Kingfishers on Island Paradise

One of my favorite travel destinations in the Philippines has to be Camiguin, a tiny volcanic island just north of Mindanao. Despite having a land area of less than 100 square miles, it holds a huge amount of geographic diversity, with white beaches, pristine rainforests, and multiple active volcanoes that give a skyline more akin to Hawaii than the Philippines. 

Picture of the island from a previous visit in 2017

Bird-wise it's no slouch either; despite the fact that it's a tiny island and that the northern coast of Mindanao is only about 6 miles away, the water separating them is so deep that they were never joined in the past ice age, giving some of the birds there enough time to diverge into separate species. It's the second-smallest island in the Philippines to hold endemic birds (after Calayan Island north of Luzon), with two to three endemic species: the Camiguin Bulbul, Camiguin Hawk-owl, and Camiguin Hanging-parrot (the hanging-parrot is considered as only a subspecies of Philippine Hanging-parrot by some killjoy taxonomists, while the bulbul is only split on one list, though it's a fairly obvious split). It also has endemic subspecies of Orange-bellied Flowerpecker, Yellowish White-eye, and Black-naped Monarch, and some otherwise difficult-to-see Mindanao endemics like Rufous-lored Kingfisher, Dimorphic Dwarf-kingfisher, and Writhed Hornbill. In other words, it's no slouch in the bird department. 

I'd been to Camiguin twice before, and seen the bulbul and hanging-parrot, the latter of which is supposedly the most difficult of the endemics thanks to hunting and trapping. The hawk-owl, meanwhile, I only managed to hear, despite the fact that everyone else who's been there always talks about how easy it is to see. I've lamented many times my terrible luck when it comes to owls (surely it's not because I'm terrible at owling), but it was rather frustrating that I was missing this last Mindanao-endemic owl. 

This horrid picture of Camiguin Hanging-parrot is the only photo of that species uploaded to eBird, though thankfully other photographers have much better pictures

When my friend Mika, who'd recently moved to the Philippines, expressed interest in visiting Mindanao with her husband Yuki at the end of July, my first suggestion was Camiguin- not because of the birds (though I was looking forward to seeing some more), but because of all other other great tourist attractions: volcano hiking, snorkeling, beaches, and the like. And of course I was hoping for the opportunity to try birding there once more to see if I could actually see the hawk-owl, among other things. 

Unless you feel like spending far too much money to fly into the tiny Camiguin airport, getting there from Manila requires flying into the nearby city of Cagayan de Oro on mainland Mindanao, taking a bus or van to the port of Balingoan, about 3 hours away, and then a ferry across to Camiguin itself. It's altogether an unpleasant experience, especially since the road from CDO to Benoni is narrow and twisty, and lends itself much more to carsickness than it does to getting work done or enjoying the view through the window. 

We were pooped by the time we reached Balingoan on the afternoon of July 27, and things didn't improve when we reached Camiguin: an unfortunate motorbike accident left Yuki injured, and the rest of the day was spent in the hospital making sure it wasn't anything serious. Thankfully there were no broken bones or other major injuries, but it was enough to prevent him from participating in most of the usual tourist activities in Camiguin in general. That threw a wrench in our vacation plans, and left us with much more downtime than was expected. As a side effect of that, it left me with a little more time to head out and look for birds- I know, poor me. 

My intent for our first morning on Camiguin had been to head up the mountain to the island's best birding area before sunrise, then be down to our AirBnb by breakfast time. Unfortunately after the stress of the hospital experience the night before my bed was too tempting, so I didn't hop on my rented motorcycle until just before sunrise, getting to the birding area a little before dawn. The drive over the middle of Camiguin is absolutely beautiful- cattle pasture transitioning into a valley with forested volcanoes on either side. It's worth a visit even without the birds. 

Camiguin landscape

The birding road in Camiguin

Bird-wise, there wasn't as much to see my first morning as I'd hoped, at least along the road: a family of Philippine Magpie-Robins, a large flock of Ridgetop Swiftlets wheeling, uh, at the top of a ridge, and some Everett's White-eyes in the bushes beside the road. I heard the endemic Camiguin Bulbuls calling and had a brief flyover from a Camiguin Hanging-Parrot, but never got a good look at either of them. 

Immature Philippine Magpie-Robin

Ridgetop Swiftlets

Everett's White-eye

I took a small trail heading into the woods for a ways, hoping to see the Dimorphic Dwarf Kingfisher that was sometimes seen in that area. I didn't see the kingfisher, though I may have heard it, but I did get great views of the endemic subspecies of Orange-bellied Flowerpecker calling out from a tree next to the trail, as well as a family of Mangrove Blue-flycatchers. 

Camiguin Orange-bellied Flowerpecker

Female Mangrove Blue-Flycatcher

Baby carabao in a meadow

On the way back up to the road, I flushed a few Rufous Paradise-flycatchers by accident, but, much better, finally got a close-up look at a Camiguin Bulbul. These are the most common of the island endemics (and certainly the most vocal), but usually fly away at the slightest disturbance, making them much harder to photograph than most bulbuls. It may not be the most attractive endemic bird, but it's one of my favorites, both for its beautiful song and for being confined to a tiny forested area of an already-tiny island.

Camiguin Bulbul

On July 29, our last day on the island, I had one more morning to go birding, and this time Mika joined me. Miraculously, we were able to drag ourselves out of bed before the crack of dawn and get up the mountain before sunrise, with enough time to look for owls. This was to be my last chance to see Camiguin Hawk-owl for the foreseeable future, so I was determined to actually get a glimpse this time. It took about a half hour of walking up and down the birding road and alternately listening for the owl and trying playback, but we finally got a response from a pair of Camiguin Hawk-owls! Contrary to basically everyone else's experiences with them, these ones mostly remained hidden away in the forest (again, my terrible owl luck), but I did have a brief flyover from one- what a relief to finally have seen that bird. 

After the sun had risen, we walked down the forest path to try for Dimorphic Dwarf-kingfisher once more. This time I was more prepared and had brought a recording of the call, and after a bit of trying we finally saw a Dimorphic Dwarf-kingfisher fly by us at about 100 miles per hour, never to return again. That's most people's experience with this bird, so I was happy to have finally see it, even if it was brief. Much more cooperative was a Common Mock-viper we saw slithering along the forest floor- it's always nice to see live snakes in the Philippines, since they're mostly just seen dead along the side of the road after being killed by some misguided farmer. 

Common Mock-viper

Along the road was another family of Mangrove Blue-flycatchers, including a juvenile bird. The birds in the Philippines actually aren't often found in mangroves, at least outside Palawan, so it's an interesting bird to have up on a mountain a ways from the coast. 

Juvenile female Mangrove Blue-flycatcher

Adult male Mangrove Blue-flycatcher

Our last birding experience that morning was magical: a beautiful male Rufous-lored Kingfisher sitting by the side of the road calling, giving us amazing views. This is one of the rarer endemic kingfishers, and much more often seen than heard. This one wasn't shy at all, and sat still for half an hour as we walked around it taking pictures and admiring it. It was certainly the best view I've ever had of one, and honestly probably one of the best views a birder has ever gotten of one. Not bad for my last morning on the island!

Rufous-lored Kingfisher

That was the end of our (very successful) birding on Camiguin, though later that day we had some more wildlife-viewing fun snorkeling around the sunken cemetery, an area where part of an old Spanish town had slid into the ocean during a massive volcanic eruption. There's not much left of the actual cemetery now except for a single crucifix sticking creepily out of the water, but the coral reef life was amazing, with lots of giant clams and tropical fish of every size, shape, and color. I unfortunately don't have pictures as I lack an underwater photography setup (I really should get on that at some point), but it was a great reminder of everything I love about the tropics. The longer I go into the dull, grey Washington DC winter, the more I realize that I miss it. 

It's hard to call the Camiguin trip a total success after the unfortunate accident that mostly left Yuki out of commission- there's lots of the island I'd like to show to him and Mika. Still, it was a great excuse to spend some time with good friends from college, and to see some incredibly rare and beautiful wildlife at the same time. Not a total loss, overall.