More than sixty members of our nearest Pramuka troupe recently visited Harapan Rainforest. Pramuka is the Indonesian scouting movement. They got to experience rainforest close up on the forest trail – where there are regular sightings of hornbills (including two of the nestboxes erected for them), giant squirrels, leaf monkeys, and the sounds of bearded pigs snuffling and grunting in the undergrowth. They also enjoyed spectacular forest views from our new viewing platforms.

Deep in the forest, I woke at 4.30 in the morning to walk to our gibbon survey points under the cover of darkness, itself an exhilarating experience. Arriving at the survey spot, I prepared for a morning of recording calling gibbons. Out of the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of bright colour in the first morning light and turned quickly to see what is always a wonderful forest sight: a pitta! In this case, the near-threatened Garnet Pitta. Pittas are elusive, rainbow-coloured birds of the forest floor. They flick over the leaf litter to search for snails and worms. If disturbed, they often hop away rather than flying.

A recent trip down the Kapas River through the centre of Harapan Rainforest gave me fantastic views of the wild bee colonies hanging below the branches of the tall trees towering above the forest canopy. One tree may have dozens of combs. Being so high up, the combs are protected from most of the predators who would like to get to the honey and bee larvae. But some creatures specialise in feeding off these colonies including bee-eaters and honey buzzards, and humans of course.

With no systematic surveys to date, adding a new butterfly to the Harapan Rainforest list is easy. But imagine my surprise when, after sending photographs for identification to a colleague at the RSPB (Martin Davies - who is compiling a list from published sources of ‘potential’ butterflies at Harapan Rainforest ) one of them would seem to be a new species for Sumatra!

In an earlier post, we mentioned the visit to Harapan Rainforest by Tony Whitten - senior biodiversity specialist at the World Bank. As well as his brief clip of a passing sun bear, Tony caught on film the evocative 'great call' of the Agile Gibbon, which is a duet, with the female accompanied by the male. He also got shots of the family of four swinging their way through the tree canopy with ease. So sit back, turn the volume up, and immerse yourself in the sights and sounds of the rainforest.