Wildlife of S. E. Asia and S. America. A Photo Journal by Francis Burlingham.: 2022

Introduction

Over the last few years I have been lucky enough to live in Thailand, China, Malaysia, Vietnam, Colombia and now Brunei. In my spare time I have had the opportunity to travel fairly widely, camera in hand, in search of wildlife. In these posts I aim to share some of these experiences and show you some of the extraordinary wildlife that can be found in these regions. All of the photographs you see within the posts and pages here are my own unless otherwise stated. Copyright © Francis Burlingham 2015

Friday 23 December 2022

Extended Dry Season in The Colombian Amazon

A couple of weeks ago I spent some time working in the Colombian Amazon near Leticia. The Amazon region suffered from flooding earlier in the year and is now struggling with drought. These highly irregular weather patterns are likely due to the effects of climate change. The Amazon has been continuing to suffer from a lack of rain and as a result, river levels were well below what would be expected for the time of year. The lack of rain was also clearly affecting the amount of invertebrate life. The Amazon has been suffering from an increasing number of droughts in recent years and is struggling to recover.

Despite the unseasonably dry conditions, I did manage to get a few wildlife photographs as I passed through. The most noticeably abundant animals that I came across seemed to be tarantulas. I came across at least two species. The largest were pink-footed tarantulas. These were present in the trees at night near my accommodation as well as in the roof of my cabin!

Avicularia juruensis (Yellow banded pink toed tarantula) Amazon near Leticia Colombia

Near the cabin were also about seven holes close together at the base of a large grassy plant. These contained a ground dwelling fast moving and shy small species of tarantula that I have not yet been able to identify.

Tarantula species Amazon near Leticia Colombia

I came across a number of nice butterflies but nowhere near the number that I would have expected. There were however the usual ubiquitous large shiny blue Morphos that flew past occasionally without settling and a few nice Heleconia butterflies. Here is a small selection:

Anartia amathea(Red Peacock) Amazon near Leticia Colombia

Junonia evarete (Tropical Buckeye) Amazon near Leticia Colombia

Lasaia agesilas Amazon near Leticia Colombia

Eurytides callias Valencia Community Amazon Colombia

Philaethria dido (Dido Long Wing) Amazon near Leticia Colombia

I was also surprised by how few reptiles I came across. One Anole, an Iguana high in a tree and a few Ameivas were all I managed to see.

Ameiva ameiva Valencia Community Amazon Colombia

Iguana iguana Valencia Community Amazon Colombia

It was so dry that I only saw one amphibian.

Rhinella margaritifera (Leaf Litter Toad) Amazon near Leticia Colombia

Bird life was also pretty limited. The highlight for me was seeing a small flock of Scarlet Macaws. They were unfortunately too quick for me to get any photos.

Milvago chimachima (Yellow-headed caracara) Amazon near Leticia Colombia

Brotogeris versicolurus (White winged parakeet) Amazon near Leticia Colombia

Nyctidromus albicollis (Common Pauraque) Amazon near Leticia Colombia

There were plenty of vultures hanging around wherever there was human habitation.

Coragyps atratus (Black Vulture) Amazon near Leticia Colombia

My favourite encounter of the trip was this lovely little screech owl.

Megascops choliba (Tropical Screech-Owl) Amazon near Leticia Colombia

I hope the rains come soon to this part of the Amazon and that I get a chance to visit again during a full wet season.

Sunset over the Amazon

Victoria amazonica (Giant Waterlily) Amazon Colombia

Tuesday 18 October 2022

A week in the Amazon via the Javari River on the Peru Brazil border.

Spending time in the Amazon rain-forest was the fulfillment of a dream I have had since childhood. I travelled with my family from Bogota to Leticia, crossed the border into the Brazilian Amazon port town of Tabatinga, and from there took a five-hour trip by motorboat on the Amazon river and its tributary the Javari River to The Palmari Reserve jungle lodge and research facility. The lodge sits on the Brazilian side of the Javari River overlooking Peru on the opposite bank. It was the dry and low water season so there were many exposed sandy beaches on the sides of the river.

The View from Palmari Lodge across the Javari River

Palmari was recommended by a colleague who had stayed there doing research some years ago, as a place to see ´the real Amazon jungle´. Far enough from large settlements to still be relatively unspoilt and where there would be great opportunities for spotting lots of wildlife. It did not disappoint.

The river here is also home to a large population of two species of river dolphin, one pink and one gray in colour. We saw them many times during our stay. The dolphins are difficult to photograph as they only surface for a short time, however I did get this couple of record shots.

Inia geoffrensis (Pink Amazon River Dolphin)

Sotalia fluviatilis (Gray Dolphin)

The majority of my time was spent walking the many trails through the forest around the lodge with our designated guide Augusto. He was an incredibly enthusiastic and positive guide who helped plan successful walks to see many of my target species. In the evenings Augusto took me on night walks and we also spent two evenings caiman hunting on the river. The caiman hunting was successful, both times we came across juvenile spectacled caiman and I was able to get these photos of these magnificent animals.

Caiman crocodilus (spectacled caiman) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

The night walks were also a great success and we saw lots of incredible wildlife. These two opossum species were a particular highlight for me. These mouse opossums are about as cute as it gets.

Marmosa demerarae (Long-furred Woolly Mouse opossum) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

This common opossum was a regular visitor to the trees near the lodge kitchen.

Didelphis marsupialis (Common Opossum) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

I was keen to find the giant tarantulas that the Amazon is famous for, so Augusto took us to a river bank where he knew there were tarantula holes. Here I got my first sighting

Pamphobeteus sps (Chicken Eating Spider)Javari Valley Amazonia Brasil

My wife found another tarantula hole during the day, which I retuned to twice to get these shots. The first time, mum was off hunting and this baby spiderling was left in the hole.

Pamphobeteus sps (Chicken Eating Spider)Javari Valley Amazonia Brasil

The second time we returned at night and we enticed the tarantula out by using a thin stick to mimic the movement of prey outside the hole. This was by far the biggest tarantula that I have ever seen, the size of a dinner plate. For scale the hole in the picture is about 10+cm across.

Pamphobeteus sps (Chicken Eating Spider)Javari Valley Amazonia Brasil

There were plenty of lizards to be found both in the grounds of the lodge and in the surrounding jungle. Here are a selection of my favourites:

This massive green iguana was resting on a tree outside of my room.

Iguana iguana Javari Valley Amazonia Brazil

The ameiva was common around the lodge hunting insects.

Ameiva ameiva Javari Valley Amazonia Brazil

This tree runner would hide on the opposite side of the trunk when disturbed.

Plica plica (Collared treerunner) Javari Valley Amazonia Brazil

I saw several Anoles sleeping on leaves at night but only a couple on tree trunks in the day time.

Anolis fuscoauratus (Brown-eared Anole) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Anolis trachyderma (Common Forrest Anole) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

I was surprised not to find any snakes other than this dead water snake.

Hydrodynastes bicinctus (Herrmanns Wter Snake) Javari Valley Amazon Brasil

There were also plenty of frogs and toads about at night, particularly near the small streams in the jungle, some small and others huge.

Scinax ruber (Tree Frog) Javari Valley Amazonia Brazil

Ameerega hahneli (Yurimaguas poison frog) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Boana lanciformis (Rocket Tree Frog) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Leptodactylus pentadactylus (Amazon Smokey Jungle Frog) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Rhinella ornata Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Rhinella margaritifera (Leaf Litter Toad) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Rhinella proboscidea Javari Valley Amazon Brasil

My favourite frog was this small green spotted tree frog.

Boana microderma (Tree Frog) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

I am always keen to look for primates and after failing to get any good photos on our first encounters, we started out on an early morning walk at 5:30am. Augusto was great at tracking them down for me. First we encountered a mixed group of squirrel monkeys and a more furry looking species but did not manage to get close enough for photos before they fled. A little later we encountered a group of squirrel monkeys and although they were very nervous and disappeared off in the canopy, I managed to get a few shots from long range before they went.

Saimiri boliviensis (Black -capped Squirrel Monkey) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

The next group of monkeys that we came across were saddle back tamarins or in Spanish chichico labios de leche (milky-lipped-monkey) on account of the white moustache around the mouth. The Spanish name seems more appropriate to me for these beautiful little monkeys. There appeared to be two groups of these monkeys in a territorial dispute. They were really hard to photograph, always moving quickly in the canopy and at long range, disappearing off as we approached. As a result I only managed to get a couple of pictures. These were truly wild monkeys, unhabituated to human presence and as a result always kept well away from us.

Saguinus fuscicollis (Saddleback Tamarin) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Saguinus fuscicollis (Saddleback Tamarin)

Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Other mammals I came across included large black and large red squirrels, agouties and what was possibly a small deer and some bats.

Saccopteryx sps (White lined sac winged bat) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Saccopteryx sps (White lined sac winged bat) with baby Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

I also sadly found a recently dead juvenile sloth.

Choloepus didactylus (Linnaeus's two-toed sloth) Dead specimen Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Birds were in abundance around the lodge and I was delighted to see two species of parrots and to see wild blue and yellow macaws in the forest. The macaws were shy and flew before I was able to photograph them feeding in the canopy.

Pionus menstruus (Blue-headed Parrot) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Aratinga weddellii (Dusky-headed Parakeet) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Here are some of the other birds from around the lodge.

Chlorophanes spiza (The green honeycreeper) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Galbula tombacea (White Chinned Jacamar) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Sleeping Kingfisher with moths drinking from its eyes. Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Oropendola birds had a colony in a tree outside of my room. Every morning at dawn they started making noise and displaying with very unusual noises. A fantastic natural alarm clock.

Psarocolius decumanus (crested oropendola) Javari Valley Amazon Brazil

Typical of any rainforest there were plenty of butterflies around. I was particularly keen to get more photos of the large blue Morpho species. There were a few about that flew quickly and without settling. I did manage to get a couple of photos of the Adonis Morpho that settled briefly with wings closed, hiding the spectacular blue colour. The butterfly is named after the mythological Greek god Adonis, the god of beauty and desire.