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

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

Tuesday, 1 April 2025

A Short Road Trip Through the Crocker Mountains of Sabah

I recently drove from Brunei to Sabah to explore the Crocker Mountains driving via Tenom and Tabunan, exploring a couple of waterfalls along the way. Mensisilad waterfall at the Melalap sub station near Tenom was pretty but there was no wildlife of note to photograph. The Mahua waterfall near Tabunan was however, more spectacular and proved much more rewarding.

Graphium stratiotes (Kinabalu Swordtail) Mahua Waterfall Sabah

Highlights at this waterfall included a white nosed keelback snake, a pygmy squirrel and a couple of rare endemic butterfly species. This swordtail butterfly is only found in the Croker range and around mount Kinabalu.

Graphium stratiotes (Kinabalu Swordtail) Mahua Waterfall Sabah

The snake was small and fast moving as it hunted amongst the rocks of the river. I only managed to get one pretty average shot of it.

Amphiesma flavifrons (White-nosed Keelback) Mahua Waterfall Sabah

Trying to photograph the fast moving water snake.

A more common reptile found here was this green crested lizard.

Bronchocela cristatella (Green Crested Lizard) Mahua Waterfall Sabah

I was extremely luck to see the very rare endemic Kinabalu Birdwing butterfly. It was a female trying to find a place to lay eggs and moved rapidly amongst the trees without settling for long. This butterfly became the state butterfly of Sabah in 2023 as part of an awareness raising campaign to help save this large charismatic species.

Troides andromache (Kinabalu Birdwing) Mahua Waterfall Sabah

There were numerous other beautiful butterflies to photograph at the entrance to the waterfall site.

Graphium antiphates (Fivebar Swordtail) Mahua Waterfall Sabah

Graphium evemon (Lesser Jay) Mahua Waterfall Sabah

Papilio helenus (Red Helen) Mahua Waterfall Sabah

Cyrestis nivea (Straight Line Map) Mahua Waterfall Sabah

Cyrestis maenalis seminigra (Dark Mapwing) Mahua Waterfall Sabah

Bathed by spray and mist at the Mahua Waterfall

Unfortunately I was not quick enough to get a good shot of the pygmy squirrel but you can see its ear tufts and just how fluffy it is in these pictures.

Exilisciurus whiteheadi

(Whitehead's Pygmy Squirrel)

The mountain scenery in this part of Borneo is beautiful. I stayed at Borneo Kiim Resort where at an altitude of over 1000m the nights were quite chilly. The views from here were stunning.

View of Gunung Kinabalu past the end of the Croker Range at Tambunan

Early morning view across the cloud shrouded valley to the Crocker Range.

After a couple of nights it was time to head to Kota Kinabalu via Mount Alab. Along the way we stopped to look for Raflesia and were luck enough to find a 3 day old bloom that was just starting to fade.

Rafflesia pricei Gunung Alab Sabah

R. pricei is a slightly smaller species than R. kethei which grows near Poring but is nonetheless an impressive flower.

Rafflesia pricei Gunung Alab Sabah

My final stop before KK was Gunung Alab at just over 2000m above sea level. Here there were a couple of species of orange hued Rhododendron in flower.