In the United Stated, I said aloud, I'd expect to see a dipper on such a river. My two companions, Anthony Huang and Kuo Ta-jen, laughed, "Hear that?"
I strained to hear the first "jreet," followed by a wren-like warble. A brown dipper. We'd surely see one later, they assured me, when we hiked back down the mountain.
It was still winter, and we were an hour south of Taipei in the tiny township of Wulai, nestled in the beginning foothills of the spectacular Central Mountain Range, just down the road from the resort-entertainment park the Chinese call Dreamland.
I'm a fervent birdwatcher. And for me, this was totally new territory—a dream awake.
I had met Anthony the day before at lunch. My lucky day! The only newsman in Republic of China whose full time beat is outdoor recreation.
And here I was now with Anthony and Ta-jen, president of the Wild Bird Society of Taipei, looking for the feathered creatures of Wulai.
The hills trilled with birdsong. The loudest and clearest voice belonged to the white-eared sibia, "There!" said Ta-jen, pointing. I spotted the dark bird with the white eyeline just as it gave a jaunty whistle.
"Look, gray-throated minivets, in the hillside tree by the pagoda," I could distinguish their metallic trill, A flock of a dozen or more reddish-orange males and yellow females shone like lights on the leafless branches.
Seconds later they wee joined by a lone maroon oriole. He perched long enough to produce a deep and mournful whistle, then flew off.
Further down the trail, at he edge of a wood nearby a ramshackle hunter's cabin, a Formosan monkey was chained to a pole. Boar-like pigs, chickens, and geese ran free in a muddy front yard.
Up and past the cabin, along a path to a scenic overlook, a half dozen chestnut-red birds exploded from dense brush and, just as quickly, disappeared—bamboo partridge.
A birdsong chorus followed us down river. First, a full tree of yellow-green Chinese white-eyes in company with a flock of varied tits (chestnut-breasted cousins of our chickadee) and greenish-backed white-bellied yuhinas.
The yuhinas gave their nasal call, "jew-jew." The tits whistled and "shushed."
Then we saw others: noisy black and white Chinese bulbuls, distinctive in song: "chirp chirp JEEP chirple chirp," and gray-eyed nun babblers, yellowish-brown worshippers with blue-gray hoods.
A tiny jewel-like bird flew to a rock in the river right below us. Bearing the inappropriate name, common kingfisher, it was only six inches; but its back was a brilliant indigo against a brilliant orange belly. Off it flew, just above the water, disappearing down-stream.
A little green heron, landing on a rock, held itself motionless. Intent on a fish? At least not very: It leaned forward and flew off, perhaps bothered by the little bird whose song we had heard earlier: There! The brown dipper—plump and chocolate-colored, its short tail cocked upwards. We watched as it performed the feat dippers are noted for—walking nonchalantly under water looking for food. Then, from out of nowhere, another. Oblivious to our presence, they foraged, flitting from rock to stream bottom and back again.
Ta-jen stopped abruptly, "Hear it? The Formosan blue magpie." Its raucous call signalled it was hidden in a nearby tree. We waited patiently and were rewarded: No one, but four showed themselves now—magnificent blue birds with black heads and yellow eyes...and feet and beaks of bright red.
As we headed back to town, the scrub-brush around us was alive with white-eared sibias, lesser-scimitar babblers (robin-sized birds with curved bills), gray tree pies (jay-like birds with reddish-brown backs), and tree pipets (greenish-brown ground birds with twitching tails).
On the bridge at Wulai, we stopped to watch a bluebird lookalike—"deep blue back and rusty tail (that it fanned and flicked nervously). It was a plumbeous water redstart, the next to last bird I would see on my visit to the Republic of China.
Two hours later, I was on a big, white China Airlines "bird," flying to Los Angeles. As I leaned back to doze, my lovely morning in a Chinese watercolor flooded my mind, amid flashing feathers, as two dippers foraged in a gurgling mountain stream.
Organized interest in watching bird in the Republic of China is relatively new. It began back in 1964 when scientists from Tunghai University participated in an international birdbanding program—the Migratory Animal Pathology Survey.
Over the next six years, 143 species were banded on this lovely Pacific island, which shares the same latitude as Hawaii.
The first formal birdwatching club was organized in 1972 by Sheldon Serveringhaus, a Cornell graduate working at the Asia Foundation in Taipei.
The Wild Bird Society of Taipei, organized in 1984, has over 400 paid members, and an estimated 2,000 associates who regularly participate in society activities.
They hire fishing boats to take them out to see pelagics (ocean birds) and dare the marshes at midnight to spy on waders (herons and egrets). And this year, they're operating a birdwatchers' "hot-line", a phone number you can call for an update on what the birds are doing in Taiwan (700-5524).
The first field guide to Taiwan's birds was published in 1970 and updated in 1976. And the Wild Bird Society of Taipei is distributing a new Field Guide to the Birds of Taiwan, by James Chang. The fully illustrated, four-color 1985 edition is in Chinese, but bird names and distributions are also in English.
The Wild Bird Society of Taipei may be contacted by writing Kuo Ta-jen, No. 51, Lane 419, Kuangfu South Road, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.—Heidi Hughes