The Spilornis cheela is one of the birds of prey peculiar to Taiwan. Snakes are its main food, so it is also called the crested serpent eagle. When the eagle is in flight, a white horizontal stripe can be clearly seen on its extended wings. It enjoys soaring on rising air currents on a clear day, circling the sky at an altitude between 200 and 2,400 meters above sea level, where broad-leaved trees grow. The bird normally nests in remote places and becomes even more secretive during the mating season. The author of this article applied his detective spirit and kept surveillance outside a nest for many long hours, finally capturing the genuine moments of an adult bird together with its fledgling.

Text and Photographs by Lin Hsien-tang
Translated by Lin Sen-shou
Reprinted with permission from Rhythms Magazine

I have long grown used to it all: spending my days wandering around graveyards or tramping on Kuanyin Mountain, keeping company with acacia trees and too many mosquitoes. This is just the sort of place where the crested serpent eagle loves to make its home: woody areas remote yet not too far removed from places inhabited by people. Their nesting spots seem easy enough to find, but you can search high and low and not find one. Often, you might be standing right below a nest without realizing it.

One summer day, these handsome fowls will suddenly vanish altogether from their usual aerial activities. It is almost as if they had all held a meeting beforehand and decided on a certain date to go into hiding together. While you are still feeling baffled by this sudden disappearance, they are off somewhere busy propagating their offspring. This is how these eagles survive: by being so secretive and mysterious in their mating season. Therefore it takes a detective-like spirit to find their nests that are so close yet so elusive.

7:30 As I park my motorcycle, I see a farmer working nearby. Taking out my equipment, I think up an excuse to explain my outfit--all geared up, I'm not going to fool anyone into believing I'm an innocent hiker. So if anyone asks, I'm here to photograph insects, butterflies and plants.

Halfway along a small path, I check to make sure that no one is around and swiftly dive into a nearby grapefruit orchard. I pray I won't run into any farmers there. After leaving the orchard and climbing up a steep hill, I relax a little since I'll be safely alone in just another fifty meters.

The eagle is calling again. The high-pitched, monosyllabic whistle can be clearly heard at the foot of the mountain. The sound has traveled as far as two hundred meters and must be audible to people living nearby. Only they don't know what it is and are not interested in finding out.

I stop at a turn, listen and look around. Then I sneak into a bamboo forest and make my way through it. Now I am only fifteen meters away from the nest.

The adult bird is not home, but the young bird is facing my direction, lying low in the nest. Although it is still a fledgling, it is almost the size of an adult eagle. Its calls for food from its parent fade away as I approach through the bamboo forest. I had thought that the eagles were so secretive during their childbearing season, but perhaps I am even more surreptitious as I furtively sneak up to their nest.

After choosing the right spot, I immediately set up my camouflage tent and tripod and I sit down on a slope. Only then do I realize I am sitting on ground covered with sharp little stones. But I have no other choice, because other spots are either too far away, or at the wrong angle, or with the view of the nest blocked by tree leaves. Sitting in the wrong posture and on sharp-edged stones, I can expect to get all scratched up in the next eight hours.

9:15 The young eagle finally relaxes its guard and stands up to stretch its body. I see it lower its head and open its beak. It looks like something is caught in its throat. After several tries, it finally spits out something that looks like a grayish black cocoon of indigestible food.

10:30 The fledgling starts calling for food again. It calls out to somewhere far off, but in no specific direction. These eagles must have very sharp ears.

12:00 The calling continues. Calls of adult birds far from the woods can be heard, but I am certain none of them is the young eagle's parent, or else the fledgling would react in some way.

12:47 The young bird has been wailing for more than two hours, and now its parent is answering. The fledgling begins to react: it turns to face south and calls out with more urgency and shrillness. The parent bird's calls grow closer and closer. Judging from the volume of the sound, the parent is on its way home. I hold my breath and dare not make any disturbance.

12:53 The fledgling's calls become louder and more pressing. It lowers itself and turns to its right. Suddenly a black shadow appears and the parent eagle is in the nest. The young bird's calls become slower and deeper, and it dives down to its parent's claws. The adult, with streaks of blood still on its beak, stops for three seconds, drops the food in the nest and flies away.

The fledgling's hungry calls just now were truly awful. Hear it once, and you will never forget it. Although I go through it every day, my nerves still tighten every time I hear it.

1:00 The young eagle looks at a dead, forty-centimeter-long green snake, probably thinking about how to go at it.

1:05 The young bird takes action. With its right claw on the dead snake, it keeps its head lowered for a while, then starts working on the snake's head. After finishing the head, the young eagle picks up the snake's torso and swallows it whole, causing its neck and chest to bulge up. Thirty seconds is all it takes for the fledgling to finish up the forty-centimeter-long snake. It is not an overstatement to say that the young bird practically wolfs down its meal. Satisfied, it now keeps quiet, lays low and stares into the distance.

2:00 I hear the sounds of a quail behind me. Before long, the quail intrudes into my restricted area, about two meters behind me. I turn my head and we meet head-on. For a moment, the quail is taken aback and stops short, but then it continues walking down the hill with two companions following behind. They probably think I'm not supposed to be here. Through all this, the young eagle remains still.

2:36 From behind me on the left, a plump chameleon comes half-sliding and half-crawling down the slope, running for its life from a huge, poisonous centipede that is chasing it from thirty centimeters behind. I keep very still, at the same time thinking how lucky I am that after all these days in the mountains, I have never been attacked by any poisonous insect. I wonder what will happen to the chameleon.

3:30 The calls start again from outside the nest and a black shadow hovers above the tree. The young bird inside the nest responds with shrill cries. Having spotted me, the intruder from its bird's-eye view, the parent will not return to the nest.

I might as well pack up and leave. The parent bird is not coming back with me hanging around.

Forever chasing birds

"In a forgotten valley, an infatuated man stands motionless by a tree branch. The weather is bleak, but the calls echo back and forth. Mountains are still mountains and trees are still trees, but birds are no longer birds. I have traveled among them and metamorphosed into a bird."

I love this place. I love the feel of this forest--pristine and quiet, with its gentle breezes and occasional strong winds that make the branches sway and the leaves whisper. There are many leeches in the forest, but they don't dampen my impulse to visit the place. I have to ride for two hours on my motorbike, and then slowly make my way up slippery, precipitous mountain trails, sometimes climbing on all fours. Then when I get there, I have to rest for more than a half hour. A round trip takes six hours. Is it tiring? No, but I sweat profusely.

Sitting high on a tree branch, straddling the trunk, I mentally reprimand myself for my foolhardiness. The weather is bad. I had wondered whether I should come up when I was at the foot of the mountain. But my feet moved quicker than my thoughts and started taking me upward. Now the dark clouds are moving fast, like ink spreading out on paper. The temperature is low and it is extremely humid. I can smell rain in the air. It is certain to rain heavily soon. But there's no turning back now. The creek at the bottom of the mountain must have risen already, so I'll have to wait for the water to recede before I can go down the mountain and cross the creek.

A crested serpent eagle is calling from the mountain ridge on my right. A reply sounds from the opposite mountaintop. Birds of prey rarely come out in such damp, cold weather. But it's been raining for half a month, so they have to come out to hunt or they will really starve to death.

1:00 Huge raindrops come falling down. If I leave now, the trail will be very slippery. I might as well keep sitting in this tree.

I open my umbrella and hold on to the tree trunk with one hand. The birds in the forest are probably whispering to each other, "That nut is here again, and this time his posture is the funniest ever."

I am drenched with rain. There is not much I can do for my photography equipment.

It rains for a solid hour and a half. The birds take shelter in the trees. I'm no different from them, except for the umbrella I'm holding. They can probably see me, but I can't tell where they are. Where are all the birds on this vast mountain?

2:30 The rain and wind subside. The mountains before me, veiled in white fog and clouds, are greener than ever after the rain. Suddenly, out from the clouds covering the mountaintop to my left soars a crested serpent eagle, calling out as it flies. A reply comes from close to my right. Judging from the sound, the other eagle is circling up from the lower right valley. It should be flying past here soon.

I place the zoom lens on my camera and stand up shakily, my right arm embracing the tree trunk. "Here it comes!" A beautiful adult bird with elegant feathers! It flies toward me from my right. I look through the viewfinder and adjust the focus. There is not quite enough light. As the bird draws closer, I use my eyes and hands to readjust the focus. I notice that the branch beneath my feet is shaking. It's probably about time I lost some weight... maybe... I seem to be flying alongside the bird.

Twenty meters and at zero angle. The sunlight shines through the treetops and onto the bird's head. Through the viewfinder, I see the iris of its eye suddenly become very bright. The angle, light and distance are perfect. All that is left is for me to make the move. I feel for the shutter button, calculate the time difference, and push twice. When I am about to take the third picture, the eagle has already turned its head, looking into the distance.

Time to call it a day! I spent the whole day but took only two pictures, which is actually not so bad considering the location. I should feel lucky if I can take a picture on one out of thirty trips. I don't know why, but though the chances of not getting any pictures far exceed those of succeeding, I am still willing to drag my exhausted self here. Maybe it is this love--this love I have for the place, the atmosphere, and the birds here that are so full of spirit and their unique style.

I get my equipment and start home, stumbling twice during the forty-minute walk. I reach my motorbike and check to see if I have been attacked by any leeches. There is some blood on the sole of my right foot, but no sign of a leech anywhere. I look carefully and find some mashed substance. I probably stepped on it when I tripped and fell.

Next time, even if there is a ninety-nine percent chance I will not take any pictures, I'm still coming. And then the next time, and the next time... Maybe again I'll wait for a long time to no avail, but still I'll keep coming!

It's the scent of the forest, of the birds, of... many other things that attract me and keep me coming back.