In search of Spoon-billed Sandpiper

I have had a fascinating week and have been able to look at a lot of birds with my humble Bressner 8 x 32 glasses. I have a certain attachment to these glasses as I bought them at Ascot Racecourse some years ago when I experienced the illusion of a winning day. The last thing I had in mind at the time was bird watching and particularily to be doing so in Thailand! There is a problem with the left glass which doesn’t focus brilliantly. But I am pleased to say the glasses are no longer getting me into trouble!

I live near an area where there have been regular sightings of spoon billed sandpipers. The species is listed as critically endangered. Unfortunately for me I have missed the spoon billed sandpipers. I think not having a spotting telescope is in fact a major disadvantage. These fellows are small, about 16 cm according to the field guide. So my Bressners are quite inadequate unless sandpipers do me a favour and pop up under my nose and wave their spoonbills about in the air!

More to the point there are so many different species of shorebirds in the salt pans and mudflats that I am not sure that I would be able to recognise any species other than the black winged stint. The latter is ubiquitous and beautiful with its very elegant, indeed sexy to my mind, pink legs. Talking of sexy looking birds, I think the little egret is straight out of design school, perfectly shaped and coloured.

I have a lot of work to do if I am going to be able to identify the plovers, sandpipers, ruff, greenshanks, tattlers, redshanks, knots, turnstones, dowitchers, godwits not to mention little stints, red necked stints, Temminck’s stints and long toed stints! Please note I haven’t mentioned sea gulls or terns!

The good news is I am expecting to take delivery of a turbo nutter Kowa spotting scope when my good friend Tony arrives in a couple of weeks. The bad news is I am likely to start full time work in May, become a father in July, and might not have the time for golf and birds. But in truth the bad news is wonderful….I am so happy about the prospect of being a father for the first time and the job means a degree of financial security and it means I can probably stay on in Thailand.

Back to the birds. Yesterday afternoon I was crawling about in the Pak Thale salt pans in pursuit of spoon billed sandpiper. What I did see was a pile of green shanks, plovers, egrets and the famous feral greater flamingo. When I saw it with my naked eye I thought it was a swan but when I got the Bressners on it I could see the groovy pink legs. This fellow has escaped from captivity and hangs out down here and seems to be in pretty good shape. Today I borrowed a small plastic boat with paddle and got in amongst the ruff near Wat Khao Takhroa. I must go back there and use that boat for a longer period of time; there are many interconnected fish ponds and with some protection from the sun and some cold drinks I imagine a very productive few hours could be whiled away.

Highlights would have to be: booted eagle wearing a fine pair of yellow boots and the ruff today.