Of Cockatoos, Caves, Trappers and Trust

Island of Seram, Moluccas Archipelago, Eastern Indonesia
By Bonnie Zimmermann

It’s mid to late afternoon, deep in the rainforests of Seram. It’s hard to tell the time as the canopy above is so dense that it lets in little light, and what sky I can see is cloudy and grey. Using some large leaves as a simple mat, hoping to avoid too many insect bites, I sit and wait. I am surrounded by a sea of green and millions of insects. The insects are unseen, but produce a background whine that never ceases. The Seramese call it “the sound of silence,” and it’s hard to ignore.

It is a surreal moment. To my left, my partner Ceisar (from Yayasan Wallacea) and friends Dores, Ois and Dace are sitting on the forest floor, smoking cigarettes, drinking tea from a thermos, and playing cards using my camera case as an impromptu table. We are waiting for the cockatoos.

I am honored to be the first member of the Project Bird Watch Team to visit Api Lima (Five Fires) located within the Manusela National Park. The site is about a 60 minute hike from PBW’s jungle camp, and provides some incredible viewing of the Moluccan cockatoo. The island of Seram is the only place in the world where these birds live.

The hike to the site is fairly strenuous and our pace is “jalan cepat” – a fast walk. This forest seems older than the one near out canopy platform. As we ascend the mountain side it is forest primeval with trees so gigantic that it would take eight men with outstretched arms to span the base, and you can hear near by sounds of hidden streams and waterfalls.

Moluccan cockatoo

Over the last few years during various eco-tours and expeditions we were regularly invited to visit Api Lima, which is known by the local people as the “stone hut”. We could see the stone out-cropping location with our binoculars from atop our canopy platform, but we always seemed to contemplate visiting the site at the end of a trip when we were just too physically exhausted.

This past October, as we sat on platform making plans for the next day – it came up again. We decided the next morning while my colleagues and our guests visited the platform, I would do a jalan cepat to the site to check for birds and return to camp mid-morning. Our guests would be returning to Sawai via boat that very afternoon. If the site was not special, I’d go back with the group to Sawai, but if it was a likely spot for future study and observation I would return that afternoon, spend the night in the “stone hut”, hike back to Teapiate for a short rest the next morning, and then hike back the 20+ kilometers to Masihulan. No boat would be available the next day.

I left with Ceisar, Dores, Ois and Dace at 4:00 a.m. and amazingly enough we were back at the jungle camp by mid morning – the trip was a success! In two very large trees, just below the stone out-cropping, we saw at least eight Moluccan cockatoos. That decided it – the tour would return to the village of Sawai and I would join them there tomorrow afternoon, in time for the dinner with the King.

That afternoon, after the tour returned to Sawai, I took a nap and at about 3:00 p.m. we took off for Api Lima. We arrived around 4 p.m. and started waiting for the cockatoos.

Prior to settling in to watch for the birds, we climbed the steep incline to the “stone hut” to drop off a few things before darkness descended upon us. It is really not a hut, but a limestone out cropping, with stone floor below, and a great view of the canopy. It is fringed with vegetation which makes a natural blind. You can also climb on top of the out-cropping for an even more impressive view.

I spent the next hour talking with Ois, Dace, and Dores as Ceisar translated. Ois and Dores are former bird trappers and we talked about their trapping days. I was able to get a real sense of what has happened to the parrot and cockatoo population on Seram for over a decade. It was fascinating and I am amazed that with our eco tourism program and other ways to help the villages, that its ironic that now these former trappers are protecting the very same creatures they used to take.

It grows dark – almost too dark to for our cameras and then we hear the calls. Loud and clear, proud and wild echoing above us. We see a flash of wings – the first cockatoo lands in the tree directly above us – screams then hops over to a fork in the tree and begins to preen. I can hardly breathe. Sixty or so feet above us, he is oblivious to us. Soon more birds join him in the tree.

I can tell by watching the skill and movements of Dores and Ois that they were former bird trappers. They move silently through the forest always seeming to know where the birds have moved. Several times after we thrash around for five or ten minutes, they would shine their flashlight into the trees, directly onto the cockatoos. This is when they would have trapped them. Early evening or dawn would normally be prime trapping time.

We are excited to see them but it is impossible to photograph or videotape them in the fading light. We listen, watch, and as the dark descends, we bump around in the dense forest undergrowth, gather our gear and prepare to climb up to the stone shelter.

The men light a small fire and heat water for tea. There is a low wood platform for sleeping and we choose our spots. I take the distant corner. I wonder if they think I’m crazy — why would some middle aged American woman travel all this way to protect birds? Remember, this is a Muslim country and women don’t do anything in public, let alone march around in the rainforest with the men.

Village of Sawai, Island of Seram

We have some tea, some rice from camp which we eat with our hands, and the men smoke their clove cigarettes. As the light of the fire shines on their faces, I see strength, passion and innocence. We line up like sardines in a can, and they all fall asleep immediately, snoring into the night. But I can’t…I’m too overwhelmed by the entire experience. As I lay there I also think, “this is the most exciting thing I’ve ever done” and then think “I must be completely crazy to go seven and a half hours into the rainforest alone with five men.”

A few hours later, something falls or jumps from the stone face and lands on my stomach. I don’t know what it is – Spider? Frog? Snake? I think for a moment – these new friends of mine have accepted me into their world, I can’t act like a stupid tourist or even “girl.” The decision is made. I take my sleeping blanket, flip the unwanted creature off my body and to my disbelief, it lands on one of my neighbors. It’s just not light enough to see what it is. In his sleep, he does the same thing and tosses it into the forest. My honor is saved.

As morning begins, we pack up and head down the slope again in the shadows, to see the birds again.

We are rewarded and see four cockatoos in two different trees waking up, preening in the early morning light, and calling to each other. Suddenly they take off in unison, screaming into the forest ready to start another day. Watching those birds touched my heart, and convinced me all the more to do everything I can to protect those creatures.

We hike back to the jungle camp, take some tea and rice and then make the 30 k trek back to Sawai. I’m hot, exhausted, dehydrated and happy. When we get back to the village the men tell me that I have been accepted as one of them, and that we are now family. This is incredible.

This visit was a turning point in my relationship with the local people on Seram and has allowed us to do much more including building a rehabilitation and release facility for birds that have been confiscated from the trapping and smuggling trade. The facility is called “Kembali Bebas” and I will be returning there in a few short weeks. And that’s another story.