3. Sumatran Cochoa.

With the team splitting in two and half going up to Camp Cochoa and the rest, including me, taking the easier option of trying again for Sumatran Wren Babbler we set off up the by now all to familiar trail up Mt Kerinci. Again we set off in the dark and birded on the way up. Mika and Kevin headed straight for Camp Cochoa with Bobbi whilst, Fred,Tony, Steve, Dan and myself stayed  at lower elevation picking out the various species of bird from roving feeding flocks as they passed through.

Sunda Warbler

Sunda Forktail

Sumatran Trogon

Fire-tufted Barbet

That all rapidly changed when a WhatsApp came through from the Cochoa team! They'd found not one but two Sumatran Cochoa's. We were just below camp 2 at this stage and, knowing that the birds would probalby stick around if they'd found a good fruiting tree to gorge in, decided to set off up the trail. We were told we were 30 minutes away. In reality it took us 55 lung bursting and heart pounding minutes with the sweat pouring off us to reach Camp Cochoa. The steep track and altitude made for hard going and my heart rate peaked at 166 bpm! 

Arriving at Camp Cochoa we found it empty and realised we'd have to climb even further up the trail. By now I thought I was in serious danger of a heart attack but 25 minutes later we reached the rest of the group and another group who were nearby and heard about the Cochoa.

There were two birds - an adult male and the female type juvenile bird  below. We watched them for about 15 minutes before they moved out of sight.

Unfortunately Tony arrived just as the birds disappeared out of sight but we hung around for another hour or so and could hear them calling. He and Bobbi disappeared only to reappear from the dense undergrowth having successfully relocated the Cochoa for Tony to get brief views. 

This Jackdaw sized thrush like bird is classed as vulnerable due to habitat loss and is only found  in forests between 1,000 - 2,500 m. It's secretive nature makes it hard to find and it's a bird many visitors to the region fail to see. Buoyed by our success we headed back down the mountain for a late lunch only to arrive at camp 2 to hear that, due to imminent rain, our lunch was now at camp 1 which had a rudimentary shelter. And rain it did as it can only do so in the tropics. 

It was a tired but happy team that headed back to the accommodation for a quick shower before heading out for dinner of, you guessed it, rice and chicken......

Tomorrow would be our last day in Kerinci before heading to Danau Kaco and, hopefully, a chance to catch up with Sumatran Ground Cuckoo.

2. Everything coming together.

On our third day in Kerinci the weather changed for the better and we made the most of it by getting up early and doing a bit of 'thermalling' looking for frogmouths and owls before trying again for the elusive Sumatran Peacock Pheasant in the hide.

As well as the weather our luck changed with Sumatran Frogmouth at last responding to calls and coming to take a look and providing us with decent views.

We moved to a higher elevation near Camp 2 (2,020 m above sea level) for the scarce Rajah Scops Owl named after James Brook, Rajah of Sarawak. We'd heard one calling on a previous foray in the dark but failed to see it. Almost immediately one responded to the playback tape and descending into a dry river bed we all enjoyed good views when Dan picked it up on the thermal.

Realising we were very close to the endemic  Salvadori's Pheasant roost picked our way quietly along the boulder strewn dry river bed and obtained much better views of this near threatened species roosting above us.

Buoyed by our success we returned down the trail to one of the hides to try again for the Bronze-tailed Peacock Pheasant at 1st light. Entering the hide we made ourselves comfortable and settled in for the long wait. Unfortunately for us a couple of Chinese photographers arrived who had absolutely zero field craft or common sense - sticking long lenses through the hide opening and trying to set up a tripod in the confined space whilst his wife was outside continually standing up and making a noise. Fortunately for us they decided to move before one of us committed an assault and wrapped the tripod round his head! Chinese photographers are universally disliked because of the appalling fieldcraft and rudeness and I had several run - ins with them in Thailand earlier this year.

Even more fortunately, after a further wait, the pheasants made an appearance with two separate birds being seen! Success at last.

Sumatran Robin

After breakfast in the field and a hot sweet black tea we headed back up the trial towards 'camp cochoa' where we hoped to catch up with the endemic Sumatran Cochoa. Our luck continued when several Schneiders Pitta's crossed the trail in front of us. I felt happy for fFred as we'd managed to catch up with all his target birds in Kerinci despite the poor start.

Our climb towards 'Camp Cochoa was punctuated by the fantastic calls of the worlds largest gibbon the fabulous Siamang and we stopped to watch these primates move effortlessly through the trees. The noise they make is incredible.

Moving higher we tried several times for Sumatran Wren- Babbler but despite hearing them several times we couldn't see them. A pair of Snowy-browed Robins feeding a youngster were unconcerned by our presence and even tolerated the young Indonesian hikers that passed in groups heading towards the summit of Kerinci.

The trail between cap 2 and Camp Cochoa was particularly gnarly with tree roots and mud and with the altitude approaching 2500 m we were soon out of breath and sweating profusely.

Camp Cochoa is one of the best places to see the endemic Sumatran Cochoa. Hard to see due to its secretive and sluggish nature it is one of the 'must see' birds of Kerinci. Camp Cochoa is also one of the best places to catch up with Sumatran Shortwing and Sunda Laughing Thrush. We failed with the Cochoa but saw both the other species well. 

After a long but successful day in the field we headed back to the hotel for a quick change of clothes and a shower before heading out for dinner.

1. First days in Sumatra. Exploring Kerinci

Arriving at our hotel in Kerinci well after dark we met our ground team of Bobbi and Yudi from Explore Kerinci  - see here. Bobbi was the bird guide and Yudi was our driver and hot / drinks / food provider. Two great guys. We were all tired and hungry and the guys went out and got us nasi goreng which is fried rice and egg. Something we'd get very familiar with in the next 9 days. The rooms were very basic and not very comfortable. Our alarms were set for 5 am but there was no change of sleeping that late  - jet-lag and the morning call to prayers at 5 am saw to that! Breakfast was hard boiled eggs and plain white bread with jam - no butter!

Today was to be our first day exploring the dormant volcano that is Mt Kerinci and we piled into the pickup for the bumpy drive to the trail entrance in the dark. We'd hoped to pick up Sumatran Frogmouth but despite hearing them we couldn't find any.

As it got lighter we moved to one of the hides where we hoped to catch up with Schneider's Pitta and Sumatran (bronze-tailed) peacock Pheasant. Unfortunately it wasn't to be with only a couple of people (including Fred) lucky enough to see the pheasant as it approached from beneath ha fallen log to the left of the clearing. Today was going to be a long day of near misses and rain! The weather certainly didn't help our cause and for the remainder of the day and the following day we struggled to find our target species. Using the thermal after dark on the edge of the forest, in the hope of picking up a Salvadori's Nightjar we, instead, found a cool looking Slow Loris. A new species of mammal for me.

However, we did manage to find a Schneider's Pitta roosting in the thermal and, unbelievably, a roosting Salvadori's Nightjar.

Despite the best efforts of Dan and Bobbi we continued to struggle. The weather really was appalling and the trail up Kerinci was slick with mud.

Bobbi pulled the proverbial rabbit out the bag when he found us roosting Salvadori's Pheasants but the views were restricted and although we could say we'd seen them no one was really happy with the views.

However, our luck was about to change....

Sumatra & Malaysia 2026

 The main target of this trip was to see a few of the rare and endangered endemic species of birds that call the forested slopes of Sumatra's highest peak, the volcanic Mt Kerinci, and surrounding areas. When Fred approached me over a year ago and asked if I’d like to join him on an expedition led by Ornis ( see here ) I didn’t need much persuading after my introduction to Asian forest birding in Thailand earlier this year. Fred’s main targets were the recently accessible Sumatran Ground Cuckoo, Schneider’s Pitta & Sumatran Peacock Pheasant. All birds he’d missed on a trip to the area over 20 years ago. For me almost everything would be new as I’m not a big world lister.

The Sumatran Ground Cuckoo story is fascinating. First identified as a separate soecies to Bornean Ground Cuckoo in 1897 it was thought to be extinct from 1916 until 1997 and was known from only 8 specimen's. In 1997 researchers in the area came across a hunter who’d caught a live bird and they ‘acquired’ it off him and, for the first time ever, a recording was made of the bird’s call! 

It’s only in the last few years that local bird guides have managed to pin down individuals that come to a hide, deep in the forests,  to feed on crickets & mealworms out out for them. Access is strictly restricted although you can sometimes be lucky enough to bump into a Sumatran Ground Cuckoo crossing the trails. 

The only issue I had was we were planning a family holiday in Menorca with the grandchildren just prior to the Sumatran trip and,because of issues with local ground agents, Ornis weren’t able to give exact dates for the trip. As it happened I arrived back from Menorca at 5 on on a Thursday evening and set the alarm for 4 am Friday morning to pick Fred up enroute to Manchester airport. 

The trip meant flying to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia and having an overnight stay before flying to Sumatra the following day to meet up with the rest of the expedition group and expedition leader Daniel.  There was also an extension each side of the main trip for those who wanted to try for two Malaysian specialities in the form of another pheasant and a partridge - Malaysian Rail Babbler, Mountain Peacock Pheasant and Ferruginous Partridge. Fred & I opted to tag this on to the end our our Sumatran odyssey using a local guide. 

Unfortunately Air Asia, which has a reputation akin to a well known budget carrier named after a Mr Ryan, cancelled our early morning flight from KL to Oandang and bumped everyone into a later flight. Facing a 6-7 hour drive from Padang to Kerinci  meant we’d arrive in the dark.

Arriving in KL early afternoon  we took a taxi from the airport to the hotel with a driver who must have learnt to drive watching cartoon re-runs of the ‘Wacky Races’. How he passed any form of driving test will be one of life’s mysteries. How we survived is another one!

Checking into our hotel early afternoon we decided to get the hotel to arrange a taxi to take us a 40 minutes drive to an area where the elusive Rail Babbler had been reported on eBird. Although we didn’t know the exact spot it was worth a punt as we knew what the call was.

Despite spending g lots of time working in Malaysia I’d never done much birding and I’d forgotten how sapping the high humidity was. A steep climb up a forested trail also revealed the extent of the fly tipping problems in Asia. The first few hundred metres were blighted with waste tipped off the road and into the forested ravines.

Although we didn’t score with the long-shot Rail Babbler we had a gentle introduction to Malaysian birding adding a few padders to the trip list in the form of Maroon Woodpecker, Crested Tree Swift and Blue-throated Beeeater whilst the trip back down in torrential rain resulted in a Large-tailed Nightjar contemplating its life choices perched on a wire.

Little Green Pigeon

Blue-throated Beeeater

Marron Woodpecker

Great-tailed Nightjar

Soaked we’d expected to have to use the Malaysian equivalent of Uber, imaginatively named Grab, to ‘grab’ a taxi back to the hotel. Unbelievably our taxi driver had waited for us and got a good tip for his reward and a booking to the airport the next day

After a leisurely breakfast at our KL hotel we met up with our friendly taxi driver at the allotted time and headed to KL airport. The difference in driving styles from our previous trip was appreciated and made for a much more comfortable journey without the white knuckles and increased heart rate! 

Air Asia were their usual disorganised and chaotic selves though. Being directed to the self check in machines our reservation number wasn’t recognised and despite asking for manual check-in the ground staff seemed unable to grasp that we couldn’t use the automated machines. Dozens of others were in the same position and the poor girl got more and more flustered before we eventually ducked under a barrier and manually checked in without an issue. To be fair we thought we’d have an issue with our hand luggage which was way over the weight limit containing laptop l, two camera bodies, 2 lenses, spare batteries, thermal imaging camera & binoculars. Despite most people’s  bags being weighed as soon as I mentioned cameras we were waved through.

It was here we met the rest of the group and introduced ourselves. Tony & Steve were old friends from Yorkshire. I thought I recognised Tony and it turns out he comperes and is front of house at Spurn Migfest! Small World. Kevin had flown in from Vancouver and Mika was from Helsinki. All were experienced Asian birders and had the same specific target birds as we had.

An uneventful short flight had us touching down in Padang where, as we’d completed our immigration and visa forms prior to flying, we sailed through security, picked up our luggage and met Daniel, our tour leader, outside.

Another blast from the past. Masked Shrike. New to the UK

My previous post about the Long-tailed Shrike in Fife got me thinking of another rare shrike I'd seen in the area. You have to go all the way back to 2004 for this one when an unidentified juvenile Shrike was found in Kilrenny, Fife. Special permission was granted from the BTO to catch and ring it as it was a suspected 1st for Britain and the identification was by no means certain. First seen on the 28th October the news was released on 29th October. 

I was birding at Llanfairfechan in N. Wales when the news broke and with Malc Curtin offering to drive through the night the twitch was on! 

Arriving on site we weren’t surprised to find several hundred birders there already. Finding a parking space we joined the throng as the darkness faded and the day broke. At first there was no sign of the shrike in the walled area it seemingly preferred but we weren’t worried. Shrikes can be late risers! 

I can’t remember much about the actual bird itself apart from it being a rather striking monochrome. I do remember it being my mate Mark P’s first species of shrike in the UK! The 244 in a circle denotes it was my 244th UK species that year. 

After the shrike we headed towards nearby Ruddons Point where big rafts of sea-duck and grebes were congregating. It was a bit choppy but we managed to find at least one Surf Scoter and a Red-necked Grebe in the throng of birds that included 247 Long -tailed Ducks! 

From there we moved to Leven where a scan from the seafront revaels a big flocl of around 200 Velvet Scoter.

Since this 1st record there have been 4 more records, all of 1st winter birds, but none since 2020. Maybe 2026 is the year we'll get another one?

Long-tailed Shrike

I was seabird ringing on Puffin Island when news broke on Sunday of a Long-tailed Shrike found at Crail in Fife. Coincidentally it was very near where Britain's first Masked Shrike was found in 2004! I didn't see the messages until late in the afternoon and it was too late to travel that day. This is only the 2nd record of Long-tailed Shrike in the UK following a bird that was found on S Uist in November 2000 and was only present for two days although it was rumoured to have been around and identified as a Red-backed Shrike for a few days prior to it s true identity being realised.

Monday morning came and I was making plans to got up to Crail Tuesday as there were other things I had to sort out  Monday. The shrike was still there. With Jan going away to play golf in Northumberland for a few days I was doing a shop at a well known local supermarket when my plans changed and the events I had planned for Monday got shifted to Tuesday. A quick mental arithmetic and a check of Google maps and I was planning to go. Knowing some of my mates on the Hilbre ringing team were keen to go I contacted them and before Id got home we'd arranged to meet at mine around midday.

The journey should have been uneventful if not long but endless roadworks on the M6 along with accidents and idiots rubber necking conspired to slow us down and add almost an hour to our journey! We eventually arrived at the designated parking area around 18.00  and set off for the 15 minute walk to where the bird had been showing intermittently. What a fantastic area. Singing Corn Buntings and Yellowhammers serenaded us whilst Yellow Wagtails and Skylarks flew over calling. The shrike was actually found by someone doing Corn Bunting surveys and much credit is due to the finder and those who arranged parking and access.

There were a few people still hanging around and we soon realised this wasn't going to be any easy roll up, see the bird and leave. Although faithful to a relatively short length of hedge it would go missing for hours at a time before showing briefly again and then diving back into cover. It hadn't actually been seen for over an hour and a half and before that had gone missing for over two hours. We'd heard that some people had left site without seeing the bird.

Luckily we stood next to Andy Lawson where we thought we'd get the best chance of seeing the bird and after a stressful wait and continuous scanning of the hedge he calmly  announced he'd got it perched up inside the hedge. With impeccable directions he got Steve & I on to it and, whilst using the scope with one hand I used the other to ring Al who was viewing from a different position. He soon came running followed by the others on site and everyone eventually got views. We were extremely lucky as it transpired that this was the longest it had shown all day. A few distant photos later, and with Steve managing a couple of short videos, it flew back down into the cover of a very deep ditch running alongside its favoured hedge.

Three happy Hilbre musketeers rocking their new Obs baseball caps. An expertly taken selfie by Steve.

It briefly perched up and showed really well in the open but before the majority of people could react it promptly flew down again. By now we were getting cold and aware that the journey home was going to be long and tiring so said our goodbyes to others we knew and headed back to the car pausing only to photograph the Isle of May and reflect at how near the bird must have come to settling there and how much more difficult it would have been to get to see it! Coincidentally my previous blog post was about twitching a Calandra Lark on the Isle of May.

Many thanks to the Barnsmuir Farm Shop for allowing parking at their site and to the farmer for allowing birders access to his land to view the bird. The bird has been aged as a 2nd calendar male and is already moulting. There are a number of races of Long-tailed Shrike but the race that breeds closet to the UK is Lanius schach erythronotus that breeds in the Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. 

A tired but happy car of birders arrived back in Chehsire at 01.30 this morning! 

Blast from the past. Calandra Lark 14th May 2006

 I was reminded of this twitch by a mate of mine, Malc Curtin, in a comment he made on Facebook about Fred driving us home in torrential rain in his underpants! Not pretending to be Superman but a simple expediency after getting soaking wet whilst viewing this rare vagrant which, at the time, was the 12th for Britain with the majority only being one day birds.

The bird was found on the Isle of May on the 12th May 2006. Two years before I started this blog. Understandably the wardening staff didn’t want hordes of people stomping over the island and potentially disturbing nesting Eider until a proper management plan had been put in place so it wasn’t until Sunday 14th May. There was also the added issue that the regular passenger boat going from Anstruther, holding 100 people, was unavailable as was undergoing  maintenance due to a broken gearbox,  so there was no way of getting across. Yet….. there was the possibility we could charter an 8 seater RIB from North Berwick…… we were on! 

Meeting in Cheshire we drove towards North Berwick for our scheduled boat trip at 12.30 in worsening weather. It was touch and go whether we’d be able to make the 10 mile crossing to the Isle of May. We arrived early around 11.00 and found our skipper, who’d already made several journeys that morning, on the phone to a group of birders who’d booked an earlier crossing but who were delayed because of a traffic problem on the A1. He immediately offered us their slot with the advice that, due the worsening conditions, he could probably take the late arrivals across but not pick them up and we’d only have a couple of hours on the island. 

In full waterproof gear and wearing life jackets we set off into a rolling sea. Unfortunately I’d made the schoolboy error of wearing a hat but not pulling my hood up. Others fared even worse as hadn’t even got waterproofs on. The first big wave that hit us went straight down my neck and I spent the rest of the trip shivering and uncomfortably wet. Exhilaration at the speed and crashing waves was soon forgotten as we hung on as we bounced across the Firth of Forth.

An eventful crossing saw us arriving in the sheltered harbour on the Isle of May and met by one of the wardening team who directed us where to walk and where the bird had last been seen. A nervous and uncomfortable wait ensued, as it had just walked into some vegetation, until we all managed ‘scoped’ views. It then flew across towards the lighthouse giving us all good views of the diagnostic dark underwing with a white trailing edge. 

It showed much better here and we spent the rest of our allotted time watching it feed in the short vegetation before heading back to the harbour for our bouncy RIB ride back to the mainland.  Our skipper confirmed we were the last trip he was making that day so we were extremely lucky that we’d arrived early.

The journey back to Cheshire in Fred’s  Red Audi A4, was done in torrential rain with a steamed up interior and our chauffeur driving in his boxers as he’d got soaking wet. Quite what the police would have made of it if we’d got stopped is something we’ll never know……

Since then there have been 6 more records including a long staying, but elusive and wide ranging bird, on Fair Isle that stayed for 35 days in 2021. Most records are in May & June and we’re well overdue another.

Scottish Natural Heritage, the Isle of May Bird Obser-

vatory and the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology would

like to thank all visiting birders for being patient and

following the on-site directions to view only from

certain points; their behaviour was impeccable. A

further thank you is due to those who made a donation

to the bird observatory. We hope that everyone took

away memories of a superb bird in the stunning setting

that is the Isle of May