Birding With Y Bird Japan Group Part III

4th - 7th April

Spent 4 days with Ken Tanaka's group from Japan, similar program like last year, a night at Rainforest Discovery Centre, Sepilok then another few nights at Borneo Nature Lodge, Kinabatangan River. The trip ended at Tanjung Aru Beach for the endangered Blue-naped Parrot ...

The highlight of this trip were :

• Bornean Bristlehead - Seen daily
• Bornean Black Magpie - In hunting flocks with Bornean Bristlehead
• Bat Hawk - At Gomantong Cave
• White-crowned Hornbill - A pair at Gomantong Cave
• Rhinoceros Hornbill - Last bird seen in the evening at the river !
• White-fronted Falconet - A pair at Menanggul river
• Great Slaty Woodpecker - Heard and seen at one of the death tree along Menanggul river
• White-bellied Woodpecker - In flight at RDC
• Orang Utan

Digiscoped with Nikon Fieldscope EDG85 via FSA-L2 DSLR Photo Adapter on Nikon D300s

At Kinabatangan River

Oriental Pied Hornbill feeding at one of the tree opposite Borneo Nature Lodge

 

Storm's Stork is one of the endangered bird in Borneo and one of the last strong hold for this bird is at Kinabatangan River ...

 Healthy looking Orang Utan

 Rhinoceros Hornbill

Happy birding folks !

Dancing In The Air ...

28th February 2012

As I was browsing my collection of pictures to be uploaded into 500px website, I decided to re-edit one of my favorite shot of fighting Intermediate Egret taken with Nikon D300s and 70-200mm 2.8 VR lens at Penampang paddy field few years ago ...

I changed the background colour and put a bit of contrast plus cropped it to 33%. I was thinking of submitting this image to the Handbook Of The World - World Bird Photo Contest together with the other pictures taken with my scope ...

 

Happy birding !

Nikon Prostaff 7 10x42 Binocular Review

20th February 2012

When I first tried this model at Rainforest Discovery Centre last year during the Foresty Open Day, I could not believe my eyes how sharp and it has better contrast and well controlled Chromatic Aberration (CA) than the current Monarch series. Then I went to Fraser's Hill with the gang for the International Bird Race on the same year, tested it against the grey sky with Monarch III. It does confirmed my finding.

I have been using 8x binocular for many years and couldn't get better view with 10x binocular even though I have tried few models and different brands. But with Nikon Prostaff 7 10x42, it was different. There were one time I was at Raganan - Timbuk mudflat with Joe waiting for the White-browed Crake, from the other bank about 80 metres, there were a Sandpiper which looked either Marsh or Common Greenshank. The weather was cloudy that time.

I was thinking of detaching the Nikon FSA-L2 adapter from my Nikon Fieldscope EDG85 and replaced it with my favorite 25LER eyepiece. But the 10x42 I had really helped me in ID'ing the bird (Marsh Sandpiper). I am used with the habit of using my scope after getting the subject on my bino even when the birds was really close.

 

Other feature I like is the weight. Even though both is heavier than Nikon Monarch III for 8x42 and 10x42, from my daily usage, it was not a problem and sometimes I did not realized it was hanging on my neck ! No more shake on my hand too hahaha :)

I hope if Nikon could incorporate fast focus for all models in the Sport Optics lineup like the legendary HG L, that would be the trademark for Nikon compared with other competitiors. It is a bit slow for my taste the Prostaff 7 series because my favorite 8x32 SE a bit faster.

Overall,  I would recommend the Nikon Prostaff 7 10x42 for beginners in birding and for those who do not own a fieldscope because the extra 2x you get from the 10x42 will benefits you in getting those ID right especially for smaller Waders and Raptors. But you will get smaller Field Of View (FOV) than the 8x42. More info about FOV, click this link http://www.nikon.com/products/sportoptics/how_to/guide/binoculars/basic/basic_08.htm

Thanks to Irene Chong from Sandakan Foto for the demo unit. Selling price is around RM 1188 for 8x43 and RM 1288 for 10x42.

Link for Nikon Prostaff 7 at Nikon Vision Japan website.

On going discussion about this binocular at Birdforum :

• http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=192068
• http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=202792

 
Happy birding !

Nikon Fieldscope EDG85 VR Review

29th January - 11th February 2012

Nikon Vision Japan introduced the world's first Fieldscopes featuring Nikon's lens-shift type VR (Vibration Reduction) system for EDG 85 both angled and straight scope on the 6th October 2011. From my brief test at the previous Borneo Bird Festival in October 2011, the VR works when there were slight shake or vibration caused by wind and non-stable platform such as wooden walkway. Other methods tested by tapping on the tripod that hold the VR scope.

 Nikon Fieldscope EDG85 VR on Jobu BW Pro Gimbal head and Velbon 830 carbon fibre tripod. Estimated weight around 7.75 kg

Battery compartment under the EDG VR wording

Green LED when VR is ON

I did a test within 2 weeks for Nikon Malaysia and I was shooting mainly with my D300s and other D7000 body coupled with FSA-L2 adapter at my favorite mudflat concentrating on Waterbirds and Kingfishers.

With this EDG VR scope, it was possible to get sharp images while shooting around 1/60s at 500mm F/5.9 using Continuous High (CH) and with Timer modes. Out of 18 shots taken in sequence with CH, I got more than 9 sharp images which is almost impossible with my current EDG scope ! More with cable release on Timer mode.

EXIF : ISO 100, Shutter speed 1/60s, 500mm F/5.9 with FSA-L2 on D300s. Images were cropped 50% and resized only. No sharpening applied

Other usefulness of the VR, while focusing at 500mm up to 1750mm, it helped me in obtaining faster perfect focus while focusing on the helical through the viewfinder without getting back and forth. No shaking on the images and videos even at 1750mm ! This is one of the important aspect by having VR scope when recording videos at high magnification where a slight movement by wind etc could caused shaking and blurring on the recording itself.

The VR scope uses 4 x AA batteries and could last for 17 hours. After 30 minutes of non-active usage, the VR will turn off itself in order to save power consumption. I didn't really feel the weight differences between my EDG85 and EDG85 VR. Plus it looked like the EDG85 VR seems to have better better contrast than my EDG scope ...

Mike Freiberg and Bill Schmoker from Nikon Prostaff USA tested the VR scope on windy day at :

• http://blog.aba.org/2012/01/whole-lot-of-shakin-not-going-on.html

Summary : I like this scope very much ! Is it worth upgrading to EDG85 VR scope ? Yes and for those who wants to take Digiscoping and Videoscoping to another level plus for visual use especially when you do lots of sea watching !

Thanks to Tee at Nikon Malaysia for the loan unit.

Digiscoped with Nikon Fieldscope EDG85 VR via FSA-L2 on D300s and D7000

 

 

Happy Digiscoping !

Greater Painted Snipe (Rostratula benghalensis)

October 2011

Secretive and very shy ! But luck was on my side last October, saw a couple were feeding at one of the paddy field plot just next to the main road. The female did paused for few seconds when she saw my car stopped but it didn't bother her especially when I unwind the window and pointed my scope to her. Opportunity !

There were more than 3 pairs seen at Penampang paddy field with around 500m each that set them apart and this particular pair had a successful nesting with 3 juveniles were photographed by Gary Albert the following month.

Digiscoped with Nikon Fieldscope EDG85 via FSA-L2 DSLR Photo Adapter on Nikon D300s

The male above has more role here than the female such as incubating the eggs and taking the immature for feeding (Not in the picture)

 The interesting part is, the female seems to be leading the male while feeding. This is obvious especially when both were crossing on the open spaces at the paddy field like shown on the picture above.

Hope I can get better and cleaner pictures of this beauty next time !

Happy birding ...

White-browed Crake (Porzana cinerea)

23rd January 2012

Crakes and Rails is considered uncommon to rare in my place even the resident Crake such as Slaty-legged Crake and White-browed Crake. Yesterday afternoon went to Ranganan - Timbuk wetland and upon arrival, Joe showed me his shot of the White-browed Crake and it was quite close too !

There were few Great and Little Egret, lone Grey Heron, Black-winged Stilt, Common Moorhen and Common Kingfisher. A flock of Pink-necked Green Pigeon was busy feeding on a fruiting tree, a bit unfortunate for good pictures because it was a bit distance. The strange things is, there were no single Wandering Whistling Duck and on my last visit in December 2011, there were more than 100 of them. Not sure what happened ...

Digiscoped with Nikon Fieldscope EDG85 via FSA-L2 DSLR Photo Adapter on Nikon D300s

500mm ~ cropped 33% edited with Nikon Capture NX2

The baby !

 Never had the opportunity to get quite close with this bird !

Last photo before they walked back behind the reeds ...

Happy birding !

Sabah Wildlife Conservation Colloquium 2012

9th - 10th January 2012

Invited by Sabah Wildlife Department and jointly organized by Malaysian Palm Oil Council (MPOC)to attend the by Sabah Wildlife Conservation Colloquium 2012 was held at Le Meridian Hotel in Kota Kinabalu to discussed 3 Action Plans namely the Orang Utan, Bornean Pygmy Elephant and Bornean Rhinoceros in order to save this species from extinction.

There is a hope ...

More info from the links below :

• http://www.newsabahtimes.com.my/nstweb/fullstory/55113
• http://www.theborneopost.com/2012/01/09/much-to-be-done-for-wildlife-conservation-director/
• http://www.dailyexpress.com.my/news.cfm?NewsID=80316
• http://kgsilou.blogspot.com/2012/01/sabah-not-much-land-left.html

Some of the pictures taken during the 2 days event with Nikon D300s and 28mm 2.8 lens

Areden, Ryan and Edmundo representing Borneo Rainforest Lodge

Wildlife photograper Cede Prudente and Wendy Hutton, author for many books regarding Sabah

Peter from Sabah Wildlife Department with John Prudente from Borneo Geographic

Lawrance, John Nair, Brandon Miles and Clay busy discussing something ...

Mark representing APE and Mark from Danau Girang Field Centre 

Teles with the CEO's Blog 

Protected species in Sabah by Wildlife department

Displaying products made from palm oil

Providing latest info in regards with Borneo Sunbear and other conservation project by Borneo Conservation Trust

The Secretariat

Hope to see you all on the next Colloquium !

Common Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus)

4th January 2012

First posting of the year with Common Kestrel, uncommon winter visitor in my place mostly seen at Tempasuk and Penampang paddy field, this time, fellow birder, Wan Iskandar saw it at Alam Mesra residential area and seen few times on top of the street light scanning for its prey.

According from Quentin Philipps's book, there were 6 Falco species migrating in Borneo and only 1 being a resident the Peregrine Falcon Falco peregrinus ernesti. 

Will try to get better pictures soon with the gang depending with the weather condition ...

Digiscoped with Nikon Fieldscope EDG85 via FSA-L2 DSLR Photo Adapter via Nikon D300s

Happy birding !

Digiscoping Images at Nikon Vision Japan Website

30th December 2011

Some of my pictures has been published by Nikon Vision Japan at Nikon EDG microsite : http://www.nikon.com/products/sportoptics/edg/top/index.htm at Digiscoping Gallery. This is one of my best achievement  as a bird guide and photographer. Thanks for the supports from my family, best friends and Tee from Nikon Malaysia with Irene from Sandakan Foto.

Digiscoped with Nikon Fieldscope EDG85 via FSA-L2 DSLR Photo Adapter on Nikon D300s edited with Nikon Capture NX2

I will be testing the new Nikon Fieldscope EDG85 VR soon and hopefully with Nikon V1 mirrorless camera and do not forget to check my upcoming Birding & Digiscoping Workshop for January 2012 at http://horukuru.blogspot.com/2011/12/birding-digiscoping-workshop-2012.html

Happy birding and thanks for everyone who followed and enjoyed my blog for year 2011. See you in 2012 !