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Paktaley, Lampakbia and paddies!

I had the pleasure of taking Karen and George Sherman for a day of birding to the prime birding area of Paktaley, Lampakbia and the paddies of Petchaburi. It  had rained massively the day before and when I met them at their hotel the skies were all dark with rain filled clouds. We bravely set off anyhow and amazingly enough didn't encounter any rains at all throughout the day. The salt pans were flooded though and it was impossible to walk the dykes. Thus we didn't have a real chance to look for the Spoon-billed Sandpiper.

Karenn and George were easy to please anyhow and as we kept birding the fields and the pans we ended up with a day count of almost 100. Most of these birds were new for both of them. I managed to pick up a few pictures along the way and here are some of them starting with the quite numerous Black-tailed Godwit.



     It isn't often I get a chance to get fairly close to Ruddy Turnstone but this one was quite co-operative.


 
      The  Wood Sandpiper fluffing it's feathers like a Ruff!


Red-necked Stints were common and inspite of very little color they have beautiful feathers in nice layers.

                               
   A real winner is the Long-toed Stint and this one also came close.


               Larger Gulls are never common here. A 2nd CY Heuglin's Gull stood out amongst the many     Brown-headed Gulls.


     Adult Black-crowned Night Heron is quite an attractive bird.


        In some reeds a Bronze-winged Jacana showed at a distance.


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