Sulawesi & Halmahera 11 September – 3 October 2009 Tour Report

Another splendid Birdquest tour to Sulawesi and Halmahera, and one that was rather different to usual, in that we did not see rain until our penultimate day! Everywhere was very hot and dry, some areas not having had any rain for three months, perhaps the effect of an ‘El Nino’ weather event. This however didn’t seem to have any negative effect on the birding, and we recorded a very handsome total of 283 species. Yet it is the quality and rarity of the endemic birds that are the main attraction, and we were not disappointed! On Sulawesi we enjoyed many superb endemics such as Greenbacked, Lilac-cheeked, Sulawesi Dwarf, and Great-billed Kingfishers (some of the 14 species recorded!), daytime roosting Speckled and Ochre-bellied Boobooks, Sulawesi Scops Owls and Sulawesi Masked Owl, Cinnabar Boobook, Sulawesi and Heinrich’s Nightjars (also at daytime roosts), Knobbed and Sulawesi Dwarf Hornbills, Red-eared and Maroon-chinned Fruit Doves, Sulawesi Ground Dove, Sombre Pigeon, Sulawesi Serpent and Sulawesi Hawk Eagles, Spot-tailed and Sulawesi Goshawks, Small Sparrowhawk, Purple-bearded Bee-eaters, Purple-winged Roller, Malia, Great Shortwing, Maroon-backed and Yellow-flanked Whistlers, Red-backed and Sulawesi Thrushes, the asyet-undescribed ‘Sulawesi’ Flycatcher, plus the demure but entertaining Matinan Flycatcher. Our ‘Bird-of-the-trip’ however, was a richly coloured Maleo that posed for us in the afternoon sun. On Halmahera we saw Beach, Common Paradise and Sombre Kingfishers, Moluccan Boobook, Moluccan Scops Owl and the strange Moluccan Owlet Nightjar, Blue-capped, Grey-headed and Scarlet-breasted Fruit Doves, Spectacled and Cinnamon-bellied Imperial Pigeons, Great-billed, Redcheeked and Eclectus Parrots, Chattering and Violet-necked Lories, a total of eight Ivory-breasted Pittas, Gurney’s Eagle, Goliath Coucal, the odd Paradise Crow, and we enjoyed the thrilling experience of watching the dawn lek of Standardwing Bird-of-Paradise. The biggest surprise of all, however, was the sudden appearance of a pair of Invisible Rails! They remained in view long enough for three of us to get a good look, before scuttling away through the forest undergrowth. This is without a doubt the most important ornithological events of the tour – one of the first times that birders have seen this species in the field and the first time on an organized tour!