Taiwan: In Da’an Park

After taking you up and down the central Taiwanese mountains and back and forth through the greener parts of Taipei, I thought I would end my account of our April 2013 trip to Taiwan with a stroll - my last bird walk before heading home - just across the street from our hotel. 

Da'an Park is a first-rate urban birding site, where the small trees and manicured lawns make bird-spotting easy.

There are, as you might expect, ubiquitous city birds like the Light-vented Bulbul (Pycnonotus sinensis), a species that has flourished in the presence of people throughout its large Chinese range. 

There is more to see in the park, though, than the standard curbside birds. I found, for example, a pair of soberly handsome Grey Treepies (Dendrocitta formosae), another widespread Asian species.

One of the highlights if the park is a breeding population of a particularly beautiful endemic species, the Taiwan Barbet (Megalaima nuchalis).   Until recently this was included as a race of the Black-browed Barbet (M. oorti), but it is now recognized as a species in its own right.

Barbets prefer the tops of tall trees, and can be difficult to watch if they are not feeding. However, at Da'an most of the trees are small, and the birds are forced to remain at quite watchable levels. 

Besides scattered trees and bits of near-woodland, Da'an Park boasts a central lake that attracts both migrants and birders. During our visit the trail around the lake was boarded off for repairs, but the workers - friendly and helpful, - like all the Taiwanese we met - allowed me to slip through for a while. The lake is a good place to see water birds like this Common Moorhen (Gallinula chloropus) and breeding Black-crowned Night Herons (Nycticorax nycticorax)...

...And the dense growth of trees around the lake attracts songbirds, including little flocks of Japanese White-eyes (Zosterops japonicus).

Some of the lakeside trees bore fruit, and that brought in Black Bulbuls (Hypsipetes leucocephalus nigerrimus, an endemic subspecies). Greek scholars among you will have noticed that "leucocephalus" means "white-headed"; some subspecies of Black Bulbul really do have white heads, but not this one.

Even without a white head, these are handsome birds, especially considering that they are members of a generally dull-coloured family.

The park is popular with people of all ages - but that doesn't seem to stop the birds.

It doesn't stop the squirrels, either, especially thanks to people, like this gentleman, who come to the park to provide a handout. 

This is the Taiwanese race of Pallas's Squirrel (Callosciurus erythraeus taiwanensis).  This squirrel, native to China and surrounding countries, has been introduced into Argentina, Belgium, France, Japan, and The Netherlands - probably a result of escapees from the pet trade.

Eileen joined me at the end of my stroll through the park (despite a bit of rain).

Eileen is not a birder, but does consider herself a "birdwatcher-watcher".  This is her view of my encounter with a subadult Malaysian Night Heron (Gorsachius melanolophus), a remarkably urban bird in Taiwan.

As I remarked in my last post, my only other encounter with one was in the depths of the Vietnamese rainforest).  Mind you, even that bird was remarkably tame (or, at least, sluggish).

I will leave it up to my readers to decide whether the plain but handsome adult of my last post is a more attractive bird than the subtly barred and spotted subadult.

Of course the bird is a stunner in either plumage.  Well, I think so.

And with that, Eileen and I left the park, passing a statue of the Goddess of Peace - and soon we had left Taiwan as well, heading home to Canada.  We'd both like to come back one day, mind you!