THREE WEEKS IN THAILAND 4. KAEN KRACHANG NP
The last days of our VENT trip we spent in Kaen Krachang NP, a large forested area with only 2 roads and also quite few tracks. We stayed at a countryclub-like place outside the park, where our rooms were so far from the reception and restaurant, that we had to be transported by golf carts. Interesting rooms, as they contained a small zoo, it turned out: in my room there were three frogs of two different species, a very large flat spider, the usual small gekkos, and their predator, the tokeh, who announced his presence now and then with a loud ‘gekko’ (or ‘tokeh’). In a loudspeaker in he restaurant a Hoopoe nested and had two small, but already crested young, and close to our room a nightjar sat on its eggs (?); more thorough studies showed that it was not the Large-tailed Nightjar that we heard a lot around here, but an Indian Nightjar.
Also outside the park proper is Ban Nok San, a place where a retired school-teacher has created a bird paradise by constructing a few pools and feeding regularly. There is a lee-screen from behind which one can observe the birds. Easy birding, this: one sits on a stool and peers through the holes, and lots of birds come and show themselves. There were Greater and Lesser Necklaced Laughing Thrushes, Siberian Blue Robin, Tickell’s Blue Flycatcher, Abbott’s Babbler, Buff-brested Babbler, and both Large and White-browed Scimitar Babbler. Red Jungle Fowl was a common visitor, and even the otherwise so shy Bar-backed Partridge could here be watched at leisure. There were also mammals here, Indochinese Ground Squirrel and Northern Tree Shrew, all clearly habituated to this place.
The park itself was a wonderful and wild place, full of colourful butterflies. One had to leave own transport at the gate, and we were within the park transported in open ‘bakkies’, a bit of a problem now and then, as we had several thunderstorms; fortunately things dry out quite quickly in these temperatures. We entered the first day through the one road, and found two bull elephants. Otherwise also here there were various squirrels, and the constant gibbon song, but this park also had two species of leaf monkeys, the common Dusky and the rarer Banded, and we watched both in their very hazardous-looking ‘long jumps’ from tree to tree. A very large fruit tree that we had found the first afternoon, and which we hoped would be full of fruit-eating birds the next morning, was instead full of monkeys. There still were many leafbirds, fairy bluebirds and barbets, but the hornbills were clearly not willing to land there, as long as there were so many monkeys, and there were also fewer pigeons than usual, although we did find the uncommon Yellow-vented Pigeon (besides the often common Thick-billed Pigeon), and had close ups of a calling Mountain Imperial Pigeon.
Kaen Krachang was also the area for the broadbills for us this time. Earlier we had had several chances to admire the Long-tailed Broadbill, but here we found first the exquisite Silver-breasted Broadbill, and the next day the chunky Dusky Broadbill, almost a caricature of a bird. On the last day we chased also the Black-and-Yellow Broadbill for a long time, but although we heard its very characteristic ‘boiling kettle’ call all around us, we never got to see the birds themselves. But we did succeed in seeing the Green Magpie (A bird I missed so often during an earlier trip to Buthan, that I started doubting that it really existed), as well as the very uncommon-looking Ratchet-tailed Magpie, living here in an isolated local population. And of course also here we had a new flycatcher and a few more bulbuls, as well as the nice Spot-necked Babbler and lour first Orange-bellied Leafbird.
All in all this has been a wonderful trip, and I have seen many more birds than I ever could have found by myself. Many thanks Dion and Mike, and also Jane, Linda, Pamela, Sharon, David, Jim and Mike, who all showed me birds I had not found by myself and who also were such good company!
Wim Vader, Tromsø Museum
9037 Tromsø, Norway
wim.vader@uit.no
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