We had had a successful start to the morning's Birding on Leti with good views of the endemic Kisar Friarbird, along with the local subspecies of Yellow-throated Golden Whistler & Southern Boobook. Plus, I had seen a bonus Red-backed Buttonquail. We still had more time birding the forest & field edges to the village where we had landed before dawn.
Black-backed Fruit-dove: This is the lettiensis subspecies which is restricted to Leti, Moa, Luang, Sermata and Teun Islands. There are four other subspecies of this Lesser Sundas endemic
Rose-crowned Fruit-dove: This is the roseipileum subspecies which is restricted to East Timor, Wetar, Romang, Kissar, Moa & Leti Islands. Like the xanthogaster subspecies that occurs on Babar, Damar & the Tanimbar Islands, it does not have the rose crown that the third Lesser Sundas subspecies and the two Australian subspecies have
Timor Zebra Dove: This is more commonly known as Barred Dove. I've kept to the name I originally knew it as during my first visit to Indonesia, as I generally get confused with the names for this group of similar-looking small Doves
Little Bronze-cuckoo: This is the rufomerus subspecies which we had previously seen on Damar Island. It also occurs on Romang, Kisar, Moa & Sermata Islands
Cinnamon-banded Kingfisher: This is the dammerianus subspecies which occurs on Moa, Leti, Babar & Damar Islands. Two other subspecies occur on other Lesser Sundas & Tanimbar Islands
White-shouldered Triller: This is a monotypic Wallacean endemic which occurs from East Java and Bali to Sulawesi subregion & the Lesser Sundas
Paddyfield Pipit: This is the medius subspecies of the Eastern Lesser Sundas. Another subspecies occurs in Bali, Sulawesi, Bali & the Western Lesser Sundas. Other subspecies occur in Borneo, the Philippines, South East Asia, Indochina, the Indian Subcontinent and St Just in Cornwall (albeit sadly this individual never made it onto the UK List)
Zebra Finch: Male on the left & female on the right. This is the guttata subspecies which occurs from Lombok to Sumba, Timor & some of the Banda Sea islands, which Clements lumps with the Zebra Finch found in Australia. IOC & the Birds of the Indonesian Archipelago splits guttata as a monotypic species: so this will be another armchair Tick for me when I get the time to convert my birding database to follow IOC taxonomy
Zebra Finch: Female. That is an impressive bill
We returned to the village in late morning where we were met by the Lady Denok's boats. It had been another successful morning ashore.
Tree Sparrow: This is the malaccensis subspecies. We typically saw Tree Sparrows as we got back to the villages at the end of the Birding
Just in case, we weren't sure if this was a Christian village
On the beach waiting for the Lady Denok's boats
Looking back on the village
