Taman Rimba Kiara is a little green gem located in a corner of the TTDI residential area. The above flowering tree, the firmiana malayana or mata lembu, flashes in testimony to man's care-less-ness - it's one of only two trees in the park that had flowered, since then the tree had been chopped down.

Wednesday, 23 June 2021

My 'spark bird'

 Archive image


It could have been ignored, so commonplace, so unremarkable you say?  Have I understated the uniqueness, the beauty of the Yellow-vented Bulbul (Pycnonotus goiavier)?  No, one could deem the bird rather uninspiring because of its less than intense colours but it has a special place in my collection because it's one of my 'spark birds' although one would normally cite a rare or exotic sighting to be a spark bird.  However I would put it that it's not just one bird that ignited my interest in birding but a series of sightings over time that did it, and in the case of this bulbul it was also the repeated nestings in the home compound that contributed to this avian fixation.

A 'spark bird' is defined as a species that triggers a lifelong obsession with birding, according to Twitchers' vocabulary (which) is the set of jargon words used by twitchers (committed birdwatchers who travel long distances to see a new species to add a species to their "life list", year list or other list (source: Wikipedia).













No comments: