We found the below interesting encounter, from our Naturalist's journals. Although the observation was some years ago, we would still like to share the story with you as our monthly dose of wild life!

… There are 109 species of amphibians in Sri Lanka and 92 of them are endemic. A mature male Duttaphrynus melanostictus was observed in an evening., while it was puffing its vocal sac and calling sharp on the ground. Firstly the male D. melanostictus jumped towards an artificial pond up to about one meter to the edge of the pond. At once a mature male Polypedatus cruciger jumped on to toad's back. The male tree-frog stayed on the male toad's back for about ten minutes …

(Source: National conservation Review–1993/A guide to the Biodiversity of Knuckles forest Region IUCN – 2003)

Please read full review here

The paper you are viewing here is authored by A. A. Thasun Amarasinghe & W. Gayan M. Edirisinghe
Special thanks to Thasun for sharing this knowledge with our readership! Photo credit: Authors;www.scienceblog.com;ca.wikipedia.org

A. A. THASUN AMARASINGHE, D. M. S. SURANJAN KARUNARATHNA & DEEPAL WARAKAGODA

Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush Myophonus blighi is a globally threatened bird species (IUCN status Endangered) endemic to Sri Lanka, found mainly between 1,200 m and 2,100 m, where it is confined to densely wooded, ferny ravines and gorges, especially those with a rapid torrent running through them. Its food is reportedly mostly insects, but snails are also considered important and it has been recorded eating reptiles and amphibians including geckos, small Calotes or Ceratophora lizards and tree frogs (probably Polypedatus) (BirdLife International 2001).

Between 09h15 and 10h15 on 29 March 2006 at Riverstone in the Knuckles Forest Region (altitude:1,385 m) in Matale district in Central province of Sri Lanka (7º24'55"N 80º48'35"E) we watched a mature male Sri Lanka Whistling Thrush foraging on the ground. The temperature at that time was 23oC, the humidity 79%, the weather cloudy.

First the bird hopped slowly towards us up to c.1 m distance. Then it jumped over a small dead stem lying on the ground and caught a mature male Sri Lankan Leaf-nosed Lizard Ceratophora tennenti (Plate 2) sitting on the bole of a small Keena tree Calophyllum walkeri. The bird caught the prey by its neck and dashed it twice on the dead stem, but the lizard then escaped and ran about a metre before the bird jumped over and caught it again at the neck. Again the bird dashed the lizard twice, this time on a rock, then took it under a shrub and beat it a third time on another rock. The first two dashes using the rock were done slowly, the third one was quicker and so powerful that the lizard was thrown about 60 cm.

The bird retrieved it and returned to the rock on which it had just dashed it. After 30 seconds it repeated the same action, and over the course of half an hour it beat the lizard 49 times mainly in groups of three.

After this treatment the bird released the dead prey and rested for about a minute, then caught the lizard by the snout, ventral side upwards, and manuscript, Dr. Zeenia Nissam of the Department of Zoology, Open University of Sri Lanka, for her generous support for the field visit, Mr. Kelum Manamendra-Arachchi (WHT–Wildlife Heritage Trust), Mr Kasun Ekanayake and Mr F. S. Abeywickrama (YZA–Young Zoologists' Association of Sri Lanka) for valuable help in preparing this paper.

Figure 1. Stages in the catching and eating of a lizard by a Sri
Lanka Whistling Thrush Myophonus blighi. (a) The bird hops
slowly towards the lizard. (b) It catches the lizard at the neck.
(c) It starts to swallow the prey head-first. (d) The lizard's tail
projects from the bill.

'Makarae' – in Gal Oya National Park a rare predatory act was observed recently. "Hoona" – as popularly known is a frequent visitor to most Sri Lankan houses. But the type we are used to are no longer than a few inches, but the type our Naturalist observed in the National Park was about 1 foot long.

This is an excerpt of his own account…
(in a ) …while lying on a large rock boulder (4 m height and 6 m wide) (the Gekko) moved slowly to the forest floor. In this ground there were two small rat holes nearby and one was owned by antelope rat (Tatera indica) and other by mole rat (Bandicota bengalensis). After a few minutes we heard a small noise like 'crivk crivk crivk'. At this instance the gecko (Hemidactylus maculatus hunae) quickly came out from the hole of the mole rat holding a juvenile mole rat (5 cm long) from its mouth. Then the gecko dashed the prey three times on the granite rock wall and repeated this action five to seven times. Then it swallowed the prey at once from its head…" at about 22:45 h. After five minutes the gecko immediately retreated back to the cave. No additional observations of predation on this rat species by were recorded.

The Spotted giant gecko Hemidactylus maculatus hunae is the largest subspecies recorded in Sri Lanka and it considered to be endemic to the island. Forty two species/sub species belonging to nine genera of geckos, family Gekkonidae, have been recognized from Sri Lanka and 31 (71%) of them are endemic to the island (Amarasinghe et al., 2009)