The Hide

Green Bee-eater - juvenile (corrected)

I have had a very quiet weekend on the birding front. Early morning trips to Huay Mai Teng Reservoir on Saturday and Sunday morning confirmed the continuing presence of River Lapwing, six on Saturday morning, and five Sunday. However the weather has been wet combined with overcast skies, almost reminiscent of Scottish summer days ( do you remember dreich?!  ....  well most conditions for dreich met except cold!) so I've been happy to stay at home and potter.

I bought a portable hide about six weeks ago and haven't really used it. It's been on my mind to get to the reservoir very early and set up close to where the River Lapwing can usually be seen. I did this on both days but I didn't get in early enough. I didn't get a decent shot of the River Lapwing on either day. What was annoying was that they were within 20 feet of my truck on Saturday morning but it was raining quite heavily and I didn't have my DSLR with me. I was quite disappointed I didn't get a decent shot but truth is I didn't and on this occasion I don't think it was down to anything I did or didn't do! I can't make the birds land to order!

Little-ringed Plover

Little Green Bee-eater - juvenile (corrected)

However I think I learned a lot about using the hide, especially positioning it. I did manage some shots of a juvenile Blue-tailed Bee-eater and a Little Ringed Plover. I also learned a little bit about the juvenile of the bee-eater species as well because the absence of an elongated tail threw me a little and had me thinking. (Edit: I thought I had: Dave Gandy has advised me it is a Green Bee-eater and he knows more about this than me so I'll stand corrected. Thanks Dave.) These are the first shots I have taken using the hide and I reckon it has significant potential although I don't like being confined and cramped.

Wednesdays

White-throated Kingfisher

 I have a busy schedule here in Thailand with work occupying me on weekdays from about 7:00 am to 17:00h. I teach a number of additional classes in the evenings and also on Saturday mornings. Add in a family with a 2 year old son and another baby on the way! So I grab every opportunity for birding that I can and most Wednesdays from about 5:00 pm to 6:30 pm I head to the nearby rice paddy. It's a massive area and because it is flat there is generally some sort of breeze. At the moment the weather and lighting conditions can be highly variable with a lot of rain the norm right now together with humidity and overcast conditions. Not ideal photography conditions.

Plain Prinia

Just nice to be out birding and to be able to take a few pics of the more common species - a rather worn White-throated Kingfisher, a Plain Prinia and Red-wattled Lapwing and Blue-tailed Bee-eater. I am enjoying my digiscoping at the moment as I am getting some  decent shots thanks to understanding the histogram!

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Red-wattled Lapwing

Blue-tailed Bee-eater

The highlight yesterday evening was flushing a Black Bittern from some long reeds. This is a bird I really want to shoot as it is a real beauty, black with yellow facial streaks extending to its back. I think I need to get set up in the hide and wait for it to show!

Black-winged Stilts

The Black-winged Stilt is one of the most common birds in the locale. It is ubiquitous....rice paddy, reservoir, mudflats, aquaculture. Sometimes it is easy to overlook it as it is all too common. Today, there was bright sun and blue sky at lunch time so I headed back to Wat Khao Takrao in the hope of shooting the Great Thick Knee I observed yesterday. Alas it was nowhere to be seen. Neither were there great numbers of Painted Storks, just a handful. So I took the opportunity of getting close to some Black-winged Stilts to see how the histogram might assist. I think it did. By my standards these are decent shots and in particular I like the way the shots really show the birds' key feature - their pink stilts whose length, in comparison with the rest of their body, is often unappreciated as usually they are submerged in murky water.

The stilts are usually very noisy, real screechers, and generally don't like you getting too close. Alongside  Red-wattled Lapwing they seem to act as sentinels for other birds and their screech acts as an alarm bell. I lurked behind some bushes which gave me enough cover and enable me to take some shots.

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I shot the Little Heron while waiting hopefully for the Great Thick Knee: it was a good distance away so it is not the clearest shot I have ever taken. I was enjoying watching the Blue-tailed Bee-eater hunting from its perch. It must have incredible eyesight because it shot up a tree and plucked some unsuspecting insect, perhaps a dragonfly, and brought it back to its perch where he scoffed it. I was aware of Pheasant-tailed and Bronze-winged Jacanas in the pond but due to the height of the vegetation it was impossible to view them other than as they flew in through the air.

An Afternoon in The Khao Yoi & The Wat Khao Takrao Area

The highlight of a very pleasant afternoon's birding was a Great Thick Knee in the Wat Khao Takrao area, Phetchaburi province. It's in exactly the same place as it was last year. I saw it just after 6:00 pm in what was very poor light and it even put on an aerial display which really showed off its features. I inadavertently flushed the Thick Kneee as I approached not knowing it was there. My initial reaction to seeing its wings was that it was a gull, but I did think it was a little bit big, but its identity became clearer once I had my bins on it.

Stitch that! A Panorama Shot (3 files) stitched together

I was in this area because I had seen a large group of Painted Stork from the road in the large pond, approximately 105, and I was trying to get closer to get a shot. Earlier I had seen three large groups of the storks in aerial formation in the Khao Yoi area. As you can see the light and distance were against me in terms of getting a really sharp image with detail. There is a Spot-billed Pelican in among these storks but he is well covered up. I was also excited by the prospect of other stork species being in this group but I think these were all juvenile Painted Stork.

It was a grey, overcast afternoon with lots of rain, most of which I managed to avoid. However not ideal conditons for photography. However being able to use the histogram was once again a great help in getting decent balanced shots in poor light.

I also had good views of a Black Bittern in the Khao Yoi area, however it was distant. It's not an uncommon bird just elusive and beautiful! And it would make a fantastic photograph. Something to aspire to!

The Histogram

Asian Koel - female

Eudynamys scolopacus

นกกาเหว่า

By consequence of being laid low I took some time to look carefully at some of my digiscoped photographs over the last year. Somehow or other I found myself learning about tonal histograms and "blinking highlights". In other words incorrect exposure and as a result the many might-have-been shots on my hard drive. More to the point I have discovered what I should know already: how to use the histogram to get a good image.

Now the depressing thing is that in a lot of my shots the highlights are blown as are my shadows.And I went out tonight to try and give effect to what I have learned. I am really very pleased with this female Asian Koel which I shot in dodgy light in the final hour of daylight today. It's a lovely bird and bucks the trend of the male bird having the good looks. Thanks to the bird being quite settled I was able to take a few shots, look at their histograms and then make adjustments. There are no blown highlights in the above and the shadows and blacks are likewise within scale. This is a first step and as I say the light wasn't very good so I am pleased to get this shot of this bird. I am pleased with the detail. It's another step up the learning curve and I hope it's going to give me some decent shots.

Ashy Woodswallow

Artmaus fuscus

นกแอ่นพง

 I am equally pleased with this Ashy Woodswallow, a bird I have found very difficult to photograph. Once more I am pleased with the range of tones especially the lighter ones in the bird's bill which nevertheless have some good detail. This is a very exciting moment in my development!

Laid Low

Alas a long weekend, including a Friday and Monday holiday, comes along and I was stricken with the consequences of food poisoning, in fact the worst bout of it ever. In consequence I only managed a little birding and spent most of Sunday, Monday and Tuesday in a horizontal position near the loo! I am happy to report that I appear to be on the mend.

On Friday 15th July I met up with Tom Backlund for an early start in Khao Yoi, Phetchaburi province. We saw Painted Storks and Spot-billed Pelicans but in nothing like the numbers we had seen the week before. We saw a large number of Painted Storks in distant treetops but our efforts to get close resulted in Tom's truck getting stuck in the mud so we did not pursue them any further. Plenty of birds including a Black Bittern and three Racket-tailed Treepies, plus thousands upon thousands of egrets. I have to acknowledge gratitude to Tom for pointing out the treepies and their distinctive flight: I would  have disregarded them as drongos.

I must confess to having felt a little frustrated on account of not being able to get any decent shots. I guess this is part of wider malaise about not getting any real stand-out shots for a while. I  lay the blame for this entirely on myself due to inexperience and impatience. However Tom made the observation that Thailand is generally not very good for getting close to birds in order to photograph them. He bemoaned the general absence of hides and screens. He said that it would be difficult to market Thailand as a bird photography destination on account of this. I have been thinking about this and he's completely spot on, as usual! Take Tokyo where most of the principal birding sites have simple screens with a range of small viewing windows at different heights, ideal for getting close to the birds. The solution in Thailand is either telephoto lenses, digiscoping or a portable hide.

I drove over to Huay Mai Teng Reservoir after getting towed out of the mud and sad to say nothing to report. I took some shots of a green bee-eater but really very few birds, adding to my sense of malaise.

Sunday 17th July I made a quick early morning visit to Huay Mai Teng and saw three River Lapwing. There were also a few Cinnamon Bitterns hiding in long rushes but they didn't allow me to get a shot and flew off. In the same area there is a very large bees' nest in a tree which I will endeavour to photograph on my next visit: the shots I managed were blown at both ends of the scale, shadows and highlights, so not really very informative.

Then as a dutiful husband I went home and took my wife and son out and we had some lunch in a new restaurant in the local shopping mall and well..........let's say we won't be going back there!

STOP PRESS! I have just received a message from Phil Round to say a Sharp-tailed Sandpiper was observed this morning (Wednesday 20th July 2011) just outside Bangkok at Kok Kham.

Pheasant-tailed Jacana

Hydrophasianus chirugus

นกอีแจว

It being my birthday today, 53 years young, I had the pleasure of my wife and son for the afternoon and we went birding and in fact did a little tour. Our first stop in the early afternoon was Huay Mai Teng Reservoir where there were no birds of interest; no River Lapwing to be seen. We had a very pleasant lunch in one of the restaurants near the reservoir and I have to say it was simple,traditional Thai but it was delicious and cheap. Good to know that there is good food nearby.

Pheasant-tailed Jacana

Hydrophasianus chirugus

นกอีแจว

With the prospect of big birds at Khao Yai we decided to head cross country after our lunch, basically due east, about a one hour drive through interesting open country arriving just after 16:00h. I headed straight to where I saw storks and pelicans yesterday. However just before it I picked out a Pheasant-tailed Jacana in a large pond and that became the day's photo-opportunity. If only it had been 10 metres closer! This fellow was joined by a shorter tailed female. What delightful birds!

Pheasant-tailed Jacana

Hydrophasianus chirugus

นกอีแจว

The real story today was once more big birds, specifically a count of about 450 Painted Stork on the ground at  18:25h in the fading light. Let me also add not a sign of a Spot-billed Pelican today after yesterday's 300 +. The Painted Stork count is low as many of the birds were obscured in the ditches of the distant fish pond. In other words I believe there were significantly more than this number. Quite a spectacle once more.

What a lovely way to celebrate my birthday!

Big Bird Convention in Khao Yoi

Painted Storks

My friend Tom Backlund texted me yesterday afternoon to tell me he had just seen several hundred Spot-billed Pelicans and an equally  large number of Painted Stork in the Khao Yoi area of Phetchaburi Province.  (I have amended this because Tom's text said "sev hundred" which I took to mean "seven" and he has now corrected me! So probably not a record!) So there really was only one place to head for today! The habitat here is predominately fish farming ponds.

Spot-billed Pelicans

Well the big birds did oblige. There were plenty of Spot-billed Pelicans and Painted Stork. I really don't know how to count such large flocks. The pelicans were exclusively in the air and I would estimate between 300 - 400. The Painted Stork were more obliging in photographic terms but equally difficult to count. In real terms a spectacular show as they formed huge kettles. There were thousands of egrets in attendance too. But photography was difficult! Well digiscoping was difficult, the simple act of framing moving birds in the viewfinder was beyond my powers and apart from a few storks in trees, none of the big birds were on the ground.

Painted Stork - juvenile?

There were also a couple of Brahminy Kites on the premises, keeping an eye out for opportunities. Also some Collared Kingfishers which unhelpfully stayed in the shade and otherwise might have given me a great shot

Brahminy Kite

I stayed in bed this morning and had a long lie instead of heading to the reservoir. I am glad I did so. It's good that the big birds appear to be in such vigorous good health and I hope I can make it back to Khao Yoi soon and hopefully some better shots. I am not sure how long this convention will last!

Collared Kingfisher

The Weekend

River Lapwing

Vanellus Duvaucelli

นกกระแตหาด

I didn't have any classes on Saturday morning so it was a joy to head up to Huay Mai Teng reservoir without any time pressure. On arrival there were five River Lapwing around the main launch area and they appear to be reasonably settled.  I didn't see any Small Pratincoles anywhere in the site today so I imagine they will not be back until December or thereabouts. In the main Small Pratincole area I even managed to see one River Lapwing but I don't know if it was one of the five dispersing from the launch area or another bird.

Little Grebe

Tachybaptus ruficollis

นกเป็ดผีเล็ก

I took advantage of the lack of pressure to have a good look around this morning and recorded 54 species. All fairly common species too including a decent look at Barred Buttonquail which didn't seem too bothered about my presence until I attempted to photograph it at which point it scurried off into the undergrowth! I had to settle on a very confiding Indochinese Bushlark that appeared to welcome the opportunity to pose.

Indochinese Bushlark

Mirafra marionae

นกจาบฝนปีกแดง

This pair of Sooty-headed Bulbul's showed well for me. Their most interesting feature is the yellow undertail covert which is just about visible on the left hand side bird. This indicates they are of the thais sub species; red undertail covert that they are klossi ssp. They are very common in the local area, for example nesting in the trees facing our house. However it is a species that had me marvelling at the start of my birding and I was glad to get a shot of them, not the best I hasten to add.  

Sooty-headed Bulbul

Pycnonotus aurigaster thais

นกปรอดหัวสีเขม่า

The attraction of the reservoir is obvious. It's an ideal place in hot weather to catch a bit of a breeze. Many of the locals come for a swim and wash their cars and motorbikes here! In the evening barbecues are popular. The reservoir is also popular with anglers. Sadly some poor child must have been drowned or injured as this sign has gone up in the last few days. I have done my best to translate it - but word for word translation doesn't work! 

A recently added warning at the reservoir launch area

"Take care! Danger

Children are forbidden from playing -  deep water"

All photographs, except for the last shot, digiscoped at Huay Mai Teng Reservoir Saturday 02.07.11

On Sunday afternoon I took a drive up to Chaloem Prakhiat Thai National Park in Ratchaburi Province. Dodgy weather with grey overcast conditions in the park and not a single shot of a bird in the forest. Plenty of White-rumped Shamas, Greater-racket Tailed Drongos and a fair few Black-naped Monarchs. Lots of calls. It would have been nice to get a shot of a Shama as they are beautiful looking birds but they were making lots of noise, including Laughing thrush but not posing for me in the available light. I only managed to shoot insects but they are nevertheless nice shots. I actually needed a shot to highlight pollination for my Grade 5 science students: they loved the bottom shot even if to my perfectionist eye the focus could be better! Now I don't have a clue about identifying any of these species so feel free to help!

My thinking about this national park is that due to its comparative proximity to Kaeng Krachan, maybe about 60 km to the north, it must have a lot of the same species in it. I think there must be Pittas and other species skulking around in the undergrowth especially at this time of the year. Nothing today, some interesting sounds, but nothing other than an idea. I think I need to get to higher ground in the park and that means an early start so maybe next week with  Friday a public holiday I shall get up there and really check it out!

I am happy to report that the reservoir is full of water.

It was a pleasant weekend, unpressured and gentle, and I was simply happy to be out and about. 

All photographs digiscoped at Chaloem Prakhiat Thai NP Sunday 03.07.11