Maurice and Lynsey, father and daughter, from England made an impromptu decision to visit Thailand for a week. They also arranged for a day and a half of birding not too far from Bangkok.

The weather in early April is humid, hot and rather unpleasant. The country is waiting for the first ‘mango rains’ and the Thai New Year, Songkran, is normally the start of that period.

Most migratory birds are gone but a few wet season breeders start arriving.

Our first stop was at Bangpra/Khao Kaew area in Chonburi. It took a little over an hour to get there but well worth the drive. Just about every bird we saw was new for both. We started out with great views of Golden-headed Cisticola, Chestnut-headed Babblers, Chestnut-headed Bee-eaters, AshyWoodswallows, Bushlarks, Greater Racket-tailed Drongo and many more common birds.

A little further up the road we had a flock of 20 Red-breasted Parakeets. So nice to see that many of them free flying in the wild. Also a group of Hill Myans. Both these two species were heavily pouched in the past for the pet trade but much less so now.

Then we moved further up the road for a little walk next to the hill forest. It was rather quiet and very hot but we did see good numbers of Racket-tailed Treepies, Grey-breasted Prinia and Dark-necked Tailorbirds. Other birds that were heard included a Blue-winged Pitta and Puff-throated Babbler.
The water level at Bangpra was very high and thus restricting movement.

A drive towards Bangkok saw us arrive at Bangpoo at noon.
There is a little spot where water is allowed to drip from a hose and we watched many Swinhoe’s Whiteeyes make use of this. Also Scaly-breasted Munias and an Eye-browed Thrush which actually was a provincial lifer for me (Samut Prakan).

The watchtower area had very little to see but 10 Painted Storks was good enough.
Out along the pier there were still hundreds of Brown-headed Gulls, some Lesser Sandplovers, Common Redshank, Black-tailed Godwits, a lone Whimbrel and a single Pacific Golden Plover.
We then had our lunch at a restaurant nearby.

Our last stop for the day was a visit to Latkrabang which are my regular stomping grounds. We quickly got the ‘wished for’ Bronze-winged Jacana, Pheasant-tailed Jacana and White-browed Crake. Some fields being worked on by the farmers had attracted huge numbers of Egrets and Herons.
The day ended up with 100 species.

Day 2.

Pick-up at 5 am and an hour and a half drive to the Military Academy at Nakhon Nayok. This is located next to Khao Yai national park and give opportunity for birds not found around Bangkok.
We did get a few: Stripe-throated, Sooty-headed, Black-headed, Black-crested and Red-whiskered Bulbuls. Lineated Barbet, Blue-eared Barbet, White-crested Laughingthruses, Dollarbird, Crested Goshawk, Shikra, Oriental Honey-buzzard etc

Before drop-off I wanted to show a couple of Owlets at Benjakitti park and that worked well. Spotted Owlet easy as it gets and after some harder work eventually Asian Barred Owlet.

https://ebird.org/tripreport/119018