Bali August 2014, Bedugul (Kebun Raya)

Kebun Raya, or botanical gardens, is the easiest place to see some montane species, some of which are Sundaic specialities, in Bali. It is located in Bedugul and can be easily reached by public transport from Singaraja, Ubud or Denpasar with one or two hours driving, so most people visit this site as a day trip. However when staying in Bedugul, the park can be visited earlier in the morning (the park still only opens around 8:00) and the area can be birded more thoroughly. This village can easily be reached from Singaraja or Ubud by bemo. Just state that you want to get out in Bedugul. The town offers few places to stay and we stayed in the Strawberry Hill Hotel, which we can highly recommend, but has one drawback. It is completely surrounded by a very busy road, making walking to the (rather close) botanical gardens quite difficult. In the end we paid 20.000 IDR for transport to the gardens and 15.000. IDR to get back.

 The entrance fee is 18.000 IDR, which is fair as the gardens are well maintained and they provide many toilets (2.000 IDR), rain shelters and a warung at the office as well as a restaurant at the Bali Treetop Adventure Park (for those who have kids...). Apparently there is a guesthouse that provides accommodation within the gardens, but it seemed closed, just like the cafe within the Medicine Garden. We birded the area for two mornings and we enjoyed our time here a lot. The gardens are rather open but still many forest birds do occur here, especially in the pockets where the forest gets a bit better. In the end we saw close to 60 species just within the gardens. A guide is definitely not necessary for this area.

Map of Kebun Raya including our bird sightings. 

A: Javan Owlet, 

B: Dark-backed Imperial Pigeon,
C: Yellow-throated Hanging-parrot
D: Sunda Bush-warbler
E: Javan Bush-warbler
F: Sunda Warbler
G: Javan Whistling-thrush
H: Possible Sunda Thrush
I: Indonesian Honeyeater

J: Crescent-chested Babbler

K: Chestnut-backed Scimitar-babbler

The first day we birded just within the main gardens and immediately after entering the park the first feeding flocks of Javan Grey-throated White-eyes, Mountain Leaf-warblers, Little Pied Flycatchers, Scarlet Minivets and Javan Treeshrews (surprisingly) appeared and Flame-fronted Barbets were heard. All these proved to (very) common within the gardens. We headed North up to a gully (just south of the fern garden) and enjoyed good views of Crescent-chested Babblers in this gully as well as fly-by Grey-cheeked Green-pigeons and Yellow-throated Hanging-parrots. Here a Javan Owlet was heard calling but remained out of sight as well. A bit further to the East an Indonesian Honeyeater was much appreciated as well. Unfortunately it started raining and we sheltered for a while. After the rain it became very foggy and that made birding rather difficult, but we still managed to get some views of a Dark-backed Imperial Pigeon in the Northern part of the main gardens. Later we want to the "Hutan Tropis" trail where many good species were observed, including Sunda Bush Warbler, Sunda Warbler, Chestnut-backed Scimitar-babbler, Fulvous-chested Jungle-flycatcher and Mountain White-eye. The fog and rain became worse so we called it a day after this area.

Javan Grey-throated (or Mees's) White-eye (Lophozosterops javanicus)

Mountain Leaf-warbler (Phylloscopus trivirgatus)

2nd kj male Little Pied Flycatcher (Ficedula westermanni)

Javan (or Horsfield's) Treeshrew (Tupaia javanica)

Two days later we returned to the park to focus on the North-western part of the park, which seems to consist of better forest than the main gardens. On the way to this area we enjoyed views of several perched Grey-cheeked Green Pigeons, a single Wedge-tailed Green-pigeon, two Javan Whistling-thrushes and a group of Chestnut-backed Scimitar-babblers as well as another calling Javan Owlet that managed to stay out of sight again. Once inside the North-western area it appeared rather quiet, but with a little work we still managed to see good birds, most notably two Javan Bush-warblers, a species that has only recently been discovered on Bali and was previously thought to be an Javan endemic, and a flushed thrush that could have been a Sunda thrush. Other species observed here were Rusty-breasted Whistler (much more common here), Sunda Cuckoo,Snowy-browed Flycatcher, Crescent-chested Babbler, Sunda Warbler and Lesser Shortwing. Species that are common in the main gardens appeared equally common here. It has been suggested that this site is better visited during week days and should be avoided on public holidays and weekends, for it can get very busy. This is definitely true for the main gardens, but not for the North-west loop, as we visited this area on the Indonesian Independence Day and hardly saw anybody.

Javan Whistling Thrush (Myophonus glaucinus)

Grey-cheeked Green-pigeon (Treron griseicauda)

Fulvous-chested Jungle-flycatcher (Rhinomyias olivaceus) in flight

We can highly recommend this area as it offers easy, but still very entertaining birding in pleasant surroundings. We suggest to bird the area for two days as new birds kept turning up. We even considered visiting the area for a third day...