February 24, 2020. Khao Yai National Park
This is Day 8.2 of a 19-day birding tour of Thailand; it was a private group arranged through Field Guides, adhering to their typical itinerary. The pictures in this post are just some of the many Thailand pictures I’ve uploaded to GreatBirdPic.com. Check out the site before you leave: see the Latest Pics uploaded by our members or read the About GPB to find out more about the site. You are welcome to join if you enjoy bird photography.
Apres Lunch at Khao Yai
After lunch we had some time to wander around the area and I noticed a lot of birds flying in and out of a nearby tree. The tree was loaded with small berries and the birds were enjoying their lunch, too. Most of the birds were Black-crested Bulbuls, which are showy, noisy birds. The sub-species in this region has an orange throat.
Another bird that frequented the tree was the Chestnut-flanked White-eye. This is a male, as indicated by the heavy brown streaking on its side.
On this shot you can’t see the chestnut flank but the white eye-ring certainly shows up.
Also seen around the area where we ate lunch was this big Large-billed Crow:
We gathered our things together and jumped back into the vans and headed down the road toward our next destination. We stopped off the side of the road and then took a hike down a service road toward another blind. As we got out of the vans we spotted a Banded Kingfisher overhead.
As we approached the blind we spotted a pair of Little Spiderhunters overhead. This small birds have one of the longest bills in proportion to their body I have ever seen.
We headed off the trail into the blind area. It was a similar setup to the previous one – posts about 5 foot high had black plastic mesh suspended between them with slits cut through the mesh every three feet or so.
We didn’t have as much luck at this blind as the previous one. Perhaps it was the time of day (afternoon) when the birds were usually scarce. One bird that did come down was the Scarlet-backed Flowerpecker. This female has a bright red rump, which is pretty but I wish we had seen the male which has that red flowing down the back of its whole body.
At this point our intrepid guide Dave gave us a choice. We could continue to search for birds in this area of the park or take an hour van ride over to a bird research park where we would have an excellent chance of finding the national bird of Thailand, the Siamese Fireback. It was a unanimous vote – so off we went to find these beautiful birds, covered in the next post.
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For you overachievers here are the Ebird checklists for that portion of our trip:
https://ebird.org/checklist/S64935542
https://ebird.org/checklist/S64935543
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Glad you found GreatBirdPics.com. Check out the site before you leave: see the Latest Pics uploaded by our members or read the About GPB to find out more about the site. You are welcome to join if you enjoy bird photography.