Thaibirds and more

Watercock  Mid August isn't the best of months for raking up a long list of species in the field. But it is a lovely month with dramatic skies, green fields and local birds still being busy about. The Watercock is a bird that often doesn't show well and though it was rather distant we still got good looks of a breeding bird.  They have a booming sound and a nice contrast with their green surroundings. Still need a good image of this species. Purple Heron All you often see of the Purple Heron is a 'periscope' sticking out from tall rice plants.  Streaked Weaver There seemed to be Asian Golden Weavers just about everywhere. There breeding cycle last several months and I wonder how many sets of chicks each pair raise. Baya Weavers were also abundant but the one I enjoyed the most was Streaked Weaver. This time they seemed to  breed mixed in with Golden. In years past I have seen them in more distinct species designated colonies b...

Everyone knows Blue Pitta is difficult. Now multiply that by 5 and you are getting towards the difficult degree of Eared Pitta. A lot of my pictures I get while birdwatching. In other words, opportunistic photography. But when it comes to Eared Pitta, the opportunity only comes when there is a stake out and a blind set up.  I spent 6 hours with this bird and in spite of the birds coming and going only got a handful of acceptable images. The bird showed extremely well but in difficult light and always on the move. Very challenging. Well, here is the male. His colors are a bit more intense then the female. He also did the bulk of the job of finding worms for the chick as the female spent time in the nest. She did come out but only a couple of times. Here she is on her way back into the nest. It was amazing how quickly those worms were digested. The residue had to be removed frequently!

Short-tailed Parrotbill 16-25 th of March 2016 By Peter Ericsson Email: pkknjj@yahoo.com No more bookings for 2 nd half of March gave me an excellent opportunity to do some birding on my own. For so long I have wanted to see the two specialties of Poo Suan Sai National Park in Loei province. Having visited it twice but only briefly so had not yielded neither Short-tailed Parrotbill nor Rufous-throated Fulvetta.  I had heard of the drought in the park with resultant visits from the Parrotbill to a small man made waterhole.   The drive was long but on good roads and took me the better part of the day. I did manage to arrive at 3 pm and immediately arranged to visit the hide. One of the rangers has taken upon himself this little project and for a small fee let’s one use the hide. The hide was made inside of a rather large water pipe and made me feel like I was sitting inside a 2WW bunker. It was dark and most of the birds coming in were small little brown ...

Bhutan was an epic trip for me. The next trip was one I did with Stijn de Win for birding2asia. We visited the Lesser Sundas. The trip turned out to be successful in every way and hopefully we can have another one in 2016. http://www.pbase.com/peterericsson/lesser_sundas_aug_2015

                      I was able to get in touch with a good local guide in Sri Lanka, Amila Salgado.                      Thanks to him I was able to see 3 small owls. First of all the Serendip Scops Owl,                       a bird that was discovered only a few years back in the 21st Century.                          The 2nd one and also endemic to Sri Lanka was the Chestnut-backed Owlet.                          We had good scope views but not good light for photography. ...

 During a 2 day birding adventure in Sri Lanka I was able to see no less then 17 endemic birds. I like zoothera thruhes a lot so this was a priority for me. Fortunately this handsome male was singing his heart out in the early morning hours. The birds are skulkers and like the forest floor so to have him up on a branch in front of me was very special. I made a recoding as well: http://www.xeno-canto.org/237195 From Kithulgala, Sri Lanka

 The weather is very hot now and some sporadic rains have started to fall. The Spoon-billed Sandpiper is getting ready to leave for breeding grounds in Northern Siberia. On this morning myself and Bengt Legnell, an old friend from Sweden, were blessed with a couple of hours of viewing 3 individuals at Paktaley, Thailand.  2 of the birds were in winter plumage but the 3rd one was pretty far into summer plumage. I never got close enough for good images as there was a wide canal between us and the next dyke by the birds. The birds were feeding frantically as though they couldn't get enough.  Another season with the Spoonie has gone by. May they be blessed on their breeding grounds and come back here in Thailand again in mid October!