Ang Trapeang Thmor and Changkran Roy: Distant Lifers and Near Misses

Blue-winged Leafbird- my life bird #2000!

My first week and a half in Cambodia I'd been birding entirely solo- partly because I was squeezing in my birding in between my busy work schedule, and partly because I wanted to see how well I could do birding on my own in a new country. I think I did fairly well for myself- seeing about 120 species across 4 or 5 proper birding outings, including a few dozen lifers and sought-after birds like Cambodian Tailorbird, White-throated Rock Thrush, and Forest Wagtail. However, for my first full weekend of birding in the country, the plan was to go out in a more organized fashion with a proper birding guide.

I generally bird solo when I'm traveling (for instance, I managed to bird all of Ethiopia without a guide), although this has more to do with not having been able to afford one than any misplaced faith in my birding abilities. However, recently I've come around more to using guides when I'm in new places. In part it's because I think it makes sense to contribute as much as possible to local communities in the developed world while birding, since they're ultimately the ones responsible for protecting birds and their habitat. In a more practical sense, it's better to have another pair of eyes with me in the field, especially someone who's better at birding than I am because let's be honest- Ted Parker I ain't. I don't really share the opinion of certain birders (especially those of uh, a certain demographic) that lifers don't mean as much if someone else pointed them out to you.

Most importantly, philosophical ponderings aside, it's virtually impossible for foreign birders to visit the best birding sites in Cambodia without a guide and a tour outfit. The main reason is that the major birding sites in the country are run as community-based ecotourism projects, where local communities actively protect bird habitats and the nesting sites of certain endangered species and in exchange charge an entry fee to visitors (more thoughts about those in a future blog post). Very little English is spoken outside of big cities like Phnom Penh and Siem Reap, so unless you speak good Khmer it's necessary to have a local guide who can help facilitate entry and alerting the local rangers to be available and/or stake out certain birds in advance. The other reason is that there's really no replacement for local knowledge: even if you've studied the heck out of Cambodian birds and bird ID, there are lots of birds that can only be seen at stake-outs known to local guides, and if you can get a good guide like I did I guarantee they will know more than you anyway.

For my birding outings in Cambodia I booked with the Cambodia Bird Guide Association (CBGA), one of the two main birding outfits in the country. I guided for Jonny, Srun, and Chea of the CBGA on our epic trip to Lake Holon in 2018, so it was a great excuse to get back in touch with some old friends. CBGA is also an excellent, well-run organization that's doing a lot of important work for wildlife conservation in Cambodia, and I can highly recommend them to anyone thinking of doing a birding trip in the country. My guide for both outings was Nara Duong, who turned out to be an extremely good guide, and one of the best all-around birders I've ever had the pleasure of going out with- he constantly left me in the dust in terms of bird ID skills, bird spotting, and just general know-how. If your goal is to maximize your Cambodia list and see all your targets, I'm sure Nara has very few equals.

Anyway, with that long preamble over with, back to the actual birding. My destinations for the weekend of March 12 were the Ang Trapeang Thmor reservoir and the Changkran Roy forest reserve, both a few hours north of Siem Reap. Neither are on the most-traveled bird tour circuits, but hold a few extremely rare or difficult birds that made them worth combining into a 2-day trip. Nara picked me up from my hotel in Siem Reap at 5AM on Saturday the 12th, and we drive westwards towards Ang Trapeang Thmor. Ang Trapeang Thmor, sometimes spelled as Ang Trapeang Thma and more commonly known as ATT, is a reservoir built at the site of an ancient Angkorian causeway that is now one of the best places to see the endangered Sarus Crane, the largest crane in the world. Obviously the cranes were my primary target of the morning, but it is also the site of several other wetland and open country birds that would be lifers for me.

We arrived at ATT a little before 8 in the morning, slightly later than intended due to some stops along the way. Our first stop was on the edge of the reservoir, where a little wetland on the side of the road held many Grey-headed Swamphens, Bronzed Jacanas, Lesser Whistling Ducks, and my lifer Indian Spot-billed Ducks, none of which seemed in the mood to pose for pictures. In the reservoir itself were many Cotton Pygmy Geese, egrets of all kinds, a huge flock of Garganeys, and hundreds of cormorants, including Little Cormorant, Indian Cormorant, and Great Cormorant. Baya Weavers were constructing their nests by the roadside, allowing me to get my first decent pictures of that species.

Male Baya Weaver building his impressive hanging nest

Lesser Whistling Ducks

Hundreds of distant egrets and cormorants on the reservoir

The Ang Trapeang Thmor reservoir

I would have liked to stay by the reservoir a while longer to scan for other water birds and try for some better pictures, but our late start meant that we had to keep going to the crane area as they apparently go farther and farther into the inaccessible wetlands as the day goes on. To get to the cranes it was a surprisingly long, bumpy ride along dirt roads through parched rice fields and growing heat haze. We stopped a few times to get a look at some new Cambodia birds for me- Red-wattled Lapwings, Wood Sandpipers, and my long-overdue lifer Red-throated Pipit. We finally arrived at the edge of the crane habitat: a wet field at the very northern edge of the reservoir, which got progressively marshier and less accessible to the south. A park ranger was already waiting for us there, having looked for the cranes that morning. We parked the car and walked about 500 feet in the already-oppressive heat until we finally saw a small group of very distant Sarus Cranes, barely visible through the shimmering heat haze. I also spotted a very distant pair of Greater Spotted Eagles chasing each other past the cranes, another one of the specialty birds at ATT.

Sarus Cranes!

Intermediate Egret flying overhead

Wandering Midget damselfly

Atractomorpha lata, a slant-faced grasshopper

Crane habitat in ATT- there are 32 cranes in this image, and the fact you can't see any of them should give a good idea of how distant they are.

Hiking out to look for cranes

Looking at distant cranes

Although it wasn't the point-blank view of Sarus Cranes I was hoping for, it was still surprisingly breathtaking to see them in the wild. Even from a distance I can tell they're absolutely massive birds- the tallest flying birds in the world, in fact! Sadly even though ATT is protected the population is still decreasing each year, as farmland continues to encroach on the reservoir. The cranes are already completely extirpated from Thailand and the Philippines and decreasing in the rest of their range, so I can only hope that the remaining populations in India, Southeast Asia, and Australia manage to hold on.

With the cranes successfully seen, we headed even further north to another good birding site in ATT. I spotted a large raptor flying nearby, and we hopped out of the car to look at it and take pictures. My initial thought was that it was the usual Greater Spotted Eagle, but it was smaller and had narrower wings. We eventually IDed it as an Indian Spotted Eagle, a very uncommon resident in Cambodia. Now that I finally have the pictures on my computer, however, I've realized that it's most likely an even rarer Eastern Imperial Eagle, a vagrant to Cambodia with only one other record on eBird (also from Ang Trapeang Thmor). I have exactly zero prior experience with raptors in mainland Asia and I managed to leave my field guide behind in Cambodia, so I'm happy to hear any other opinions on what this bird might.

Eastern Imperial Eagle?!

We continued onwards, stopping for some very cooperative Oriental Pratincoles and a distant Greater Spotted Eagle along the way. Finally we arrived at the famous ATT woodlands, really just a few small patches of trees separated by dry, dusty fields. Our local guide went into the woods to look for roosting owls, while Nara and I looked around the outside of the forest to see what might come by. A group of noisy, beautiful Common Flamebacks were chasing each other around on the trees, and we had a distant look at a gorgeous Black-headed Woodpecker. Great Mynas, Black Drongos and Plain-backed Sparrows gave pretty good looks as well.

Common Flamebacks- male on the bottom, female on top

Black-headed Woodpecker- easily one of the best woodpeckers in the world, glad this wasn't the only time I managed to see it in Cambodia

Great Myna

Plain-backed Sparrow- always a nice break from the never-ending parade of House Sparrows and Eurasian Tree Sparrows in Cambodia

Black Drongo, having about as much fun with the heat as I was

Asian Weaver Ants on the carcass of a dead snake- pretty metal

The woodlands are most famous for their owls, however, and they were indeed present: by accident we flushed a family of Barn Owls roosting in one of the main woodlands, and they kept flying around the rest of the time we were there. We got quick looks at tiny Asian Barred Owlets and a Spotted Owlet as they flew from one forest patch to another, but they never stopped long enough for pictures. There had previously been a group of Spotted Wood Owls roosting in this area, but we didn't see them and it seems there haven't been any records for a couple of years so I suspect they've moved on.

Barn Owl

Ang Trapeang Thmor was a great success overall- despite missing some of my longer-shot targets and not getting the smashing looks at Sarus Crane I was hoping for it was still a fascinating, wildlife-filled spot to go birding in, and I finished with one of my biggest eBird lists ever. Satisfied and a little bit hot and hungry, we headed back to the nearby village to eat lunch and pay for the community ecotourism fee.

After lunch we drove back eastwards by way of Siem Reap, then north again to Changkran Roy, the second weekend destination. Similar to ATT, Changkran Roy is a community-based ecotourism area, where the local villagers preserve the habitat and in exchange receive the tourism fees from birders and hikers visiting the area. The habitat is quite different, however: in this case the villagers are preserving a nice big patch of tropical evergreen forest on a plateau in northern Cambodia. Most of the forest in the lowlands of Cambodia is tropical deciduous forest, but apparently the plateau is just high enough to create more precipitation and make things a little bit wetter. Overall it was a nice break from the dryer habitats I visited everywhere else in the country.

It was about a 2-hour drive to Changkran Roy, going from nice concrete roads in Siem Reap to crappy concrete roads full of local teens driving tractors in the countryside, then on to dirt roads as we approached the forest. We stopped a couple times on the way into the site for roadside birds, including my lifers Black-crested Bulbul and Rufous-winged Buzzard (both of which I was to see many, many more times later on). At the turn-off toward the village of Changkran Roy Nara pointed out a very large tree that had a nesting pair of Spotted Owlets. Sure enough, after a moment of scanning I was able to spot a single Spotted Owlet glaring out at us from high in the tree, the only time I ever managed to photograph this very cute little owl.

Spotted Owlet

The Spotted Owlet tree

It was getting late in the day, so we headed straight for our destination for the afternoon: the birding hide in Changkran Roy. As part of the ecotourism venture the local village set up a little blind inside the forest and provide some little bird baths and a cleared-out area in front where the local birds can come and bathe. This was my first time visiting a birding blind (they're not really a thing in the Philippines for... a variety of reasons), so I wasn't quite sure what to expect, but I followed Nara into the blind and we sat and waited for the birds to arrive, poking our binoculars and camera out of the tiny holes cut in the mesh.

As it turns out, late afternoon up to sunset is the best time to be at the birding blind, as the birds come down to the forest floor to bathe and cool off from the sweltering heat of the Cambodian day. As we were walking to the hide we saw a pair of Green-eared Barbets, a bird I'd heard before but never seen. Inside the hide a nice assortment of birds came down to bath: many Black-crested Bulbuls and Streak-throated Bulbuls, male and female Hainan Blue Flycatchers, a pair of Black-naped Monarchs, a female White-rumped Shama, and a pair of Common Emerald Doves.

Green-eared Barbet

Streak-throated Bulbul- one of the few pycnonotus bulbuls worth seeing!

Female Hainan Blue Flycatcher

Male Black-naped Monarch

Male Common Emerald Dove

Female White-rumped Shama

Male Hainan Blue Flycatcher

Things got more interesting as the light got worse: a few Puff-throated Bulbuls and a pair of Siberian Blue Robins, including a gorgeous male bird, a Grey-headed Canary Flycatcher, and an assorted flock of babblers: Puff-throated Babblers, Abbot's Babblers, and a single Scaly-crowned Babblers. Just as the sun was setting, a single rare Ochraceous Bulbul flew in. We heard a Common Green Magpie calling and Nara saw it briefly, but I never saw it at all unfortunately. It was so dark for most of this that it was a struggle to get good pictures, even in a blind which is sort of the ideal bird photography set-up, but thankfully my Olympus camera's image stabilization really pulled through and I ended up with lots of usable shots.

Puff-throated Bulbul

Female Siberian Blue Robin

Male Siberian Blue Robin- what a stunner!

Grey-headed Canary Flycatcher

Scaly-crowned Babbler

Puff-throated Babbler

Abbott's Babbler

Ochraceous Bulbul- this picture was taken at 1/4 of a second shutter speed and ISO 6400, in case you were wondering how Olympus cameras do in low light these days

This was my first time using a bird hide, and I must say I can see why they're so popular with bird photographers. So many forest birds can be nigh impossible without a lot of luck and hard work, but here I could just sit and wait for them to come right in front of my face so I could get spectacular pictures. I must say it almost feels a little *too* easy to me- I'm used to putting in the work necessary to get the rare good picture of small birds in the middle of the forest, and I do think that feels more rewarding. Of course, I sometimes use playback and pursue birds along trails to get better views or pictures, so it's not as if "traditional" birding is necessarily less intrusive for birds. Bird blinds still aren't my favorite way of birding (that's running into a mixed feeding flock in the middle of cloud forest), but I do enjoy the chance to sit down and get longer, closer-up looks at birds in their natural environments.

After night fell, we left the hide and were about to head back to the car, but suddenly heard the call of a Blyth's Frogmouth in the distance. We played a quick burst of playback, and after a bit Nara somehow managed to pick up the frogmouth sitting right in front of us, even in the pitch black. I was able to get a few pictures of it before it flew off- a very exciting bird as there aren't many records of it in Cambodia, with most of them from the Okoki swamp on the other end of the country.

Blyth's Frogmouth!

With the frogmouth in the bag we headed back to the village, where we put our things in the cabins we were staying in and ate some dinner. After dinner we headed to a different spot a ways down the road, near the edge of the forest. The local guide had apparently heard an Oriental Bay Owl here a couple of weeks ago. We spent a while wandering around along the road until we heard an Oriental Bay Owl calling from very far off. We tried to get a little closer to it by bushwhacking a path through the jungle, but it stopped calling and we headed back to the road when the vegetation got too thick. As we walked slowly back toward the car, I scanned around with my Pulsar scope and suddenly picked up a big bird perched silently on a vertical trunk by the side of the road- Oriental Bay Owl! I was able to get off a few pictures before it flew off, never having called even once. Definitely a triumph for the thermal scope. We spent the next bit jumping around in happiness along the road, as the bay owl is an incredibly difficult bird in any part of its range, but especially in Cambodia, where this was one of only a handful of records for this site.

Oriental Bay Owl!

We returned to our cabins after that, trying a couple of times unsuccessfully for Collared Scops Owl along the way. An Asian Barred Owlet was calling near the cabin but remained resolutely out of view- another frustrating miss for a bird that is supposed to be rather common. I spent an uncomfortable night in the very basic wood huts at Changkran Roy- while the accommodation was fine, the bed appeared to be in the way of a long line of ants that kept waking me up as they crawled over me. More fun in the tropics!

The next morning, we headed back to the birding blind before sunrise. While early morning isn't the best time for the birding blind since most birds are up in the canopy feeding and singing, but apparently some of the local specialties like Bar-bellied Pitta, Green-legged Partridge and Siamese Fireback are most likely to visit the baths at that time. It proved to be a frustrating morning: Bar-bellied Pitta and Green-legged Partridge called from near the hide, but never came into view (one drawback of using blinds is that it's hard to get out and chase birds- we likely would have seen the pitta at least if we'd been able to move around a bit). Meanwhile other birds barely came in, mostly thanks to the local pair of White-rumped Shamas that appeared to have claimed the baths of their own and aggressively chased off any other bird that tried to visit.

Male White-rumped Shama- a gorgeous beast, even if it was being annoyingly aggressive

Female White-rumped Shama

There were still a few good birds though- an adorable Puff-throated Babbler was a nice morning bird, and I finally got a picture of Pale-legged Leaf Warbler. Otherwise Streak-throated Bulbuls and Black-crested Bulbuls were the only ones willing to brave the wrath of the shamas. A Northern Treeshrew and an Indochinese Ground Squirrel were some nice mammal lifers.

Puff-throated Babbler

Pale-legged Leaf Warbler

Streak-throated Bulbul

Female Common Emerald Dove

Northern Treeshrew

Indochinese Ground Squirrel

Nara and I inside the birding blind

After a couple of hours at a quiet birding blind, we headed out to walk along the road a while. We saw a few new birds, like Crested Goshawk and Japanese Sparrowhawk, but mostly it was a good walk for me to get some butterfly pictures to increase my Cambodia lepidoptera list.

The Changkran Roy forest road

Genusa bigutta, an impressive geometrid moth

Pale Four-line Blue

Common Tit, another butterfly with a bird name

Grey Count

Common Baron, I think

The road was fairly quiet, so we got back in the car and headed to the other side of Changkran Roy to look for my biggest target of the trip: Coral-billed Ground Cuckoo. Ground cuckoos in general are huge, beautiful skulking beasts that are rarely heard and much, much rarely seen- especially the Southeast Asian birds, which don't even have army ant swarms to follow like their distant cousins in Latin America. Changkran Roy is one of the few places where Coral-billed Ground Cuckoo can be seen in Cambodia, and while it's incredibly rare there the villagers had reported hearing it on and off for the past couple of weeks so I was cautiously hopeful.

We first went to a small blind in the woods where the cuckoo could sometimes be seen. There wasn't much there besides a flock of Puff-throated Bulbuls, but after sitting for a while we heard the keening call of a Coral-billed Ground Cuckoo very far away. We sat tight for a while to see if it might come nearer to the hide, but it remained far away so we decided to go chase it on our own. After 20 minutes of bushwhacking through the thick undergrowth, we suddenly heard it calling from very close by. We settled down in a clear spot and waited to see if it would come into view. Soon we had a ground cuckoo calling from very near us- close enough I was able to get a good recording and it seemed almost impossible that I couldn't see a bird the size of a pheasant that must have been less than 20 feet in front of me. We waited for a solid half hour but never managed to get a look at the cuckoo. Finally, Nara got up to move our speaker to a different spot to see if the bird would come in to playback, but that was enough to flush the bird- I heard enormous wingbeats disappearing into the jungle, and then nothing.

At the time I didn't even mind too much, since I was excited to have come so close to such an elusive bird and to hear it so well. Thinking back on it though, it just gets more frustrating- the thought that if I'd sat in a slightly different spot, or stood up just a second or two sooner, I would have seen one of the most difficult cuckoos in Asia. It certainly earns its place at the top of my most annoying heard-only birds, up there with Javan Cochoa and Flame-breasted Fruit Dove. Ah well- such is birding!

Irura bidenticulata, a beautiful little jumping spider

Thyas honesta, an underwing moth that was practically dead by the time I saw it

Green-striped Palmer

We headed back to our homestay, although I made Nara stop so I could get pictures of a spectacular mixed flock of butterflies hanging out at a mud puddle. We also stopped for a huge Crested Serpent Eagle perched along the side of the road, first chance to get a decent picture of one. At our homestay we ate lunch and I wandered around a little more on my own. I happened upon a small flock of birds nearby a small stream, including my lifer Bar-winged Flycatcher-shrike and my Cambodia lifers Arctic Warbler and Ruby-cheeked Sunbird.

Crested Serpent-eagle- I hadn't realized how much bigger they are than Philippine Serpent-eagle

Bar-winged Flycatcher-shrike

Spotted Forest Skink

Spotted Jay (yes, yet another example of entomologists not having any original ideas and just stealing bird names instead)

Chain Swordtail

Four species of Graphium butterflies in one picture! Five-bar Swordtail, Chain Swordtail, Common Jay, and Spotted Zebra

Striped Albatross

Common Bluebottle

Common Pierrot

Marbled Mapwing

Great Zebra- not a zebra and not even that great if we're being totally honest

Fluffy Tit- no making fun of its name, it takes itself very seriously

Yellow Orange Tip

Striped Zebra

Oriental Garden Lizard

After lunch we headed back to the blind, where the plan was to stay until the late afternoon then head back to Siem Reap. Nara laid down on the ground for a nap, while I stationed myself near one of the openings, looking out for birds. Over lunch I'd done some counting up of my life list and realized that with the morning's lifers I was at 1,999 species! I don't really care about my life list a huge amount, but obviously life bird #2,000 has to be a good one, not some random bulbul or phylloscopus warbler or (even worse) a heard-only bird. Thus, I was looking out and hoping that whatever new bird came up it would be a good one.

Things were pretty slow at first, with mostly just Black-crested Bulbuls and Streak-throated Bulbuls coming in to bathe. The Northern Tree-shrew came in briefly which was nice, and a male and female Black-naped Monarch made an appearance. Suddenly, there was a bright flash of green in front of me as some new bird came in. I searched frantically until I saw it- a beautiful female Blue-winged Leafbird was perched in front of me, the more difficult of the two leafbirds in Cambodia and a great bird for my number 2,000. I probably won't get a tattoo of it like some of my friends do (hi Josh!), but it's definitely one of my favorite memories, especially since it was a self-found one.

Streak-throated Bulbul

Black-crested Bulbul- a bit of a trash bird at Changkran Roy, but a snazzy one at least

Northern Treeshrew

Common Yeoman coming in for a drink

Blue-winged Leafbird!

Some more good birds came in later in the afternoon- White-bellied Erpornis, Puff-throated Babblers, Pin-striped Tit-babbler, a hulking Green-eared Barbet, and the usual White-rumped Shama and assortment of bulbuls. There was a moment of excitement when an enormous King Cobra slithered through, spooking the birds and giving us a bit of a jump scare as well- a really impressive snake even though I'm glad it didn't head for the hide. I got a good look at a huge, distant Large Scimitar-babbler, another of the Changkran Roy specialties, although I didn't manage a picture.

White-bellied Erpornis

Puff-throated Babbler

Pin-striped Tit-babbler

Green-eared Bulbul

Puff-throated Bulbul

Male White-rumped Shama

Male Black-naped Monarch

Female Black-naped Monarch

King Cobra- sadly I wasn't able to get a better picture as I didn't have time to adjust my camera settings

Eventually we had to head out of Changkran Roy so we could get back to Siem Reap before it got too late. While I thought that was the end of birding for the day, the road out of Changkran Roy heading south turned out to be surprisingly full of birds, traveling through open, semi-deciduous forest. We stopped for a pair of Racket-tailed Treepies that flew across the road, only for me to look behind me and see a perched Blue-bearded Bee-eater, one of my long-shot targets for Cambodia that I was sure I would miss. There were a few Black Bazas perched in a distant tree, and shortly after we saw a distant White-crested Laughingthrush and a nice and close-by Indochinese Roller. Further along the road a pair of Greater Flamebacks flew across the road, followed by a group of Large Cuckooshrikes and a perched Square-tailed Drongo-cuckoo. Our final stop was for a Rufous Treepie and a few beautiful Chestnut-crowned Bee-eaters perched by the side of the road. It was a perfect, bird-filled end to one of the best weekends of birding I've ever had, one that made me even more excited for my next outing.