Photos by Mehd Halaouate and Haoyong Zhang
On the second day of 2024 we were with a couple of Chinese who would like to do birding in Bali for 4 days. Within those days, we went to the cliff area in the south of Bali, the vast paddy field areas, highland forest, lowland forest and also shrimp ponds area. It was a successful, yet fun birding with more than 126 species seen and mixed with cultural and sightseeing to the beautiful landscapes of the Island of the Gods.
Within this trip, we found some amazing findings. Like the Pin-tailed parrotfinch (Erythrura prasina) in the paddy field foraging together with Java munia and also the Sunda coucal (Centropus nugrorufus) which actually known to be not exist live in Bali island. For the Parrotfinch, we thought it is an escapee, but for the Coucal, Birding Indonesia team has seen this species occurred in 3 different species in Bali.
Other highlights of the trips are the Javan owlet, Javan banded pitta, Bar-winged prinia, Java sparrow, and also one of the hardest White-capped munia.
We also found a migratory species that is not common to see in Bali. Which is this Chestnut-cheeked starling. We saw 7 individuals perched at a tree along with Pink-necked green pigeon at that time. What a luck!