A feast for the eyes as raptors fly by Tanjung Tuan
NST, 9 Mar 2007
KUALA LUMPUR: Thousands of raptors are crossing the Straits of Malacca from Sumatra to Tanjung Tuan this month, promising amazing sights for those who attend this year’s Raptor Watch Weekend on Saturday and Sunday.
Easily more than 18,000 raptors fly over Tanjung Tuan, some stopping to rest and feed as they make their way back to North Asia from the islands of the Indonesian archipelago.
Raptor is the term used to describe big powerful birds of prey such as Japanese Sparrowhawks, Greater Spotted Eagles, Black Bazas and Goshawks.
Started in 2000 by two Malaysian Nature Society bird watchers, Lim Aun Thiah and Lee Kim Chye, to spread awareness of bird conservation and the migration phenomenon, Raptor Watch Weekend has evolved into a festival. It attracts about 2,000 visitors from as far away as Austria, Sweden and the United Kingdom, and as near as Singapore and Thailand.
In September, as autumn approaches in the northern hemisphere, raptors fly to the southern hemisphere to feed and breed. This month they are making their homeward journey. Last year, more than 3,000 birds were recorded over a period of two days.
The birds travel about 6,000 kilometres, using warm thermal air currents to float them up into the atmosphere, sometimes as high as 2,500 metres.
Although there is another flyway, or migratory route, through Borneo and the Philippines, most raptors take the East Asian flyway, along which Tanjung Tuan is located. It is a focal point because at 38km it offers the shortest crossing between Peninsular Malaysia and Sumatra over the Malacca Straits. On their journey, the birds face the perils of bad weather and of being hunted by humans for food or the bird trade.
There is also the danger of starvation and exhaustion if their stopover points are destroyed, which is when some birds literally drop out of the sky.
“This is why places like Tanjung Tuan are so important,” Lim said. “If it is not properly conserved, we could lose about 20,000 of these birds simply because they do not have a place to rest or eat.”
Most of the birds sighted in Tanjung Tuan will be Oriental Honey Buzzards, which have a wing span of about one metre.