Thailand Birding: Eared Pitta at Khao Yai

Eared Pitta is one of the most sought-after birds in Thailand and also a very tough one to find. It does not seem to call very often and I find it mostly unresponsive to call playback; one of the best ways to find it is to walk quietly through the forest and listen for it foraging in the leaf litter.

A few days ago this is exactly what we did on the nature trail which begins at park headquarters, Khao Yai, and around the halfway point on the trail we located a pair of Eared Pittas which we were able to view and I was able to follow them through the forest obtaining one of the worst photos of an Eared Pitta ever taken - at least it is better than no photo!

Eared Pitta by Nick Upton

The only other Pitta detected in three days at Khao Yai was another Eared Pitta which called twice on the Km 33 trail at around 5.15pm but did not respond to call playback. Blue Pitta, which is fairly common at Khao Yai, was silent everywhere we looked for it.

Photographing Insects

Bird activity has been at its lowest that I can remember in a dry season, mostly due to the strange weather patterns that have produced late rain and hotter temperatures than normal and which are now followed by wind.

Bird activity has been virtually zero from about 10.30am until about 4pm leaving a huge time window to fill; this is when it is good to be interested in photographing butterflies as well as dragonflies and damselflies as they are at their most active in the heat of the day.

I photographed the above damselfly on the stream near Haew Suwat waterfall, Khao Yai, in the middle of the day after trying harder than should be required to find even the commonest birds on 27th December. Many other damselflies were present as were large congregations of butterflies, making this a good spot to visit in the middle of the day.

Thailand Birding: Khao Yai Stakeout

The well-known stakeout behind the toilets at Pha Gluai Mai campsite, Khao Yai, produced a few birds yesterday morning. Most of the Thai photographers are camped out on Doi Lang and Mae Wong these days so there seems to be little feeding of the birds at this stakeout in Khao Yai and consequently birds that have visited in previous years are not performing right now: most notably Blue Pitta and Coral-billed Ground Cuckoo.

Although Phil Round had told me that the Ground Cuckoos had been calling a week earlier (although not seen) we neither heard nor saw this species at the stakeout and these days there are very few sightings at this formerly reliable spot.

All is not lost, though, and this great Orange-headed Thrush was extremely tame, coming within a few feet of me allowing for these photographs using a point-and-shoot digital camera.

Other species seen at the stakeout were a male White-rumped Shama, adult male Siberian Blue Robin and a pair of Puff-throated Babblers.

Overall birding at Khao Yai right now is very slow but we have seen some nice birds in Red-headed and Orange-breasted Trogons, Great Hornbill, Siamese Fireback, White-throated Rock Thrush, Mugimaki Flycatcher, Black-throated Laughingthrush, Long-tailed and Banded Broadbills, Slaty-backed Forktail, Golden-crested Myna and Great Slaty Woodpecker.

Thailand Birding: Slaty-legged Crake at Lung Sin Hide

Slaty-legged Crake is a bird that is seldom seen in Thailand and its status and movements in Thailand are poorly known. However, this species has made a number of appearances at the Lung Sin's waterhole near Kaeng Krachan national park and I was lucky enough to witness this bird's performance there a few days ago on 16th December.

Slaty-legged Crake

After watching many species bathing and drinking at the waterhole the Slaty-legged Crake came in and took a lengthy bath, splashing around and giving itself a good clean allowing us to get excellent views.

Other species we saw at the waterhole included Asian Paradise Flycatcher, Siberian Blue Robin, Large Scimitar-babbler, Tickell's Blue Flycatcher, Orange-headed Thrush, Lesser Necklaced Laughingthrush and Greater Necklaced Laughingthrush.

If you want to visit the waterhole yourself there is a 200 baht per person fee and the hide can be booked through Ban Maka guesthouse or Samarn Bird Camp.

Thailand Birding: Black-legged Kittiwake

Today a trip to Laem Pak Bia sand spit turned up quite a surprise -a Black-legged Kittiwake!

Black-legged Kittiwake at Laem Pak Bia, digiscoped by Mr Daeng

As Mr Daeng landed his boat on the sand spit a group of gulls and terns took flight and as I looked at them through my binoculars I instantly realized that I could see a first winter Kittiwake. I called to Mr Daeng to take a look before it disappeared but luckily it landed back on the beach allowing us to look at it for more than 15 minutes; Mr Daeng used my camera and telescope to obtain the above photograph.

Eventually the bird flew out to sea not to be seen again either by us or the next group of birdwatchers who went out to the spit later in the day.

Thailand Birding: Fairy Pittas & A Polite Request

Between 9th and 16th April 2012 Philip Round made a trip to Ko Man Nai. in the Gulf of Thailand, in hope of ringing scarce migrants. He was successful in finding Thailand's second Fairy Pitta as well as at least 13 Japanese Paradise Flycatchers.

The news of this prompted quite a number of people to make the trip to Ko Man Nai in search of these birds and it appears that a few more Fairy Pittas were discovered. However, this influx of birders has caused a problem on the island and Phil Round requests that birdwatchers do not visit the island unless they have first obtained the relevant permission. Read Phil's request yourself - Please do not visit Ko Man Nai without first obtaining official permission.

This discovery suggests that both Fairy Pitta and Japanese Paradise Flycatcher are more frequent visitors to Thailand than previously thought and these, plus other rare visitors, may be found on similar islands in the Gulf during migratory periods. Migrants such as these that follow a more Eastern flyway than the commoner passage migrants in Thailand usually turn up in the first half of April.

Good luck in finding your own treasure trove of migrants during passage migration times.

Thailand Birding: Sri Nakorn Kuan Khan Park

On 3rd April 2012 I found myself with the rare opportunity to get out for a morning close to home. Having had great success in finding migrant species in April 2011 at Sri Nakorn Kuan Khan park, Bangkok, I decided to see if I could get lucky again.

Arriving at about 7am seemed a bit early as my first walk around revealed little other than a Forest Wagtail, a couple of Spangled (Hair-crested) Drongos and the odd Black-naped Oriole. However, a few nice resident birds included Pink-necked Green Pigeon and Stork-billed Kingfisher, both of which are commoner here than anywhere else I know in Thailand, as well as a male Laced Woodpecker.

Sri Nakorn Kuan Khan Park

On previous visits to Bangkok's parks, looking for migrants, I have noticed that most of the best observations seem to occur between 9am and midday, so I made another lap of the park.

Over the next few hours I came across several flocks of small migrant species which included 1 Drongo Cuckoo, 3 Crow-billed Drongos, 1 Lesser Racket-tailed Drongo (quite a surprise to me), 2 Black-winged Cuckooshrikes, 1 Eyebrowed Thrush (1 or 2 others heard passing overhead), 10 Black-naped Orioles, 3 Ashy Minivets and 1 Swinhoe's Minivet.

Also scattered around the unkempt parts of the park (towards the back) I came across a few flycatchers and Phylloscopus warblers which included 5 Radde's Warblers, 2 Pale-legged Leaf Warblers, 1 Arctic Warbler, 2 Yellow-browed Warblers, 3 dauurica Asian Brown Flycatchers, 1 siamensis Asian Brown Flycatcher plus 3 male & 1 female Yellow-rumped Flycatchers.

At around mid morning (10am ish) I spent 20 minutes at the top of the birdwatching observation tower, where I have spotted many interesting birds from before. As well as some common resident species I saw a few more passing migrants; a total of 13 Black Bazas and 2 Japanese Sparrowhawks as well as 2 Dollarbirds.

By midday I was very tired from walking around in the heat and humidity for 5 hours so decided to retreat to the air-conditioning of the car. On the way back I had time to add a Hodgson's Hawk Cuckoo to the list of migrants!

It seems that Sri Nakorn Kuan Khan park is an excellent place to find good numbers of migrating birds in April. I have never managed to get to the park during Autumn migration but I hope to put that right later this year.