Birding Diary

Lat Krabang 30th June
David tried to find a location in the Lat Krabang area off of Highway 7 close to Suvarnaphumi airport that he had visited in the past. Unfortunately due to heavy development in the area the whole place had changed dramatically. Still, with a bit of perseverance and looking around we managed to find plenty of fishpond habitat a little further down the highway where we found some good birds including Asian Golden Weaver in breeding plumage and large numbers of Spot-billed Pelicans.

Khao Khieo 30th June - 1st July
Khao Khieo should be home to Indochinese Green Magpie and we were hoping to find a way up the mountain into its habitat. Both of us had previosuly visited the open zoo and the waterfall trail which is very steep and overgrown, so we concentrated on finding a road that ascends from behind the zoo. We found this easily, following signs for the Flight of the Gibbon attraction. The road took us into some good forest but views were restricted by secondary growth.

We spent an afternoon and morning in this area and strauggled to see very much. However, we did get good views of Great Hornbill, always a good bird, and Blue-winged Pitta. We found decent numbers of forest birds including Hill Myna, Asian Fairy Bluebird, Oriental Pied Hornbill, Blue-eared Barbet and others, so this location is probably one of the best ways to find forest birds on a day trip from Bangkok - it took us under two hours to get to this site from central Bangkok!

In the end, we gave up due to very slow birding.

Bang Pra 1st July
Whilst it is always good to explore new places, after struggling to see many birds at Khao Khieo it was good to head to a location where I knew I could find some interesting species. Although water levels are maintained higher than is desirable for good habitat, there are still a few parts of the lake which have emergent vegetation and some good birds. By hanging around in one such area we managed to see some nice birds including Plain-backed Sparrow, which is much more attractive than its name suggests, a male Painted Snipe, a pair of Vinous-breasted Starlings, which are scarce in most of Thailand and both Chestnut-capped and Yellow-eyed Babblers. Both of these birds responded to a quick piece of call playback and gave us good views. These are two very under-rated species and are much more interesting than pictures in field guides would indicate.

Two Oriental Darters were also seen and are more or less a permanent fixture at this site now, refelcting the ongoing recovery of this species in Thailand.

Laem Singh 2nd July
Some months prior to this trip I had found a site for Copper-throated Sunbird near Laem Singh in Chantaburi province. David and I headed to the site after breakfast, arriving rather too late in the day for birding really. There is a large road bridge across an inlet a little east of Laem Singh. A small road runs along the west side of Ao Ko Nok from this road bridge and the sunbirds can be found in scraps of habitat alongside the road.

Laem Singh is marked with the red pin. The city of Chantaburi is marked with the blue pin.

Our short visit here gave us excellent, close-up views of a calling male Copper-throated Sunbird as well as Van Hasselt's (Purple-throated) Sunbird, Olive-backed Sunbird and Brown-throated Sunbird. In the past I had seen a variety of other common birds at this spot but given the heat and our desire to get to Khao Soi Dao we moved along after watching th Copper-throated Sunbird for some time.

Khao Soi Dao 2nd July - 4th July
Khao Soi Dao is home to a few species which are resitricted to just a small area of southeast Thailand within the Kingdom; Indochinese Green Magpie, Blue-rumped Pitta, Chestnut-headed Partridge and Black-browed Fulvetta. We were not targeting these species as it seems like a long hike up the mountain is needed for this but we were hoping for a chance at some of them as well as some good general birding - we spent most of our time birding the area along the road to the waterfall at Khao Soi Dao North.

Rather disappointingly birding turned out to be extremely slow at this site and the weather quite oppressive. Mostly we struggled to see much and just found the same few common species over and over again. Oriental Pied Hornbill was of interest and a brief view of Collared Owlet was obtained. The best birds by far were a male Banded Kingfisher called in after a long attempt, a couple of Rufous Woodpeckers and a juvenile Red-headed Trogon at an unusually low altitude. Blue-winged Pittas showed very easily as they did at several sites on this trip.

Very frustratingly a Blue-rumped Pitta was heard near the headquarters and as we were getting very close to it some park workers came along, talking loudly and the bird stopped calling and could not be relocated. So close, but that is birdwatching!

With the lower areas being so quiet we decided to search for the trail up Khao Soi Dao South. We found the trail by turning left at the entrance gate to the breeding station and following it around the perimiter wall. With a four wheel drive vehicle it was possible to drive several kilomtres up to the forest edge and find a frshly cut trail up the mountain. We spent a whole morning hiking uphill - the trail was easy to follow but would not be had it not been freshly cut. The only species of real interest we encountered was Dusky Broadbill and a glimpse at Scaly-breasted Partridge which for a moment made us think it was a Chestnut-headed Partridge. Along the trail were several shotgun cartridges and the area is obviously frequented by hunters,which explains why almost no wildlife was seen on the lower slopes. We managed to hike up to about 600 metres but this did not seem high enough to get into the area where the speciality species have been seen in the past.

Although we found the trail it is likely that hunters have set traps in the area and the chance of getting lost is high. Next time I will contact forest rangers to lead me up the mountain to look for the target birds - others have been successful in this.

Wet Season Bird Watching Trips: The early wet season (April to July) is a great time to find many of Thailand's resident forest birds. Species such as Pittas, Broadbills and forest Kingfishers are much easier to find than at other times of the year. Contact me to arrange a birding trip and/or to discuss the best bird watching options for you: nickupton@thaibirding.com

Pang Sida 4th July - 6th July
Neither David or I had ever visited Pang Sida before and the entrance to the national park was easy enough to find from Sra Kaew town, following the signposts. The park staff were freindly and told us to go to the office to get a pass for driving up the dirt road. This was issued without fuss and after showing the ranger on the gate a kilometre or so after the entrance gate. Ahead of us was about 20-30 kilometres of flat dirt road for birding along.

Over the course of a couple of days we found that the area close to the campsite, most of the way along the road, was best for birding. In this area we found Great Slaty Woodpecker, Heart-spotted Woodpecker, Black-and-buff Woodpecker, Laced Woodpecker, Black Baza, Hooded Pitta and many other, more common birds. In this area we also heard Eared Pitta and Blue Pitta but could not a get a view of them.

Driving along the dirt road gave us good views of several Siamese Fireback Pheasants and Gaur are obviously abundant here judging by the number of droppings.

We found Pang Sida to have all the species that can be found at Khao Yai national park with a fraction of the visitors, probably due to the dead end road and lack of accommodation. This might well be a good alternative for birders from Khao Yai given how overused that site is these days. However, much of the forest at Pang Sida is secondary growth so that while the same species are present as at Khao Yai, the nature of the habitat made seeing them much harder.

Sab Sadao, 6th July
It is always a good idea to get to a variety of habitats in order to see a wide range of birds and Sab Sadao provided us with a habitat that not many people visit on birding trips to Thailand, and one which we both enjoy - dry dipterocarp woodland. The journey from Sra Kaew to Sab Sadao was quite a slow one with a bad accident on the Prachinburi - Korat highway. This has been the case every time I driven along this road so beware slow moving trucks, bad driving and frequent crashes.

Turning east off the highway at Km 92 we headed towards Khonburi. The road here is in the process of being repaired but there are some heavily potholed sections. After lunch in a noodle shop we took a dirt road south into farmland and traveled around 15kms to Sab Sadao which is a substation of Tap Lan national park.

Although we were birding at totally the "wrong" time of day (1.30pm - 4.30pm) we found Sab Sadao to be by far the birdiest forest location on our trip. With quiet walking and careful listening we were able to track down several flocks of birds in this open forest. The first birds we saw were a flock of Black-headed Woodpeckers which had 2 Eurasian Jays for company; some Rufescent Prinias were also present in the undergrowth. Our second flock consisted of small birds and provided us with many of the specialities that we were hoping for including Brown Prinia, White-browed Fantail, Common Woodshrike and Indochinese Cuckooshrike as well as commoner birds such as Large Cuckooshrike, Velvet-fronted Nuthatch, Golden-fronted Leafbird and Grey-capped Pygmy Woodpecker.

Further along the trail we got a great reaction from a pair of White-bellied Woodpeckers and had a female Chinese Francolin flush from our feet.

This was definitely our best afternoon's birding of this trip in terms of the numbers of birds seen and the ease of finding them.

Other Wet Season Trip Reports Kaeng Krachan & Tung Bang Jak; A 2-Day Trip 4-5th July 2008 Krung Ching Waterfall, Khao Luang National Park, Nakorn Sri Thammarat province, 26-27th August 2008 Rainy Season Birding Tour of Thailand, 1st-14th July 2009 Khao Sok National Park, 5–7th July 2008 Doi Ang Kang, 30th May - 1st June 2006 A Day Trip to Doi Inthanon, 26th July 2008 In Search of 4 Target Species in Northern Thailand, 28-29th July 2008 Hellfire Pass Walking Trail, 11th July 2002 Huay Kha Kaeng, Uthai Thani 28-29/06/08

Khao Yai 7th July
A single day at Khao Yai served up some excellent birds and a few great mammal sightings too. Often Khao Yai can be a disappointment these days due to overuse and very poor management of the park along with the difficulty of finding the specialities of the area. However, on this trip Khao Yai was definitely one of the most productive forest sites and we saw a good number of species.

Our visit was on a Saturday but in the morning things were very quiet in terms of visitor numbers although by lunchtime it had become quite busy, making birding harder.

We decided to spend the morning along the lower stretches of the Khao Khieo road where there is some very good forest and I thought we had the best chance of finding some good birds there. David was hoping for Coral-billed Ground Cuckoo and Austen's Brown Hornbill and I thought we had a chance of both there.

Our morning started off slowly but by visiting a few spots along the road we found Lesser Necklaced Laughingthrush, Siamese Fireback, Red Junglefowl, Common Green Magpie, Large Woodshrike, Asian Fairy Bluebird and several species of bulbuls. We also came across a a couple of flocks of White-crested Laughingthrushes having a territorial dispute - beautiful birds in their own right but at Khao Yai other species often join their flocks so we were on the lookout. We soon saw a White-browed Scimitar Babbler in attendance and a pair of Laced Woodpeckers. We also heard a couple of Large Scimitar Babblers and with a lot of patience we finally managed to spot one and get good views. Further up the road a Blue Pitta started to call and although the undergrowth was really thick a bit of call playback lured it into an open patch where we got very close views of it.

Having enjoyed a successful morning we drove towards headquarters but after traveling just a few kilometres along the Khao Khieo road we came across probably our bird of the trip - Coral-billed Ground Cuckoo. There it was in the road, just 15 metres away from us. It crept slowly into the roadside vegetation but we were able to draw alongside it and view it feeding in the forest.

Wat Pra Puttabaht Noi 8th July
Arriving in the morning at Wat Pra Puttabaht Noi usually makes finding the Limestone Wren Babbler fairly easy. We arrived at around 8.30am and a short walk up the Naga staircase found us two birds jumping around on the limestone cliffs. They gave themselves away with short bursts of song. With not many other species to look for here and noisy dogs annoying us we left quite quickly.

Muang Boran Fishponds 8th July
Although getting into Muang Boran fishponds is a bit tricky it always provides a large number of birds and it is was good way to end this trip with a whole load of "trip ticks" including a few species that are uncommon to rare in Thailand. In just over an hour at this location we had good views of a wide range of species including Asian Golden Weavers at their nests, a pair of Black-headed Munias with at least one fledged chick, three Striated Grassbirds singing from posts, several Black Bitterns, more than 10 White-browed Crakes and very close flight views of Oriental Pratincole.

Other birds that were new for the trip were Indian Cormorant, which is quite common at this location, a couple of Common Moorhens, which are not particularly common in the wet season, a pair of Cotton Pygmy Geese plus good numbers of both Pheasant-tailed Jacana (in breeding plumage) and Bronze-winged Jacana.

We left Muang Boran fishponds a little after midday and made the short trip back into Bangkok where David and I parted company.

Nick Upton (nickupton@thaibirding.com)