnice mentioned in her blog was a gliding lizard, Draco spp. I spotted it gliding about 10m across the Gunung Raya road while driving. It landed on a tree and it was just nice for us to observe it through my scope in which I managed to set it up before it was gone. 

The above picture is the juvenile raptor that I was looking for. I managed to snap a photo while it was circling before making a perch into the dense forest. It hid itself very well. We waited for it to fly out again but it didn't. My suspicion at that moment was a juvenile Oriental Honey Buzzard. But I was still doubtful due to lack of details of a Oriental Honey Buzzard such as the prominent tail bands and black tip on the primaries. Just to be sure, I forwarded this image to the raptor sifus in the Raptor Study Group. Thank you to Liung and Aun Tiah for their quick response confirming that it was a juvenile Oriental Honey Buzzard due to its pigeon-like head. I likely think it may be a juvenile female.

The reward for us stopping there for awhile is the appearance of the male Wreathed Hornbill not too far away and it was posing for us.

Many thanks for the nice review on your blog, Burnice. Looking forward to seeing you back on Langkawi for more lifers and your birds stories in Thailand. Bon Voyage!

Brief Appearance in Travelfish.org

This kayaking tour was back in August 2012. I didn't have my own website back then until now. I remember a very brief review by Stuart McDonald from Travelfish and I like to add on to my list of reviews. 

Stuart was recommended by a food and travel writer, Robyn Eckhardt.  With a short notice, I managed to book a boat and a kayak for us on the following day and off we paddled into the tributaries of Tanjung Rhu mangroves.  

This is the link to Stuart's write-up on his short stay in Langkawi: Langkawi Photo Essay

You may need to scroll down a fair bit to get to my name. To make it slightly easier, here is the screen shot:

A screen shot from http://www.travelfish.org/sight_profile/malaysia/peninsular_malaysia/perlis/langkawi/2289

I was using this particular email address mentioned in Stuart's writeup back in 2012. It is changed to this email address: wendynatureguide@gmail.com

My appreciation goes to Robyn Eckhardt and Stuart McDonald of Travelfish.org. Thank you for your immense support. 

Langkawi Bird Watching Tour Review from John and Mary Clark

About a week later after the birdwatching tour for John and Mary Clark, I received an email from them with their kind comments. Since I do not have my own Tripadvisor column, they wrote their comments via email and allowed it to be posted on my website.

I sincerely thank them for their kind encouraging words and feedback. I had an incredible time birdwatching with both of you.

As written by John and Mark Clark via email:

"My wife and I booked a week in Langkawi to chill out between birding trips. We knew there are some good places for birding on the island, however, and so asked a KL-based birding contact for advice on a possible guide for one day of birding. He put us in touch with Wendy Chin and we are so pleased that he did. 

We prepared a wish-list of birds we hoped to see in advance, and Wendy was candid in telling us which of these were no-hopers (either because they are not on the island or because they are out of season). Wendy carefully planned the day to maximize our chance of seeing the remainder and we did extremely well, getting 6 lifers during the day.

We started in a couple of mangrove areas where we got excellent views of the day’s top target - the Mangrove Pitta, and also saw the Mangrove Whistler and the Brown-winged Kingfisher. We then moved to forest birding and found in various sites 2 pairs of Blue-winged Pittas, a vivid Banded Kingfisher, and a Laced Woodpecker. These were the lifers, but during the day we also got good looks at some other special birds, including Wreathed, Great and Oriental Pied Hornbills, Striped Tit-babbler, Abbott’s Babbler, Black-Naped Monarch and Asian Fairy-Bluebird.

We were extremely satisfied with the day, not only because it had been well-planned to maximize our chance of seeing our key targets, but also because we really enjoyed Wendy’s company and respected her dedication to conservation as well as finding her to be an excellent guide."

John Clark and Mary Ward-Jackson, Raglan, UK

High-5 from John and Mary