There are some places that I go to frequently and have got to know the birds there like old friends. On the other hand there are some places that I seldom go to and Mae Wong National Park in the west of Thailand is one of those. My last visit to this location had been some years previous so it was almost like visiting a new place when I travelled there with Bill Collis at the end of April 2023.
Most birders in Thailand visit the north, the central and southern regions, each having its own distinctive species of birds but Mae Wong is sort of in between two of these regions, the north and central regions of Thailand. As such it has a wide variety of birds to see but for this trip it represented the closest place to Bangkok to see a selection of northern bird species as well as a few birds that are hard to see anywhere else in the country.
Staying in a local guesthouse in the nearby town of Klong Lan we travelled into Mae Wong National Park every day for three days, before moving on to the wetlands of Bueng Boraphet. Even though it was not peak birding season we saw a lot of fantastic birds, my own favourite being a little esoteric in Spot-necked Babbler, but species like Long-tailed Broadbill, Great Hornbill, Pied Kingfisher, Silver-eared Mesia, Rufous-throated Partridge, Banded Broadbill and Grey Peacock Pheasant are always fantastic.
By varying our time at the higher and lower altitudes of the national park and the different forest types that grow upon them as well as visiting several wetland areas we maximized the number of species we saw, had a nice variety of birds and made for an interesting short trip.
You can read a full trip report for this four day trip on my website - https://thaibirding.com/trip_reports/mae-wong-national-park-april-may-2023.htm
Pictured here are Long-tailed Broadbill, Golden-throated Barbet, Grey Peacock Pheasant, Kalij Pheasant, Lesser Yellownape, Mountain Bulbul, Mountain Imperial Pigeon, Pin-tailed Green Pigeon, Silver-eared Mesia, Small Niltava, White-necked Laughingthrush, Small Pratincole, Spotted Owlet, Tiger Shrike, Indochinese Bushlark and Purple Heron.