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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JWN Andrewes" data-source="post: 3149435" data-attributes="member: 7131">Once again we were faced with the choice between staying put in the hopes of picking up a few birds as yet unseen or moving on early. Having arrived at Mae Wong early, and capitalised with that brilliant first session in the blind, we decided to leave early and fit in a new site into the itinerary; Bueng Boraphet. Much of the route was lined with the usual suspects of Great Mynas, Brown Shrikes, Spotted Doves and the like, the first new player being a quartet of Pink-necked Green Pigeons which kept speed, more or less, with the car for a short distance, on the right side of the road for where I was sat, bit of a lucky break. Shortly after that, as the surrounding countryside began to contain more water, a roadside Cinnamon Bittern, and then the first few Asian Open-billed Storks appeared. The first of many.Eventually we pulled off onto a track and stopped, and started to get down to business. Out on the roadside pools, with their muddy margins were plenty of Open-bills, Great & Intermediate Egrets, the occasional Grey Heron, Red-wattled Lapwings, a flock of Black-winged Stilts, several leucopsis White Wags, Little Cormorants, a Little Grebe; birding was suddenly a very different business from the past few days of forest trails through the hills & mountains of the north. The bushes, long grasses and reeds along the road held Streaked & Baya Weavers, Streak-eared Bulbuls, a Plaintive Cuckoo, and the first main target of the site, Striated Grassbird. This monster Prinia proved pleasantly prominent, even getting up onto wires to sing. The wires also provided perches for Blue-tailed Bee-eaters, White-throated Kingfishers, Collared & Asian Pied Starlings and mixed flocks of Tree & Plain-backed Sparrows.Eventually we reached the furthest point we were taking the car and all piled out. Within minutes a Savanna Nightjar shot past. Then another! We knew there was a roost site nearby (that’s why we were here) but we had expected to put in at least a little effort to see one! One even sat itself out on some concrete, allowing even me to grab a record shot, and at one point a Yellow Bittern flew in and sat out in the top of a bush as the Nightjars drifted up and down past it. From here we proceeded on foot, and started off by checking out a vegetation choked pool beyond the Nightjar site. Here a pair of Malaysian Pied Fantails showed well, a Bronze-winged Jacana stalked through the herbage a little way off, and close in were a couple of skulky Black-browed Reed Warblers.Setting off along a dirt road through the fields, some flooded, some drier, we had the constant company of hundreds upon hundreds of Open-billed Storks drifting past, hitting a thermal, kettling up, and the drifting on again. An immature Eastern Marsh Harrier (my fourth Harrier tick this year!) quartered the landscape, a couple of Purple Herons drifted by and a Black-winged Kite hovered a little way off. Smaller birds included several Stejneger’s Stonechats, some fly-by Eastern Yellow Wagtails, at least one Paddyfield Pipit and an Oriental Reed Warbler. Most incongruous sight was a small Freckle-breasted Woodpecker bounding in over an almost treeless landscape, pausing for a few minutes on a concrete telegraph pole, and then heading off again. Soon enough it was time to get going, and by now, for me at least, the excitement went up a notch, because we were heading for the salt pans. By nightfall Spoon-billed Sandpiper could be under the belt. Gulp. As we approached the coast we started to go through mangrove lined pools, we had our first Black-eared Kites over, and a roadside wire-perching Black-capped Kingfisher. And then there were the saltpans. A bizarre two-dimensional landscape, all right angles, straight edges and reflected skies. With birds in it. Lots and lots of birds. You’ll probably have read Mr Stratford’s account by now (and if you’ve managed to miss it make sure you check it out here <a href="http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=297711" target="_blank">http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=297711</a> , but finish reading mine first<img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite2" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=";)" />), but for what its worth here’s my take. An overwhelming variety of birds, different pans seem to be favoured by a different selection. On one it would be mostly Curlew Sandpipers, another a large Caspian Tern roost, Black-tailed Godwits on another. Red-necked Stints all over the place, Lesser & Greater Sandplovers, Kentish Plovers, Marsh Sandpipers, Sanderlings, occasional Redshank, Spotted Redshank & Greenshank, a single Bar-tailed Godwit, a few Brown-headed Gulls, a bank of roosting Curlews, a bewildering mass of waders, how the hell do you pick out what you want in this lot? I confess I paid scant regard to the astonishing spectacle while my appetite for Spoonies went unfulfilled. We knew we were in the right place, we’d been told to try and hone in on the most restless looking individual in any flock of Red-necks we saw. Being the weekend there were plenty of birders around to join in the search, which can pay dividends when indulging in this kind of birding, but in the end it was our very own Games who came up trumps, and we were soon enjoying views of the uber-rare super-strange Spoon-billed Sandpiper, buzzing around through the other assorted peeps. Once seen we repositioned for better light and slightly closer views, and Dave picked up a (the) second bird which eventually sat up on the bund for excellent and prolonged scope views. Bird of the trip, hands down, everything else is gravy! Now I could get on with properly enjoying the magnificent array of birds outlined above. It truly was spectacular, and more than a bit strange to be enjoying all these winter waders in the blazing heat and dazzling sunshine.We’d been led to believe that picking out Far Eastern Curlew in amongst the three hundred or so Eurasian was almost impossible. Well, there was no way we were letting that challenge go untested, and it took all of three minutes of scanning to nail the first (my spot), and then Dave picked out a second. We were helped by the fact the light was in our favour and the birds were facing away from us preening vigourously, enabling to pick up the darker rumped birds fairly easily. Had they been at rest it would have been nigh on impossible as although they do seem to have astonishingly long bills once found, it would be really tough to use this feature to pick them out. Eventually we moved on and found ourselves on a Thailand twitch; for Long-billed Dowitcher! A tick for Games, one had been seen near the famous “abandoned building”, and with various other target waders in the area off we went. Pacific Golden Plover joined the day’s ever growing wader tally, along with Temminck’s & Long-toed Stints, and Little Ringed Plover, with Germain’s Swiftlets hawking overhead. We scanned through all the Godwit flocks we could find but alas no Dowitcher, so we left Games to search and headed off to seek out the other super rare wader in town. This we found not far off, upwards of thirty Nordmann’s Greenshank in a flock of a couple of hundred Great Knot, bringing the day’s wader count to 24 species, with plenty more to go looking for the following day. As night fell we headed back to collect Games at the abandoned building, where huge Greater Flying Foxes, bigger than Buzzards, were heading off overhead to feed. As we headed back to the main road we past a rubbish dump, proper dark now, we picked up an Indian Nightjar perched out on one of the fence posts briefly. We stopped and piled out, and soon had up to three flying about us, with Games proving very proficient in wielding the spotlight. (Jos, was this where your car came to grief?) So endeth the day on which I saw SPOON-BILLED SANDPIPER. A good day.Savanna NightjarAsian Pied StarlingOpen-billed Storks x2Stejneger's Stonechat</blockquote>

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