Kuala Selangor is the firefly capital of Malaysia. The kelip-kelip signs, t-shirts and memorabilia are all a testament to the marketing effect of a Sir David Attenborough documentary. Most people do go to Kuala Selangor to see the fireflies. Those people are idiots – fireflies are bird food! On the second stop of my Malaysia odyssey (my balik kampung – homecoming to the village) it was going to be mangroves, mangroves and more mangroves. And the most accessible place to see mangrove forest and its birds is the Kuala Selangor Nature Park. I arrived at dawn after a long drive through never-ending greater Kuala Lumpur. A very knowledgeable young park guard explained the best sites to see birds and she gave me an unsolicited 50% senior discount on the RM4 entry fee. With permit in the pocket and self-esteem in the drain I walked to the first indicated hotspot. I dipped on all her specialties but lucked upon a Stork-billed Kingfisher. His portrait, and all other pictures in this post, are either from the 10000birds archive, taken by Kai or both.
A large watchtower provides a canopy view of the swamp forest. I managed to see Edible-nest Swiftlets, Painted Stork, Brahminy Kites and Little Green-Pigeon from the tower. The storks apparently are zoo escapees, which made for an interesting escape movie theme for the day. Keep reading…
The shrubs and bushes along the canal towards the mangrove area had an interesting mix of swamp dwellers, mangrove specialists and other more catholic birds. A trio of tailorbirds Common Tailorbird, Ashy Tailorbird and Rufous-tailed Tailorbird were plying their trade in apparently different habitats, but I couldn’t figure out the distinction in their choice of shrubbery – identifying them was easier. Yellow-bellied Prinias were pretty much everywhere and Swinhoe’s White-eyes, Brown-throated Sunbirds and a Little Spiderhunter were on the flowering bushes. Three Smooth-coated Otters greeted me at the end of the canal, just before I was entering the mangrove section.
My guidebook rather curtly describes the Dollarbird (feature image) as “bulky” as its sole identifying characteristic. That is like defining the President of the United States as just “economically ignorant“: it doesn’t capture the complexity of the man or in this case, the bird. I found the Dollarbird while walking the plank – or rather the mangrove boardwalk. I wasn’t alone. Reforestation of the mangrove area is a popular Corporate Social Responsibility initiative. Despite the sometimes cringeworthy slogans, tree-planting is bringing Malaysians closer to nature. I chatted with one such group that was knee-deep in stinky mud with happy grins on their faces. They had a good time but also showed an understanding of the conservation needs of the area, the benefits of healthy habitats and their own personal role. Quite remarkable.
After 3.5 hours of intense birding in intensifying heat and humidity I drove to the Tanjung Karang Paddyfields to pass the midday heat in the comfort of my air-conditioned rental car. The fields were mostly dry and post-harvest, but I still found hundreds of Asian Openbill. I also got a full house of herons with Great White Egret, Little Egret, Eastern Cattle Egret, Purple Heron, Grey Heron and one Javan Pond Heron. A single Crested Serpent-Eagle completed my lunch session, and I drove back for the afternoon birding session in Kuala Selangor.
The afternoon was slightly less productive than the morning session, but with three Sunda Pygmy Woodpeckers and a Black-naped Oriole to add to the day’s total I was not going to complain. The park pre-dates TikTok and offers little beyond nature, drawing “our kind of people“. Very pleasant. Kuala Selangor National Park has on-site accommodation, which looked well-maintained and clean. An A-Frame Hunt costs RM50 per night (about 10 Euro), chalets RM60, the hostel comes in at RM175 and the dormitories are RM 220. Very reasonable and in close proximity of the birds. Nevertheless, I splurged 40 Euro/dollar on a hotel room off-site, which was announced as a “windowless room”. Thinking the description was some ChatGPT mistranslation I walked into the room and yes, it was indeed windowless. I fabricated a shank from my toothbrush, bought a Raquel Welch poster and then ran out of Shawshank Redemption clichés as I fell into a well-deserved deep sleep on my little prison cell bunk. A long four-hour drive to Taman Negara awaited me the next morning.
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