Friday, May 28, 2010

Mae Sot, 23rd-27th May 2010

A couple of days at a meeting in Mae Sot gave me little free time for birding, but after the events of recent weeks, with more than 80 people shot dead, 1,900 injured and nearly 40 buildings set alight across Bangkok, all in the name of fighting for democracy, I was more than happy to leave the city for a while and soak up the peace of the distant provinces.

Work commitments made it hard for me to make visits to Mae Sot reservoir (my "patch away from patch"), but staying at a small resort in the middle of town, with my room backing onto a field, did pay dividends in the form of three (common) year ticks - Little Bee-eater, Cinnamon Bittern and Slaty-breasted Rail.  The rail is something I see rarely, but this one was strutting about in the open, two mornings in a row.


Slaty-breasted Rail

On the drive back to Bangkok I stopped at Bung Borophet for an hour, my target being to catch up with Black Bittern, one of my favourite wet season migrants.  Sure enough I scored one with ease, getting excellent, but brief views (hence no photo), plus several Oriental Pratincoles, Black-headed Munia, Painted and Open-billed Storks, another Cinnamon Bittern,  a pair of Fulvous-breasted Woodpeckers and several pairs of Baya Weavers constructing nests.

Fulvous-breasted Woodpecker

Baya Weaver nests and bees nest - is there some kind of symbiosis going on here?