I guided Paul and Ros Brown on a 2-day trip to Sinharaja rain forest. An entomologist by profession, Paul works at the British Natural History Museum in London. His main focus on the tour was birds, and more specifically, endemic birds, for which Sinharaja is famous for. Ros, on the other hand, was the supportive spouse of the birder, who ...
The pair of Sri Lanka Frogmouths above were one of the 12 species of resident night birds seen out of 15 in a successful Absolute Birding tour that I guided in March, 2010 with Chris Holtby and David Thrussel from the UK. Keeping their promise, Chris and Dave have done a detailed ...
20 February to 5 March, 2012, saw me guiding a 15-day wildlife tour with John and Kate Holland, from England. Both were keen birders, and this was their first visit to Sri Lanka. Kate sported the latest Swarovski SLC 42 HD binoculars, which were superb in clarity. A birthday gift from John, it was on its first overseas trip. Our ...
I got a spanking new copy of the newly published Cuckoos of the World for free! Authored by Johannes Erritzoe, Clive F Mann, Frederik Brammer and Richard A Fuller, and publised by Christopher Helm, it describes all 144 species of the bird family Cuculidae including cuckoos, malkohas, couas, coucals, roadrunners and other species in exceptional detail. This includes accurate range ...
I spotlighted this pair of Brown Hawk Owls during the last tour close to the airport at Katunayake. We first saw the bird on the right arriving at the above perch with a mouthful. It was soon obvious that the victim was a bird. And looking at zoomed up pictures, I could see ...
Somewhere in the lowland wet zone, I spotted this Sri Lanka Bay Owl from a moving vehicle! That was during an Absolute Birding tour that I guided in the second half of January, 2012 for Mark Yates, Gary Thonburn (both from the U.K.) and Brendon Ryan from South Africa. We were returning to our accommodation 'empty-handed' after specially going ...
I am back after leading several exciting bird and wildlife tours. My last tour for the season ended was a 15-day Natural History tour from 9 to 23 April, 2011 with Barry Barnacal, Gary Bellingham, Katrina Hay, and Andrew Vinson from the UK. The three gentlemen of this group were very keen photographers, and they carried serious photo gear, including ...
22–29 October, 2011 saw me guiding my first "Leopards and Scrabble" tour. It was with Diane Lofthouse from Sydney, Australia. The trip centred around Yala National Park—the celebrated wildlife hotspot in South East Sri Lanka. Diane had turned 70 just days before the trip. And seeing a Leopard in the wild I was told was on top of her ...
My last tour for the 2009/2010 birding season was a 14-day Absolute Birding tour from 17 to 30 April, 2010 with Dr. Gilmer (Gil) Ewing from Calif., U.S.A. Gil works as a specialist Paediatrician at Kaiser Permanente. He had grown up in a lush, beautiful neighbourhood in Atlanta, where all families fed the birds in their backyards. Seeing such delights ...
Last month, I guided a 7-day Endemics Clean Up Tour with four super-hardcore Dutch birders: Erik Ernens, Robert Keizer, Eric Lam, and Marius Bolck. It was a mega success with us bagging 220 species of birds, including all 33 endemic birds. Our overnight locations were Nuwara Eliya, Udawalawe, Sinharaja and Kithulgala. After raking in montane specials on the first two ...
I am back after guiding my first birding tour for the winter tour season of 2011/2012. It was a 14-day Absolute Birding tour with Brice and Gail Wells from Perth, Australia from 1–14 November, 2011. Brice, 78, became the oldest birder to survive my Absolute Birding tour. Our final tally of birds stood at 231 species. We saw all thirty-three ...
Early this month, I guided Max Berlijn from the Netherlands. Max came to me for an eight-day birding tour through Pieter van der Luit of Inezia Tours—one of the winners of a blog quiz done by me. Of the numerous birders that I have guided over the years, Max was special in that he was my first hardcore Holarctic Lister: ...
The Scarlet Basker has got to be one of the easiest dragonflies to photograph. That is, if you're willing to put the hard hours in baking sun. Midday is when it is mostly at its element. The male above was shot in a quarry just 250 metres as a crow dragonfly flies from my garden. The owners of the ...
My last tour for 2010 was in late December with Mike Pope, who came here with his non-birding wife Gill, and their eight-year old thumb war champion son, Jaden. Our first base on this tour was the Hunas Falls Hotel, which is situated in the lush foothills of Hunasgririya mountain. About 10 years ago I researched and named two nature ...
I am back after guiding several trips. One of them was a two-day trip to Sinharaja rain forest from 28–29 August. It was with Dr. Jane Rosegrant, who is the outgoing country director of VSO (Voluntary Services Overseas) in Sri Lanka. An American married to a Scot, Jane holds a PhD in Human Ecology from the University of Edinburgh. ...
When I last blogged about this planthopper, it was known as Centromeria viridistigma. Not anymore. According to a recent revision done by Dr. Zhi-Shun Song and Al-Ping Liang at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, it now goes as Truncatomeria viridistigma. The new genus is endemic to Sri Lanka and is a monotypic one, ...
I hope the New Year will bring you peace, happiness and good health! The endemic Chestnut-backed Owlet above was photographed last November at Kithulgala while guiding Dr. Wilf Powell and his wife Mrs. Julia Powell on a 14-day Absolute Birding tour. I am always careful when typing the name of this bird to ...
