Changi, Bidadari, Pulau Punggol 29Oct11

From Con

I think the bird of the day for our outing was a Mangrove Whistler seen at Changi Reclaimed Land, a lifer for a couple of us.

We stopped along one of the regular tracks on the West side of Changi Airbase East because we noticed some bird activity, and were hoping for Eastern Crowned Warbler or some other goodies.  I first noticed a bit of an odd “Asian Brown Flycatcher”, but Kok Hui quickly realized it was a Mangrove Whistler.  We observed the bird from at least 10:15am until 10:40am.  Occasionally it would give us quite good views, although all were back light as the sun was generally behind the bird.  In general the weather was fine and getting hot, although there had been a passing shower a bit earlier.

Here are some shots of the Mangrove Whistler, the first four are from today, the last two are from Hantu several years ago.

The bird responded to playback and came forward.  It also sang in response to playback and it’s song was a match with one of Sharringa’s recordings.

I see from Avifauna and Robson that although the core habitat is mangrove, it does occur in coastal areas and other disturbed areas.

From KH

We started off at Changi and then moved on to Bidadari and finally Pulau Punggol.

Raptors seen at Changi:
1) OHB 3
2) Peregrine Falcon 1
3) Accipiter 1
4) CHE 2 (1 dark, 1 pale)
5) BWK 2
6) WBSE 2
7) Brahminy Kite >5

Mangrove Whistler ©Lau JS

At Bidadari, we had a Jambu Fruit-dove, Crow-billed Drongo, Flycatcher (Yellow-rumped and Asian Brown), Asain Paradise-flycatcher, Arctic Warbler, Tiger Shrike, Oriental White-eyes, etc.

Jambu Fruit-dove ©Danny Lau

Danny and I went on to Pulau Punggol and saw these raptors:

1) CHE 2 (1 dark, 1 pale)
2) Osprey 1
3) WBSE 3
4) Brahminy Kite 2