Thailand, one of my best trips?

I have visited over eighty "countries". I include places which are not politically classed as countries, such as overseas territories. Birds from the Falklands/Malvinas and St. Helena don't appear on my British list, 'nuff said. However I am still having new and very enjoyable birding, my recent Thailand trip gave me over 100 new species, and was one of my best trips ever, despite being a destination that many people visit early in their birding lives. 

This is because I have tackled the more difficult places whilst still young enough and fit enough, but also because I have always set myself targets as a focus for where to go. Apart from my early days twitching, I don't care about numbers, although I enthusiastically keep a world list for my own interest. It seems I have seen over 4.500 species, so to have over 100 new birds on any trip is great, but I've been on trips, like a recent trip to Finland, where the total was less than ten. My main targets in Thailand were two waders, Malaysian and White-faced Plovers, but I also endeavour to get new or improved photos, which I achieved with Spoon-billed Sandpiper, but also Bronze-winged Jacana, Black Baza, Chinese Egret, Broadbills, Pied Harrier, Kalij Pheasant, a couple of owls, Siberian Blue Robin (unfortunately not an adult male), Laughing-Thrushes, Red and Blue-bearded Bee-eaters, and many more. In turn I have several new species for the website, covering half a dozen galleries.


 The great thing about Thailand is that there are large numbers of Thai birders, and there is huge interest throughout the areas we visited, at least. They are very helpful, and a number of species are "staked out", from a nest of Spot-bellied Eagle Owl to a wintering Siberian Rubythroat at the side of the road. Although strictly "illegal", many spots just happen to have a supply of mealworms which seem to get mysteriously topped up overnight. Another wonderful phenomenon is that several villagers have set up private hides, as they live on the edge of a forested area. This provides a source of income and allows superb views of everything from flycatchers to pheasants, whilst only allowing for a small number of visitors at a time. The whole area where Spoonies winter consists of working salt pans and (probably) fish farms, and is of open access. There are small "visitor centres" and shaded "hides" interspersed with numbers of workers. The result is that birds are used to humans, but feel safe and are often approachable. The area's sheer size means that some can't be viewed closely, but that is just pot luck. We saw several Nordmann's Greenshanks in large mixed flocks, but only at a distance, most other species were as close as you would want to be.


 I currently have several targets. I need just one "conventional" wader, which is Javan Plover. My quest to see every bird on the British list category A is down to four, two of which are difficult at present due to politics, as I can't go to Israel or Russia. However a few new photos are always welcome, and Siberian Blue Robin was one from Thailand. But if I live long enough to achieve those, there's plenty more to keep me happy. I paint owls, but won't paint anything I haven't seen, so if all else fails I can go looking for owls. The bucket list will never be completed, but in many ways I've already done more than most, and when (or if) I can no longer travel, I've still got plenty to keep me occupied.

I've posted a selection of photos from Thailand to illustrate the variety of species there, hope you like them. There are plenty more if I ever wanted to go back, but there are still plenty of new destinations. 




 





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Image
  Forty Years a Twitcher We all twitch to a certain extent, it is merely travelling to see a new bird, but the term in birding circles, as opposed to the media, still implies a certain effort, beyond normal birding. Many people twitch occasionally, there is a great range from obsessive, going for everything twitching to local county twitching, or occasional when it's a bird you particularly want to see. In my case it's now the last category, but in the last part of the 20th century Ann and I were pretty much full-on twitchers. However, as in everything, twitching has changed. We used to get derogatory comments about "other people's birds" and people going to see birds they'd never heard of, now it's about carbon footprints. But sadly, the one thing that has changed is-it's not so much fun. At one time, everybody knew everybody (or knew of them), and complete strangers would jump in each others cars at the drop of a hat to go and see a rarity. Most of t...
Read more
Image
  Three Pratincoles on my list I've done little since returning from Mongolia except processing photos, but have been birding a few times. Frampton is my nearest reserve, and my favourite, despite the possibility of being blinded by reflections from a pointless "sculpture" in the early mornings. I keep a Frampton wader list for fun, which currently stands at about 43, so I had to go for the Pratincole recently. As many will know, there are three on the British list, Common, formerly known as Collared, being the commonest; Black-winged, and Oriental, of which there have only been nine records involving five birds. In my twitching days I saw all three in roughly that order and numbers, my first Common in 1986 (total 9). Black-winged in 1988 (total 6) and Oriental later in 1988 (total 3). Ive seen all three species abroad on several occasions, but as they are among my favourite waders I'm always happy to see more. I would like to see Grey, my last Pratincole, but current...
Read more
Image
A Naughty Nine No Longer  As I approach the time when I have to stop travelling outside Europe, I found myself wondering where to travel to next. I don't have a bucket list since it would just keep getting longer however many places I go, so I did what I have done in the past and decided on a focus, setting myself a target. Having long ago achieved my first target of seeing all the world's gulls, and finding others now too expensive (such as Pterodroma petrels), I decided to attempt to see every species on Category A of the British List, somewhere in the world. As I had previously done a lot of twitching this started as a "dirty dozen", and the first year I visited Kazakhstan for two species. I had been there before, but to different areas, so a thoroughly enjoyable trip got me White-winged Lark and Caspian Plover, which was also my 200th wader. The lark, which is one of the most attractive of its family, held interest in that the only UK record was less than ten mil...
Read more