Common Birds of Hilltop Lodge, Lambir Hills National Park

It was Malaysia Day (16th Sep), my birthday (17th Sep), fruiting Macaranga all in the same week; it's kind of difficult to say "no" to a few days at Hilltop Lodge, Lambir Hills National Park.

Initial trepidation about the park being teeming with visitors was completely unfounded. Other than the few construction workers trying to hurry up the new park structures and the odd day trippers to Latak Waterfall, there was no one else about.

The birds were more obliging than as usual.

Over the few days I also learnt how to do a few things I haven't tried before:
shoot from the open windows from INSIDE the lodge, shoot birds without camo at the porch; make video (mostly of bird calls) while lugging my Vaio around the house and then playback; and lastly make halfway decent bird pictures with the Canon tethered to the laptop which in turn was hooked up to a powerpoint from inside the lodge.

The few days didn't all go to waste afterall but I'm not quite sure whether this is a new "high" or new "low" for in the field wildbird photography, truth be told I didn't venture out 20 feet from the lodge!


Red-eyed Bulbul.


Purple-naped Sunbird. The fastest of all, they just don't sit still.


Plain Sunbird.


Spectacled Bulbul.


Hairy-backed Bulbul, most obliging of all coming in with a party of 3-4 repeatedly throughout the day.

The Pura (local Iban name, common temuda tree) or Macaranga was located 10 feet from the house and it was heavily fruiting, which explained the stream of birds that came around the lodge in successions throughout the day. The birds were mostly made up of smaller bulbuls and sunbirds.

Mornings and evenings were punctuated by babblers skulking around the undergrowth around the lodge.

Other than the birds captured by camera above, there were also a pair of Black Magpie which flew right in front of the lodge one morning with their peculiar calls; a Black-backed Kingfisher (flew right in front of the window I was shooting from); Sooty-capped Babbler and two other species of Babbler sp which was not identified (one with a Balicasio like call with a brownish-chocolate body and grey bluish head); nesting Dusky Munia; a Blue-eared Kingfisher (at a pond nearby); and Asian Fairy Bluebird. There were also a few unrecognisable calls throughout the day, one was a highly suspected Banded Kingfisher.

Sorely missed were the Black-headed Bulbul which on previous occasions had numerous. One large raptor (suspected Crested Serpent Eagle, seen here before) flew low one morning.

It was a good short break with the family at our home away from home, Hilltop Lodge.

For visiting birders:
Lambir Hills National Park is situated 20mins drive from Miri International Airport reachable by taxi and public bus. Several types of accomodation options are available at the Park. AC Chalets (2 rooms with a living room, kitchen area and common bathrooms) are at $150/nite or $75/room; each room can take in 2-3 people. They are situated on a hilly section of the park close to the Park office and canteen.

Non-AC Chalets are $100/nite with similar configuration but with fan cooled rooms. Hilltop Lodge is away from the rest of the chalets at the head of Innoue Trail. The rate is at $80/nite or $40/room complete with living room, common bathroom and kitchenette. Each room can fit 2-3 adults.

For more information on available options at Lambir Hills National Park and other facilities, please contact Kamal Abdullah, Person-in-Charge Lambir Hills National Park, 019-8574363.

Write-up and pictures by:
Nazeri Abghani/MNS Miri/Sep 2010

Pictures from weekends away from home at Lambir

Happiest having made the trek from Innoue trail, happier still with the prospect of checking out several waterfalls along the way.


One of the small waterfall which required a short detour from the Pantu Trail, any chance to cool off is an well appreciated break from the trek.


Lambir's ubiquotous palm.


"The attack of the giant praying mantis!" It's surprising how diverse the insect life is at a national park like Lambir ... turn on your porch lights at nite, and they'll all come crawling from all corners of the forests.


A butterfly sucking up some very much needed mineral supplements from rather unsavoury sources (to us humans anyways).


The serene and scenic 1st waterfall along the Latak main trail. And there's a long stretch of slippery sandstone slide going downhill. Caution : slippery when wet.


A beautiful woody mushroom, this thing can grow right in front of your eyes.


An unidentified bloom along the Latak main trail.


Is it a fly, is it a spider, is it bird poop? It's a fly eating bird poop spider!


This mushroom just grew out of a thick tree trunk ... what can be more amazing about life in the damp forest.


Termite mounds.


A shady creek along the Latak main trail, several waterfalls breaks the water's journey downhill.


Latak Waterfall, 30 ft drop into a serene deep green pool, off-limit to swimmers.

Nazeri Abghani/MNS Miri/May2010

Rainforest Drama at Your Doorsteps : The Snake and The Gecko

This happened in July 2008 when my daughter and me were invited by our neighbours to visit Lambir Hills National Park. We live in Miri but don’t visit the park enough.

On this occasion we were resting at the Latak Waterfall, the one with the picnic grounds. While we were standing there we heard ‘plop’ and saw the tree snake that had fallen from the trees struggling with its prey, a gecko. The pictures tell the whole story.

In the end the snake was so disturbed by the attention he (or she?) received that he/she left its prey and swam across the water.

One of the bystanders was so kind to throw the snake’s picnic lunch to the other side of the stream.

You may ask why we only now come with this story and pictures: the reason is that I found out recently that one of the photographers at the event, a 14-year old Dutch boy, received a recommendation from the 2009 BBC Wildlife Photographer of the Year contest (see Link) for a picture of the same event!

As a member of the MNS I thought it might be good to share my pictures with you. The pictures were taken with a Nikon D50 with the standard 18-55 mm lens.

Liv Jorunn van der Toorn/MNS Miri/May 2010













If you have any interesting items you've captured in Lambir Hills National Park and would like to share it with others, please email mnsmiri@yahoo.com, we'll help you publish it here on these pages.

Bornean Bristleheads in Lambir Hills National Park

2009 IUCN Red List Near Threatened Bornean Bristlehead Pityriasis gymnocephala at Lambir Hills National Park, latest sighting by Sara and Peter 0930hrs 02nd April 2010. This unusual species is likely to be declining moderately rapidly throughout much of its range as a result of forest loss and degradation. It is currently considered Near Threatened, and should be carefully monitored (Birdlife International 2009).

News from Sara after her trek at one of the trails in Lambir Hills National Park:

"This morning (2nd ) Peter and I hiked to Oil Well in Lambir Hills. At the Oil Well junction (on the Lepoh-Ridan Trail), at approximately 9:30am, we saw a group of 3 (possibly more) Bornean Bristleheads feeding in the trees right above us. At one point, one of them was only about 6 - 8m above me (see pic). They were flitting from tree to tree, branches to branches but didn't make a lot of noise.

There were also presence of other birds as well as squirrels including the Olive-backed Woodpecker running up a tree trunk. The trees here must be fruiting. We couldn't id the other birds and squirrels as I didn't bring bino and also we were busy looking out for the bristleheads.

Incidentally this was the place where I heard the Borneon Gibbon's song the other day about 2 weeks together with the trail maintenance team also at approx 9:30am, but today we didn't hear any.

All along the Oil Well trail, we heard Black Hornbills, Hill Mynas and wood knocking sound made by woodpeckers, plus many other bird songs which we couldn't ID. We did see some birds in the mid-storey and even on the ground, but too far to id them with our naked eyes.

We plan to go back to the same area tomorrow and try our luck again."

Similajau NP counted Bornean Bristlehead as part of it's birdlists (1986, 1995)), however there have not been any reported sightings there of late.

More on Bornean Bristlehead.

Sara Wong, MNS Miri, Apr 2010

A few highlights from Lambir nitewalk

A curious little dragon, image by Sara Wong.

By six pm 20th March, we've gathered 10 individuals keen on exploring Lambir Hills afterdark. The plan was to enter the trails before sundown, spend some time at Latak waterfall and slowly make our way back to the main gate.

We did just that. The walk over to the falls was pleasantly interupted by stops to gawk at a couple of tarantula's nest right beside the trail. We must've have been walking this route for the umpteenth time, if not for Kamil's help we would've not notice the perfectlt shaped hole on the mudbanks of the trail, nicely lined with cobwebs. Who other would occupy it that the tarantulas? The tow nests added a couple more interest points for our nitewalk.

A short peek at the arboreal tarantula's nest we discovered not long ago was a dissappointment. The Malayan Tiger used to occupy the treeside hole was no longer there. Several prior visits by Peter and Musa also didn't spot the beautiful creature. It must have relocated.

All along the trail towards the waterfall we spotted many geckos, stick insects, large snails, crickets and a couple of frogs. We were ardently looking for signs of snakes. Peter and Musa were fortunate enough to spot a fairly large reptile under some rotting logs in Spider's Alley a few months back. Last year the spot yielded Coral Snake, a juvenile dogtooth cat snake and a juvenile Wagler's pit viper. Not so lucky this nite.

We spent roughly half an hour at Latak waterfall gawking at the nocturnal shrimps in the shallows. They seemed to be ruling the streams in the dark, every submerged leaf we lifted revealed 2-3 hiding little shrimps. A quick shine through the banks and canopy didn't reveal any eyeshine, it would've been an extra bonus. Slow-loris, giant squirrels have been sighted before on previous nitewalk trips.

On the way back, we saw many more stick insects, praying mantis, and large ground hunting spiders. Extra effort schecking the branches overhanging the stream didn't produce anything more exciting than what we've already seen.

Our luck started to change by the time we made our way back to the site of the tarantulas nests. While busily gawking at a huge hairy critter at the mouth of it's resident, Kamil pointed out to a larger slithering quarry not five feet away from the spiders. Right there in front of us, in small peaceful movements was a banded krait. From the elapidae family, banded krait belies it's deadly venomous bite with it's graceful slow movement on the forest floor.

The krait and the tarantula definitely made our nite! The reptile is probably our 6th species so far, stumbled upon during a nitewalk just like this. We hope to see more!


Banded Krait


Terestrial tarantula.

A groundhunting spider.

Another groundhunting spider.

A many legged centipeded, note his missing limps.

A weird looking beetle we haven't encountered before.

A leaffrog, one of our regulars.

A stick insect.

Another regular hanging out.

If you haven't experienced Lambir at nite perhaps you should join us on a short trek through Lambir under the moonlight one of these nites. It's an altogether different feeling from trekking it during the day. The sights and sounds of the forest comes out more lively sometimes without the sunlight.

Nazeri Abghani, Mar 2010

Dipterocarp Mast Fruiting in Lambir Hills

Trees . . . they are everywhere in Lambir Hills National Park (Lambir Park), not only are they in great number buts also in species count.

Let’s see . . . everybody knows there is a 52-hectare research plot somewhere within the Park. Well, in that small plot some scientists decided to make a census count and they found a staggering 1,173 tree species in 286 genera and 81 tree families! Talk about diversity, Lambir definitely tops the list as the richest forest in Malaysia!

Two major types of forest are found in Lambir Park, the mixed dipterocarp forest and the kerangas forest. Kerangas forest is mainly found near the north-eastern part of the Park around Bukit Lambir peaks, while the majority of forest in other parts of Lambir is covered by mixed dipterocarp forest.

For the past few months starting October 2009, something wonderful has been taking place in the mixed dipterocarp forest of Lambir Park: the dipterocarp trees have been producing and releasing enormous amounts of winged fruits onto the forest floor. This special event is called dipterocarp mast-fruiting.


A carpet of dipterocarp flowers on the trails.

During this period many species of dipterocarps come into flower almost simultaneously, followed by mast-fruiting for a period of several months. Unlike other tree families, dipterocarp mast-fruiting only occurs at irregular intervals of anything between 2 – 10 years, a phenomenon that is very unique to dipterocarp forests of South-East Asia.


The different types of winged fruits found on the forest floor of Lambir.


The only spot not covered by the winged fruits is the pool.

A few hypotheses have been proposed to explain this distinctive feature of dipterocarp forests, but the most widely accepted must be the predator-satiation theory which suggests that through synchronization of fruiting at around the same time by many dipterocarp species at irregular intervals of several years, it not only prevents the build-up of seed predator population, the heavy fruiting is also a means of defense to prevent seed predators from wiping out the whole crop of seeds, thus ensuring survival of some of the seeds to germinate and grow into seedlings.

A small group of MNS Miri Branch hikers who regularly visited the Park during weekends over the past four months saw first hand the chronological sequence of mass flowering and mast fruiting of several dipterocarp species along the trails they regularly walked.


Peter admiring the young seedlings taing their rightful places on the forest floor.

February month appears to be the height of the dipterocarp mast-fruiting, as the trails are literally covered with thousands of fallen dipterocarp winged fruits, and at some places it is so dense that walking on them makes quite treacherous as it is really slippery underfoot especially on a descend. It is also observed that many of the other plant species were busily producing bountiful fruits and seeds along side with dipterocarp trees. The forest has certainly never been seen so busy with all these reproductive activities!

Come and visit Lambir Hills National Park now and see for yourselves this special miracle before it is all over. You may not easily see it again in the next few years!

Write-up and photographs by Sara Wong.

References:
Hazebroek, H. P., and Abang Morshidi, A. K. 2006. National Parks of Sarawak. Sabah: Natural History Publications (Borneo).

Sakai, S. 2002. General Flowering in Lowland Mixed Dipterocarp Forests of South-east Asia. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 75(2): 233-247.