Sunday, Jan 21 - Birding Mang Den

Overloaded Motor bike with broom straw harvest

Straw drying on highway center strip

End result!

 We met up at 6 AM for breakfast so that we could take off at 6:30 to go to the next hide. The hotel was just setting up as breakfast doesn’t really start until 6:30 but we were able to get coffee, French bread to slice and toast, yogurt, Vietnamese foods and even little cream cakes.  Bob ordered eggs as well. The staff are really nice and pleasant though their English is very limited.  If you want something off of the menu, it really helps to point to the item as it is listed in Vietnamese and English. Katy and I tried the yogurt with honey that was quite nice as well.

We took off just after 6:30 with Tien promising us that the walk to the hide would be much easier than on Friday - fingers crossed!  We had about a 40 minute drive and then started down the trail.  The first bit was a little steep but okay and the walk was pretty short.  Tien had to set up the hide - this one has no roof.  He brings the screening material with him and attaches it to trees and poles when he needs it.  It already has holes for viewing and he enhances the holes with sticks etc., to improve the viewing.  He spread mealy worms in various places and carefully arranges some sticks and parts of a log.  He also had his great folding chairs - these are small and more like a stool but have a back which is a major improvement over just a stool.  We were still in the process of sitting down when the first bird appeared.  He really is the bird whisperer!  This was another very exciting bird - Chestnut-eared Laughingthrush.  It is very shy and we had no guarantee that we would see it.  In fact the small group that we have crossed paths with a couple of times in the last 2 weeks, spent 4 hours looking for this bird yesterday and didn’t see it.

Chestnut-eared Laughingthrush

My hide hole

Set up to attract the birds

So we saw it immediately!  And then two other species - White-gorgeted Flycatcher and Mountain Fulveta (very cute).  The Laughingthrush, like the Golden-winged we saw on Friday are both in vulnerable status.  There aren’t many and they are hard to see.  We watched for about an hour and a half as they came back multiple times to gorge on the mealy worms.  We got great views of all of them and Bob got 3 life birds in that time.

We walked back to the van slowly and though there were a couple of spots where you needed to be very careful, we got back easily.  We then wandered down the street seeing what else might be about.  Tien saw and heard a Red-headed Trogon, he wouldn’t cooperate - I saw movement but didn’t really see the bird.  We started to drive back to the hotel but stopped at a lovely overview because Tien spotted a bird.  This was a Vinous-breasted Starling and a life bird #4 for Bob for the day.

Valley of rice fields with mountains behind

We returned to the hotel just after 11:30 and decided to meet up for lunch at 12:30.  I sat out on the dining terrace by their beautiful pool and read for a bit in the warm sunshine.   For lunch, three of us ordered the Club sandwich which seemed a good bet.  Katy ordered a Papaya salad with pork.  The sandwich came with cucumber and an egg and French fries.  I enjoyed it but David doesn’t like cucumber and doesn’t do fried egg but he could extract those bits and eat the rest. Katy’s salad was large with lots of big shrimp crisps on the side. We were meeting back at the van at 3 PM so had a bit of time to relax in between. 

Lovely pool at the hotel - not quite warm enough for a swim

 At 3 PM, I was outside with David as the van drove up and Tien saw a bird.  We crossed the street as Katy and Bob came out and they followed us up a vacant lot.  (There are 5 large houses across from the hotel and they are all abandoned. There are quite a few places where we have seen this.  There were a lot of empty, never finished hotels in Danang for instance.  Whether this is an offshoot of the pandemic or risky investments or what, we don’t know.). Tien was on a Velvet-fronted Nuthatch which I finally saw.  He then got Katy and me to locate a Grey-capped Woodpecker.  Bob also saw Indochinese Cuckooshrike - life bird 5 for the day!

We took off about 3:30 to head for another hide though Tien said that the beginning of this trail is a bit rough.  We drove to the point but all decided that trying to slip/slide down yet another trail was not in the cards for this afternoon.  There was only one bird that might show up there so we figured that with 12 more days to go, we’d opt for safety.