Thaibirds and more

As usual I have neglected to post on my blog. It seems that Facebook takes priority these days along with my pbase account. Anyhow, here is a little something. These are amazing wild oxen found free roaming in the tropical forest of Thailand: How do they grow that strong only feeding on planst? Gaur! The master of the tree tops: Gibbons.....these are incredible strong animals well adapted for a life in tree tops. They also live of plants and fruit.....amazing, isn't it? On the forest floor. A Ferruginous Partridge is carefully viewing the road before crossing the road. Just too bad I didn't manage to focus correctly.  Male Banded Kingfisher with prey for its young. Simply gorgeous looking bird!  The only place in Thailand to see Ratchet-tailed Treepie and with a tail like that it makes it a rather special bird. Unlike other treepies this one prefers it inside the thick forest.  The Rufous-browed Flycatcher has its strong ho...

The Small Pratincoles breed on the exposed river bed. Such great flier they are.  The Red-throated Pipit was a 1st time photographed species for me. 

The banks of the Maekong river by the Golden Triangle is a great place to visit in the dry season when the  water levels are low. This time I decided to set up a blind and see what would come. This strikingly yellow Citrine Wagtail showed up. It is the less known Motacilla citreone calcarata race that some people also call the Himalayan Citrine Wagtail. It has a black back as opposed to the grey of the nominal race. I watched it for almost an hour as it kept feeding on small aquatic invertebraees.

Here is the reason I did a 48 hour stint: Spot-breasted Laughingthrush. Ever since I 1st saw it with  Bob Sothman  a couple of years back (my only time) I have dreamed of getting a picture of it since it has never been photographed in the wild and was missing in the OBI database. So when Mr Kamron told me of his find I simply 'had to go'..............I couldn't find a car to hire though in Chiang Mai since it was long weekend. I gave up the idea of going and went to Baktaley and the waders. While watching the Spoonies the phone rang and my dear wife informed me she had found a car for me. Wammo! Got the flight and off I went....and here is my hero! Spot-breasted Laughingthrush is an extreme skulker but had been lured into view with the help of meal worms. Now a couple month later it is still habituated and 'checking in' for some worm hand outs! 2.11.0.0

This time I managed to get a bit closer. Still need that 'real close up' one day as the 400mm simply isn't enough for such a small bird. 

 Brian Fletcher stopped over for a day on his way from Sydney to a birding tour in Northeastern Brazil with Birdquest. Brian had tried to see the Spoonie on two different occasions, once in Myanmar and once in Thailand but failed. This time he was rewarded with some of the best views possible. We spent several hours enjoying 3 birds as they fed in the salt pans. Brian also added Milky Stork to his world list as well as White-faced Plover, so it was quite a happy man that boarded his plane the day following.

Rick and Elis Simpson has set out to see as many waders as possible within a year of birding. Their journey began with an attempt to see Spoon-billed Sandpiper at Baktaly, Petchaburi, Thailand. They had allotted a week for their visit to Thailand and I was able to join them on their 1st day. It still has rained a fair bit and the salt pans are full of water. This makes it a bit hard to find the smaller waders. It took us about an hour before we got sight of our Spoonies. 3 birds were feeding next to a narrow piece of soil at the end of one of the pans. This naturally gave cause for rejoicing. We kept going and ended up with 28 species of waders for the day.                                           Spoon-billed Sandpiper          ...