Punggol 18Feb06

From KH

50 species of birds for 4 hours of rambling in the hot Punggol grassland. That's a pretty darn good number! The main highlights were the sooty-headed bulbuls, the common snipe and the changeable hawk eagle. The sooty-headed bulbuls are escapees, but the fact that at least 4 birds were sighted means they could be doing well. I've seen them further up Sungei Serangoon before. Yes, the snipe is back. The snipe drain can get its name reinstated. But it's also the wagtail drain, 'cos 2 yellow wagtails were spotted in it too. The changeable hawk eagle was a surprise to us, as we first glimpsed a big raptor flushed out by us. It then reappeared in full view and flew in the sky for several secs allowing us to track its flight over to Halus.

From Danny

Robert, Kok Hui & myself met at Punggol MRT pick up point b4 heading to the snipe drain. Despite the last clean up, glad to report sighting of a common snipe. Ideal departure gift for Kok Hui's journey to Idaho. As none of the big guns around to capture the snipe feeding openly in the drain, bear with the blur image attached.

Thx to Sree's direction, we managed to trek thru' the grassland all the way to the bank of Sungei Serangoon opposite Lorong Halus Charcoal yard. On the way we came across waders' habitat & wooded patches, which we were not aware of. Another surprise sighting were flocks of Sooty-headed Bulbuls, both red and yellow vent variants were present.

Yellow Wagtail. Common Snipe ©Danny Lau

Common Snipe ©Tan KH

1 Sunda woodpecker
2 Dollarbird
3 Collared kingfisher
4 White-throated kingfisher
5 Black-capped kingfisher
6 Blue-tailed bee-eater
7 Asian koel
8 Lesser coucal
9 House swift
10 Pink-necked green pigeon
11 Zebra dove
12 Spotted dove
13 White-breasted waterhen
14 Common snipe
15 Common sandpiper
16 Marsh sandpiper
17 Common redshank
18 Pacific golden plover
19 Little ringed plover
20 Changeable hawk eagle
21 Brahminy kite
22 Black-winged kite
23 Grey heron
24 Purple heron
25 Striated heron
26 Little egret
27 Great egret
28 Brown shrike
29 Long-tailed shrike
30 House crow
31 Black-naped oriole
32 Pied fantail
33 Asian brown flycatcher
34 Asian glossy starling
35 Purple-backed starling?
36 Javan myna
37 Common myna
38 Barn swallow
39 Sooty-headed bulbul
40 Yellow-vented bulbul
41 Zitting cisticola
42 Yellow-bellied prinia (heard)
43 Common tailorbird (heard)
44 Scarlet-backed flowerpecker (heard)
45 Olive-backed sunbird
46 Yellow wagtail
47 Paddyfield pipit
48 Baya weaver
49 Scaly-breasted munia
50 Black-headed munia