Further Excursions In South Bali

Hi everyone, recently I have done a bit of birding around the resort and in some rice fields. I picked up a few life birds while birding at these two locations. I saw some very unexpected and cool birds at the hotel. On one random day when I was chilling by the pool, I saw about 50 GREAT AND LESSER FRIGATEBIRDS fly overhead! Here is a photo of a Great Frigatebird.

My sister even pointed out a BLACK CROWNED NIGHT HERON, which was the first sighting on the trip! On my last morning in Bali before we left for New Zealand at midnight, I birded the hotel grounds. I saw this cool lizard. This may be a flying lizard, it looks like it has wings.

I had spotted a bird in a tree and thought it was probably just a sparrow, but I'm glad I double checked because it was an ASHY TAILORBIRD! This is a bad photo of one, but this bird moves around as much as a kinglet, which is a good excuse for this shot.

My mom really wanted to see Ubud and the rice paddies, so we drove back to Ubud for a nice lunch. Lunch was really cool because we ate at a restaurant right in the middle of the ricepaddies! This restaurant is also at the same location as the Bali Bird Walks! You will notice that I saw a lot of the same birds I saw with Su. It was a 15 minute walk through the ricefields to the restaurant. On the walk, I saw this JAVAN KIGFISHER.

When we arrived, I ordered my food really fast and ran off to the rice fields behind the restaurant. There, I saw a group of about 35 WOOD SANDPIPER, which I think are the only sandpiper found in the rice fields.

I also saw a group of CATTLE EGRETS and flushed a PIN TAILED SNIPE out of the field. I really wanted to photograph the snipe, and I was lucky to get a photo last time I was here. The snipe hide in the thick rice paddies, making it so you can't see them. They always see you first, and my guess would be that 90% of sightings are of the bird fling away from you because they were flushed. Then, my mom called me back, and after a tasty lunch I was out in the field again, focused on sneaking up on a snipe, possibly snapping a photograph of one if I was lucky. I flushed a snipe out of the field. I walked on the dike to where he landed in the field. After flushing it several times, there was one point where I was so focused on finding a snipe in the fields, that I accidentally stepped off the dike into the ricefields and wet mud covered my legs and ruined my sandals. I chased 4 snipes around the paddies for several more minutes. People were starring by now, probably wondering what I was doing out on the dikes with binocs and a camera chasing birds all over the place, with mud on my feet and legs. But, I did snap a photo of this ZITTING CISTICOLA.

And this WHITE BREATED WATERHEN, the most common species seen throughout the day. On my trip with Su I only saw one, this time I saw a lucky eight waterhens.

We left the restaurant, and started to walk back. I scanned one more ricefield for birds, and found a CINNAMON BITTERN, which was in the same rice field as last time. At the end of the day, I never photographed or got good looks a the snipe, but I was ok wit it since I did last time. I was happy to be able to come back and show the rest of my family the Bali Bird Walks location and bird it again! Stay tuned, because just later that night I flew to New Zealand, where I spent 6 nights in Auckland, New Zealand, which is the countrys biggest city. Now I am going around the country in a campervan, which I have never done before.

Bird List South Bali

Great Fridgatebird X life bird!
Lesser Frigatebird X life bird!
Pin Tailed Snipe 5
White Breasted Waterhen 9
Black Crowned Night Heron 1
Cinnamon Bittern 1
Scaly Breasted Munia 4
Zitting Cisticola 2
Javan Kingfisher 2
Spotted Dove 3
Ashy Tailorbird 3 life bird!
Cattle Egret 5
Wood Sandpiper 35
Javan Pond Heron 2
White Breasted Woodswallow 4
Yellow Vented Bulbul X
Swallow sp. X
Eurasian Tree Sparrow X