Close to Raden Soerjo Forest Park, there’s a good little restaurant run by native birders. The title “Retrorika” is indicative of a number of the design parts – outdated tape decks and blend tapes. One room of the restaurant appears to be the HQ of the native younger birders – pleasant individuals with chicken books who communicate English as effectively. Price testing (https://birdpacker.org/). They’ve additionally revealed an area chicken information (in Indonesian) in addition to a couple of chicken posters, although all of them appear to be out of print now.
It was just some meters from this place – proper earlier than dinner there – that I encountered a couple of Barred Buttonquails. Cute as they appear, two of them had been combating (in all probability females, see under) and thus in all probability didn’t consider one another as notably cute.
Their scientific genus title Turnix feels like a minor character in an Asterix cartoon (the -ix, after all) whereas I’m not certain concerning the species title suscitator. It means one thing like “awakener”, however I’ve not been in a position to determine what turns this explicit quail into an awakener of any variety. ChatGPT has a couple of totally different potential explanations however total appears to be a bit uncertain too, which – given how confident ChatGPT often is – I discover nearly charming.
The Barred Buttonquail is without doubt one of the comparatively few chicken species with reversed gender roles – the females are polyandrous (which doesn’t imply that they communicate fluent traditional Greek however relatively that they’ve a couple of male accomplice inside one breeding season). They go away the incubation and chick care fully to the males, a habits that might presumably be frowned upon in all however probably the most progressive human societies.
Nevertheless, there’s a draw back to this for females as effectively – males stay, on common, 1.7 instances longer than females (supply).
eBird states that it seems “like a diminutive partridge or quail however [is] solely distantly associated”, which supplies me a great hyperlink to the Chestnut-bellied Partridge seen in a disguise earlier that day.
Like many species in Indonesia, it’s endemic to the nation – Indonesia is the nation with the most important variety of endemic species (greater than 400), a results of Indonesia’s huge dimension, massive variety of islands, and its location inside two main biodiversity hotspots (Sundaland and Wallacea).
Subsequently no prizes for guessing how the scientific title Arborophila javanica happened.
Sadly, this doesn’t imply the individuals of Java care an excessive amount of about this chicken. As an alternative, a few of them entice it and promote it in chicken markets. That is performed in fairly massive numbers – a paper estimates that yearly 3500 Chestnut-bellied Partridges are bought within the chicken markets on Java and Bali. The typical value in these markets is about 31 USD.
I totally agree with the conclusion of the paper: “The presence of each species over a 27-year interval in quite a few chicken markets, and over the past decade on-line, indicated the absence of dedication and political and societal pressures to curb the unlawful commerce in birds in Indonesia.”
Staying with the theme of endemism (which to be trustworthy, I’m typically a bit skeptical of, because it appears to me to be too carefully associated to nationalism), the Pied Shrike-babbler is one other one (particularly, a Javan endemic).
It seems fairly just like the White-browed Shrike-babbler, and certainly I misidentified it as that till being corrected by my information.
As with many of those comparatively current splits, not a lot is thought concerning the species – for instance, right here is the Cornell entry on Weight-reduction plan and Foraging: No info, however weight loss program and foraging habits presumably just like these of P. aeralatus [the White-browed Shrike-babbler].
Staying with these clumsy double names (like German girls clinging to their maiden names, when conserving your individual title was not an possibility but), one other sighting was that of a Black-winged Flycatcher-shrike.
If you realize some scientific names of widespread birds, you may guess that the scientific title of this species (Hemipus hirundinaceus) signifies that it’s “swallow-like”.
General, the sexes look related, however the feminine is brownish within the areas the place the male is black.
I hope for the eBird writers that no strict feminist ever reads the eBird description of the Little Pied Flycatcher: “Male is strikingly distinctive along with his daring black-and-white patterning. Feminine is exclusive in her plainness”.
Truly, I feel the outline is a bit unfair, although after all, given the selection, I’d additionally want a catchy however deceptive characterization to a boring right one. To me, the feminine additionally seems fascinating (I can often inform by the variety of images I develop relatively than the quantity I shoot).
Although admittedly, the male seems a lot cuter.
Again to endemics – the Black-banded Barbet is simply discovered on Java and Bali.
It is without doubt one of the 35 species of Asian barbets. Africa has one other 43 barbet species, although these are in a unique household.
The title Black-banded Barbet was given to the species by Thomas Horsfield in 1812 – and by an incredible coincidence, a couple of years later, he described one other species which then acquired his title:
Horsfield’s Babbler. Thomas Horsfield (1773 – 1859) was an American doctor and naturalist who labored extensively in Indonesia and later was a museum curator in London.
Horsfield might have chosen a extra fascinating chicken, such because the barbet – eBird describes Horsfield’s Babbler as a “small, boring babbler with a brief tail”.
Possibly he was only a very modest man.
I had seen a number of Lesser Shortwings in Vietnam earlier, so I used to be not too excited concerning the species this time.
Although I nonetheless suppose it’s a cute chicken as effectively, simply to present you my scientific opinion.
I used to be informed the Orange-breasted Trogon is simply not often seen at Raden Soerjo.
To finish this publish, listed below are three extra species all beginning with Javan. All three are endemic to Indonesia, with a selected concentrate on Java.
The Javan Leafbird is a Javan endemic. It’s listed as Endangered regardless of being relatively good at camouflage.
It was not too long ago cut up from the Blue-winged Leafbird.
The Javan Bush Warbler is lucky sufficient to love larger elevations, a choice additionally indicated in its scientific title Locustella montis.
In actual fact, it is without doubt one of the comparatively few species for which Cornell – within the “Conservation Standing” part – sounds nearly optimistic: “its choice for larger elevations, the place strain from human habitation is low, and its fondness of open slopes, which have been cleared of timber, mustn’t solely guarantee its survival however in all probability additionally permit a rise in its inhabitants”.
Sadly, this isn’t true for the Javan Scimitar Babbler regardless of the same scientific title (Pomatorhinus montanus) which presumably additionally signifies a choice for larger elevations.
It’s listed as Susceptible. You possibly can guess the explanation: “It’s thought-about to be threatened with extinction due to seize for the cagebird commerce, the one recognized menace, which is suspected of getting pushed declines of c. 30–49% over the previous ten years (2013–2023)” (Birdlife.org).
And sure, the scientific title of the species was additionally given by Thomas Horsfield. He will need to have had a busy time on Java.
Half 1 of the go to to Raden Soerjo may be discovered right here.
