Sandakan & Sepilok August 20-30; September 19, 2025 Callyn Yorke
The Rainforest Discovery Center(RDC) in Sepilok is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Sabah. It receives hundreds of visitors daily. With the nearby Sandakan airport, RDC is readily accessible for viewing an impressive diversity of lowland rainforest flora and fauna. Among the special animals at RDC are formerly incarcerated primates, now centered on discovering if they can find enough food to survive their new home.
The majority of RDC visitors stay two or three hours in the morning to stroll on the elevated walkways and climb the canopy tower stairs. Cell phones in hand, there could be a surprise encounter with headliner celebs, such as the wildly vocal North Bornean Gray Gibbon or an endearing Borneo Orangutan.
Tons of people return in the evening for a guided walk. When the animal night shift awakens, flashlights illuminate a menagerie of katydids, wolf spiders, treefrogs, geckoes, pit vipers, owls, bats, civets, mousedeer and lorises. For visitors anticipating a cornucopia of nocturnal wonders, RDC delivers.
In addition to being a conservation, research and educational facility, RDC is an important rainforest refugia – a habitat island – surrounded by a sea of oil palm, scattered villages, expanding suburbs and Sandakan Bay. The sad news is that many of RDC’s animals are ecologically tethered to a forest fragment where they face local extirpation.
Such is the case for the popular tourist areas in Sabah, which are among Borneo’s last remaining sanctuaries for endangered species. I suppose the good news is that the concentration of special wildlife in such places as RDC, supports a thriving ecotourism industry and presumably increased funding for natural resource conservation and the acquisition of additional natural habitat.
Unsurprisingly, RDC is an mandatory stop for elite birding tours. Those groups are eager to see a number of forest specialties, e.g. Barred Eagle-Owl, White-bellied Woodpecker, White-crowned Shama , and if they are super lucky, Bornean Bristlehead (I dipped on that one at RDC).
Considering the size of RDC (4,362 ha), the extensive trail system and potential for observing a fair number of interesting creatures, it was obviously the best place to obtain nearby lodging. Unfortunately, despite having three days in Kota Kinabalu for securing travel reservations, I discovered that the RDC Sepilok neighborhood was booked solid for the next five months. The closest available lodging was the Elopura Hotel (2-Star: $30 US/night) on the Sandakan Bay waterfront, a fifty-minute Grab taxi ride to RDC ($8 US).
Besides feral rock pigeons, Eurasian tree sparrows and a large population of Rattus norvegicus, there was little wildlife around the Elopura waterfront. Continuing my search for favorable accommodations, I eventually relocated to the Sabah Hotel (4-Star: $117 US/night). RDC commute time was thereby reduced to about thirty-minutes, depending on traffic. This was a reasonably good move, since the lush hotel gardens were apparently rat-free (no one on the hotel staff seemed to know how that was accomplished) and attracted a variety of birds.
I usually arrived at RDC early in the morning before the guarded facility opened. The objective was to look for reclusive birds and other wildlife ahead of the tour busses .
But that could be done only at the forest edge. When the crowds arrived, I scurried over to the entry kiosk and obtained a wrist band receipt for paying the day use fee ($7.50 US). Subsequently, much of my time was spent birding and doing photography on forest interior trails, occasionally meeting tour groups and solo birders.
Stopping to compare notes with RDC visitors was usually interesting and worthwhile. One fellow, Fabian Dreier, a fourth-year university student in Switzerland, discovered an observation deck near the Pitta Trail. He showed me the location which was partially concealed downslope from the trail. Soon we were joined by an Austrian couple, Damian and Mona, who were producing an excellent wildlife videography of their journey through Borneo.
Most days I was alone on the Pitta Trail and obtaining photos from the observation deck, e,g, Daird’s Trogon and White-crowned Shama, both life-birds. Fabian and the others had moved on. A week later I met Fabian and friends once more in Danum Valley, another hot spot on the Sabah ecotour circuit.
On my final morning at RDC, a group led by a UK birder had just arrived at the entrance. The leader looked vaguely familiar and stared as though he recognized me. He approached for a greeting and announced his name, Ashley Boon. I couldn’t place him or his name. There was a reflective silence. Who was this character? My only framed image was of the legendary American frontiersman, Daniel Boone – flintlock rifle, shot bag and powder horn replaced by a binocular.
Shifting his stance, he informed me of the fact that we had spoken briefly three years earlier in Taman Negara, West Malaysia. It was about an Arctic Warbler I had spotted there (an uncommon sighting in Taman Negara). So detailed was his recollection of a meeting I had long since forgotten, that when he affirmed his group had tallied 329 bird species in Sabah, I was strongly inclined to believe him.
The birding group, about a dozen folks in my age bracket, was nearing the end of their Sabah tour. Reflexively alert for the possibility of a new bird, some of them appeared in need of a little more sleep. Welcome to the seriously addictive sport of world class birding.
Professionally led bird tours, especially those organized by European or American firms, maintain a frantic pace. In what onlookers might describe as a paramilitary operation, the cohesive birding group keeps the target in focus while covering as much ground as possible. Unless the tour is dedicated to photography, the shop keeping mission is clear: to check all the bird species boxes, perhaps even breaking a previous trip record.
Mr. Boon referred to his business website (Ashley Boon Wildlife Art), handed me a card and the group shuffled off in search of a rare bird they had apparently missed, Bornean Bristlehead. I have no idea if they found that bird at RDC. It was also on this American’s most wanted bird list, a monotypic species endemic to Borneo. There would be a singular encounter with Bornean Bristlehead awaiting me in the Danum Valley.
In addition to eight daytime RDC visits (22-29 August), I booked evening tours on 28 August and 19 September, 2025 (6-8 pm). We were nearly rained out on the August tour but had been initially entertained by four Red Giant Flying Squirrels, each about the size of a house cat, emerging from their individual tree boxes at dusk.
In fading light, a rodent aviator hesitated, scanned the surroundings, then shinnied up to tree crown height, some thirty-meters above the forest floor. Leaping into mid-air, for a few seconds it was a museum study skin floating across the sky. The airborne squirrel covered a distance of at least eighty-meters. Compensating for a loss of altitude, it angled upward in a stall before grasping the trunk of another tall tree. Shrieks and cheers from the tour group acknowledged the stellar performance.
RDC naturalists led us along the elevated walkways and main trails, shining powerful lights throughout the forest in search of whatever animal life might be active. Conversations with veterans of recent night walks indicated that successive evenings often produced a different species list, occasionally including something relatively uncommon, e.g. a tarsier or loris.
Highlighted on the September night session was a fairly cooperative Slow Loris. Somewhat contrary to the name, it was in continuous motion, methodically making its way along a horizontal tree limb, nibbling on the bark. This particular prosimian, one of four loris species now recognized in Borneo, probably was a life–mammal for most of us in the group.
When staying at the Elopura hotel, I found a potential birding location shown on Google Maps as a suburban green space, Sandakan Rainforest Park (SRP). I made three morning and two afternoon visits to SRP, located a few minutes from the city center by taxi (20-21 August; 30 August).
Officially, Sandakan Rainforest Park is a government botanical reserve. However, it appeared to be used primarily for jogging and partying. Birds in the park seemed habituated to human presence and were found in both the picnic area and on relatively quiet forest trails intersected by small streams. Highlights included Red-bearded Bee-eater, Sunda Frogmouth and Bornean Black-capped Babbler
In summary, I spent a total of twelve days in the Sandakan-Sepilok area, almost exclusively at the most productive location, RDC. Although there were crowds to deal with each day, I found quiet, areas for birding and photography. The weather during my visit was mostly fair with occasional afternoon and evening showers. Daytime air temperatures ranged from 24°C to 30°C; winds were usually light, 2-3 kph. Humidity was fairly constant at around 85%. My birding results are presented below.
Annotated Bird List for Sandakan and Sepilok, Sabah: 20-30 August; 19 September, 2025 (63 Species) Callyn Yorke
KEY
Abundance: Numbers following each species entry are the highest count for a single survey, when multiple surveys were made. The location (see below) with the highest numerical abundance is listed first in the species accounts.
Age, sex and molt (when known): ad = adult; imm = immature; m = male; f = female; bsc plmg = basic (non-breeding plumage; alt plmg = alternate (breeding) plumage; trans = transitional plumage, i.e. alternate into basic plumage.
Survey Location Abbreviations: ELH = Elopura Hotel, including the Sandakan Bay waterfront; RDC = Rainforest Discovery Center, Sepilok; SH = Sabah Hotel; SRP = Sandakan Rainforest Park; SAN = Sandakan, urban and suburban, including in-transit sightings between birding locations.
Ecology and Behavior: Aerial insect hawking (ah); taking fruit, berries or parts of flowers (fr); gleaning insects from foliage (ig); probing into surface (pr); estimated height (m) above ground (agl); gregarious (greg); mixed-species flock (msf).
Systematics and Nomenclature used herein, is an amalgam of Avibase, International Ornithological Congress (IOC) and current (2025) online resources, i.e. Birds of the World, Cornell University, USA. Species acronyms (banding codes) derived from the first letters of the single or hyphenated common name, e.g. REBU = Red-eyed Bulbul; LGLE = Lesser Green Leafbird; PTSW = Plume-toed Swiftlet, etc.
Borneo endemics and near-endemics are listed in Bold Face lettering.
BIRDS NOTED
- Bornean Partridge Arborophila hyperythra 1 (m) relatively tame, occasionally vocal while probing in the leaf litter around the Pitta Trail observation deck, RDC.
- Striated Heron Butorides striata 1 on roadside utility wire above a ruderal field and drainage ditch, in transit, SAN; 1 on the breakwater with scavenging rats, ELH.
- Great Egret Ardea alba 5 in roadside flooded fields, SAN.
- Oriental Darter Anhinga melanogaster 2 resting on partially submerged tree in the lake at the main entrance; swimming with only head and upper neck above water, RDC.
- Wallace’s Hawk-Eagle Nisaetus nanus 1 flew at dusk to the canopy of a tree with a squirrel box, RDC.
- Rufous-bellied Eagle Lophotriorchis kienerii 1 (imm.) soaring 40-50m agl over entrance, RDC (photo).
- Brahminy Kite Heliastur indus 1 soaring 30 m agl over a clearing, SRP; soaring over the bay, ELH.
- Common Sandpiper Actitis hypoleucos 1 in flight over the flooded edge of the picnic area lawn, SRP.
- Feral Rock Pigeon Columba livia 20 greg. almost as common on the waterfront as rats; scattered pairs and small flocks in town and villages throughout, ELH, SAN.
- Spotted Dove Spilopelia chinensis 5 greg. individuals and pairs in towns and villages throughout, ELH, SH, SAN.
- Zebra Dove Geopelia striata 2 greg. pairs on ground, roadsides, gardens and villages, SH, SRP, RDC, SAN.
- Pink-necked Green Pigeon Treron vernans 2 greg. forest edge and gardens, SRP, SH, RDC.
- Greater Coucal Centropus sinensis 1 vocal (unseen) ruderal edges of clearings and woodland, SRP, RDC.
- Raffle’s Rhinortha (Malkoha) Rhinortha chlorophaea 4 greg. in secondary growth at the forest edge; forest understory and mid-level, RDC, SRP.
- Plaintive Cuckoo Cacomantis merulinus 1 vocal (unseen) edge of forest and ruderal fields with scattered trees, SRP, RDC.
- Reddish Scops Owl Otus rufescens 1 spotlighted one evening at mid-level at edge of forest clearing, RDC.
- Barred Eagle Owl Bubo sumatranus 1 perched motionless for at least 15-minutes on a liana at mid-level in forest, RDC (photo – see intro.).
- Sunda Frogmouth Batrachostomus cornutus 2 greg. (ad., imm.) a pair perched close together a 3m agl in a young tree next to an orchid garden, SRP (photo – see intro.).
- Plume-toed Swiftlet Collocalia affinis 20 greg. flying 0.5- 10 m agl, back and forth in clearings; dipping into lake surface, RDC, SH, SAN.
- Palm Swift Cypsiurus balasiensis 1 rapid, low flight, back and forth around gardens, SH.
- Diard’s Trogon Harpactes diardii 1 (fem) near Pitta Trail observation deck – flew to mid-level perch in forest, remained stationary for at least twenty- minutes, RDC (photo – see intro.).
- Rufous-collared Kingfisher Actenoides concretus 1 spotlighted one evening while perched on a small limb overhanging a stream, RDC (photo).
- Stork-billed Kingfisher Pelargopsis capensis 1 in trees at edge of main lake, RDC.
- Collared Kingfisher Todiramphus chloris 1 in trees and on utility lines at edge of ruderal clearings and gardens; one with an insect in its beak, RDC, SH, SAN.
- Blue-eared Kingfisher Alcedo meninting 1 flushed from low perch near stream, SRP, RDC.
- Oriental Dwarf Kingfisher Ceyx erithaca motleyi 1 spotlighted on nighttime low perch over stream, RDC; SRP (photo).
- Red-bearded Bee-eater Nyctyornis amictus 1 stationary perch in a small tree at edge of picnic area, late afternoon, SRP (photo – see intro.).
- Rhinoceros Hornbill Buceros rhinoceros 2 greg. vocal – a pair duetting in adjacent trees; in flight, low over forest canopy, RDC.
- Black Hornbill Anthracoceros malayanus 2 greg. in flight over forest canopy, RDC (photo).
- Black-eared (Blue-eared) Barbet Psilopogon duvaucelii 1 vocal (often unseen), in garden trees and forest edge, SH, RDC.
- Bornean Brown Barbet Caloramphus fuliginosus tertius 1 upper-level in forest edge with an orthopteran food item, RDC (photo).
- Speckled Piculet Picumnus innominatus 1 active in forest edge and understory, RDC.
- White-bellied Woodpecker Dryocopus javensis 1 (m) on forest tree trunk at about 8 m agl RDC (photo – see intro.).
- Banded Broadbill Eurylaimus javanicus 1 on stationary perch mid-level forest interior, Pitta Trail, RDC.
- Black-winged Flycatcher-Shrike Hemipus hirundinaceus 1 forest edge in msf with LGLE and Orthotomus sp., RDC.
- Common Iora Aegthina tiphia 2 (m,f) greg. pairs active in msf with sunbirds in canopy and subcanopy foliage, SH, RDC, SRP.
- Green Iora Aegthina viridissima 1 active at forest edge of large clearing, in canopy and subcanopy, SRP, RDC (photo).
- Greater Racket-tailed Drongo Dicrurus paradiseus brachyphorus 1 ID: a small sized, small frontal tufted subspecies of GRTD; c.f. BRDR, except for large bill and lack of bronzy sheen feathering; this individual had a partially racket-less tail, in msf lower-mid-level in forest, RDC (photo).
- Malaysian Pied Fantail Rhipidura javanica 1 on forest floor, RDC.
- Bornean Treepie Dendrocitta cinerascens 1 (escaped cage bird?) on roadside utility wire, SAN.
- Corvus sp.? c.f. C. enca 2 greg. in low flight from roadside trees, SAN.
- Yellow-vented Bulbul Pycnonotus goiavier gourdini 6 greg. vocal, in gardens, second-growth and forest edge, ubiq..
- Olive-winged Bulbul Pycnonotus plumosus 2 greg. often in msf with other bulbuls, e.g. LGLE; lakeside forest edge; gardens, RDC; SRP (photo).
- Asian Red-eyed Bulbul Pynonotus brunneus 2 greg. sometimes in msf with other small passerines, e.g. LGLE; forest edge RDC.
- Spectacled Bulbul Pycnonotus erythropthalmos 1 photographed by Fabian near the Pitta Trail observation deck.
- Cream-eyed Bulbul Pycnonotus pseudosimplex 2 greg. in msf with REBU, mid-level in forest edge near the canopy walkway, RDC (photo).
- Pacific Swallow Hirundo tahitica 6 greg. flying 1-20m agl over open areas; sometimes in a msf with PTSW, ubiq..
- Yellow-bellied Prinia Prinia flaviventris latrunculus 1 staying concealed in a forest clearing with tall, wet grass and second-growth, RDC.
- Rufous-tailed Tailorbird Orthotomus sericeus 2 vocal (repeated song), staying hidden in second-growth at forest edge, SRP, RDC.
- Ashy Tailorbird Orthotomus ruficeps 1 vocal and active in lakeside forest edge, RDC.
- Bornean Black-capped Babbler Pellorneum capistratoides 1 walking on the forest floor near a small stream, RDC (photo – see intro.).
- Asian Glossy Starling Aplonis panayensis 8 greg. cohesive flocks in flight over open areas and a variety of modified habitats; garden fruiting trees, ubiq..
- Common Myna Acridotheres tristis 4 greg. often seen on the ground in modified habitats; a commensal with humans, ubiq..
- Oriental Magpie Robin Copsychus saularis 1 vocal fairly secretive at edges of forest and ruderal clearings;shady gardens; apparently declining throughout most of its range; a popular cage bird throughout SE Asia, RDC.
- White-crowned Shama Copsychus stricklandii 1 (m) vocal, apparently on its home territory in the forest understory and habituated to human presence at the Pitta Trail observation deck, RDC (photo – see intro.).
- Lesser Green Leafbird Chloropsis cyanopogon 2 (m,f) greg. pairs often in msf with sunbirds and bulbuls in outer canopy of forest edge, RDC (photo).
- Orange-bellied Flowerpecker Dicaeum trigonostigma 1 (m) in canopy of garden and forest edge shrubs and trees, often in msf with sunbirds, SRP, RDC (photo).
- Brown-throated Sunbird Anthreptes malacensis 2 (m,f) canopy of flowering/fruiting garden and forest edge trees; in msf with other sunbirds, SRP; RDC.
- Van Hasselt’s Sunbird Leptocoma brasiliana 1 (m) in canopy of flowering/fruiting garden trees; in msf with BTSB and CRSU, SRP.
- Crimson Sunbird Aethopyga siparaja 1 (m) in canopy of flowering/fruiting garden trees; in msf with VHSU and BTSU, SRP.
- Ornate Sunbird Cinnyris ornatus 2 (m,f) greg. pairs in separate sections of the canopy of flowering/fruiting garden trees and forest edge; in msf with BTSU and VHSU, SRP; RDC (photo).
- Eurasian Tree Sparrow Passer montanus 10 (m,f) vocal, greg. small flocks and pairs on the ground in a variety of modified habitats with scattered shrubs and trees; a common commensal with humans, ubiq..
- Dusky Munia Lonchura fuscans 6 (m,f) greg. in ruderal patches with fruiting shrubs, RDC; SRP (photo).
