With a month in Thailand, we had plenty of opportunities to bird watch. We went on two organized tours … one to Doi Inthanon National Park (highest point in Thailand). The other one was around Chiang Mai (specifically to two locations: Huay Tung Tao lake and a small nature preserve southwest of Chiang Mai). Both were on the eastern slope of Doi Suthep. Apparently “Doi” means Mountain. These bird watching tours were different than other countries … we spent most of our time in the vehicle driving to see different birds on the side of the road … hence my position in this photo:
We saw approximately 70 different bird species on these two trips. Some of them were duplicates of birds we had already identified ourselves. Our final numbers in Thailand were 87 different species where 44 of those were new to us.
Thailand is a wonderful place for bird watching. There is quite a variety of habitats and these habitats attract many different birds.
Although not as prevalent as in Vietnam, the Thai people do net the birds around the rice fields. However, we found the bird life abundant in Thailand … even around our hotel. Here are a few photos of the birds around our hotel:
This is a Coppersmith Barbet … a beautiful bird easily identified by his call … and then you see him and it’s “Wow.” This is a scaly-breasted Munia … a seedeater … you can tell by the large bill.
This is a black-collared Starling … a little noisy but lovely to observe.
This is a Scarlet-backed Flowerpecker … this guy is noisy too!
Here are a few random shots of some of our other favorite birds.
I couldn’t pass up adding one more of the Coppersmith Barbet … beautiful.This is a Green Bee Eater.
This is an Indian Roller … lovely sitting … fantastic colors when flying.
This is a long-tailed shrike.
Here’s another picture of the Indian Roller …
and one of him in flight …
A very cool bird … this small dove is called a Zebra (or Peaceful) Dove.
This is a female Hill Blue Flycatcher.
There were so many cool “junk birds” … this is a white-vented Myna.
The Kingfisher’s colors were amazing … This is a White-throated Kingfisher.
Another barbet …. this time the Lineated Barbet. They loved the fruit in this tree.
We’ve had the fortune of seeing three owls on this trip … we saw this one in the day-time so I was able to get a nice picture. It is an Asian Barred Owlet.
Although this is called the Common Kingfisher … it doesn’t look common to me.
Another barbet … a blue-eared Barbet.
Hanging out down near the stream, a White-capped Water Redstart.
The velvet-fronted Nuthatch …
I hope you enjoy the pictures as much as I enjoyed taking them. Haha.
Stumblingpiper
Great pics.