Standardwing bird-of-paradise - Semioptera wallacii

This was a super-exciting spotting. Our first time ever spotting in nature of a bird of paradise!
These birds have the peculiar habit of starting a very noisy and dancey courtship display just at dawn. Luckily for us they are birds of habit so the villagers know of afew places where the birds like to do their early morning parade. We had to be there before sunrise and wait and then yes, faithful to their posts a few males showed up and started their displays. They are very difficult to photograph because they keep jumping from branch to branch and opening their wings and feather chest blue flaps and the extra long feathers that you see in this picture but well, we got a few decent shots, mainly my husband, Mark, and here I post a few. We only could photograph the males but some female was around as there was a lot of raocous. And as pretty as their display is their voice does not match, they sound like strident mad chicken! Needless to say it was one of our most special days...but we went to see them only once as heat and humidity were also quite hard to bear and we feel so much better underwater :-D