birding never sleeps: NE India part 1: Travel and Tinsukia ( Wednesday 08-Tuesday 14 January 2025)

Introduction: I visited Eaglenest in April 2007 (here) and although it was a good trip I had missed a few birds making it a part of the world I was keen to return to. When Nick Preston suggested I join him on a short winter trip there with Ornis I didn't require much persuasion - some tantalising new birds, renewing acquaintance with some old favourites and the hope of better views of Ward's Trogon immediately came to mind. This is the first of three blogs giving my take on the trip. New birds for me are shown in red. All photos are mine, birds taken with a Sony RX10 bridge camera, unless stated otherwise.

Wednesday 08 January. Megan dropped me at the National Express bus stop in Shoreham about 10 minutes before my 22:20 bus to Heathrow was due. My long journey had begun.

Thursday 09 January. I arrived at Terminal 3 soon after 01:00, slept fitfully on an uncomfortable chair until the Terminal came to life and checked in with Nick, who had been in an airport hotel, soon after 06:00. Our seven hour flight departed at 09:10 arriving in Dubai at 20:00 local time in very comfortable Airbus A380. One of the best flights I can remember with reasonable leg room, an impressive range of entertainments and decent food. Another doze in Dubai on marginally less uncomfortable chairs followed, waiting to check in for our connecting flight.

Friday 10 January. We departed from Dubai at 02:00 on an Emirates Boeing 777 to Kolkata where we arrived at 07:40 local time and cleared immigration with no issues. A Black Kite and 4 Common Mynas were seen from the airport. Our Indigo flight to Dibrugah was on time, departing at 14:00 and arriving at 15:40. After collecting our bags we met recently arrived Mika from Finland and Mike from Canada who were also on the tour. Middle aged (or older in my case) birders are usually easy to spot in foreign airports even if binoculars are still packed. We were met by one of our drivers who took us to the Hotel Centre Point in Tinsukia on a good road although being India there were a few cows and dogs to avoid. And a few obvious birds, from a back seat I saw White-breasted Waterhen, Indian Pond Heron, Western Cattle Egret and 10 Common Mynas. We checked in and joined the rest of the group for a meal, they'd arrived that morning and had visited some grasslands seeing, amongst others, a male Chinese Rubythroat. A good group as it turned out with Max from Holland, Chris a Brit mostly living in Australia and another Nick, also a Brit. Josh and Rofik were our guides.

Saturday 11 January. We left at 05:30 and drove in a convoy of three 4WDs for almost an hour to Dibou-Saikhoma National Park. There in very poor visibility we drove through a tea plantation to the edge of the River Lohit, a tributary of the Brahmaputra. There several 4-5 seater dug out canoes were waiting to ferry us across to a large grassy river island, currently invisible in the foggy conditions. Nick and I were in the first canoe and soon could neither see our destination nor those hopefully following behind. After what seemed an age paddling against quite a strong current the island emerged out of the fog. Our boatman didn't seem sure of where to land but found somewhere a bit further upstream to tie up and we wandered around for a while waiting for the others to appear. With no sign of them after 10-15 minutes we tried a few 100m further down river with similar effect. While wondering what to do the fog cleared a bit and we saw one of the other canoes looking for us. They indicated we should be further up river and with our boatman undecided we ended up pushing our way along an overgrown riverside path to pretty close to where we'd first landed. Together again we started birding in the tall grass soon finding our main targets, for me 2 each of Black-breasted Parrotbill, Jerdon's Babbler and Swamp Grass Babbler but I only saw Marsh Babbler in flight. Also on the island were a ringtail Hen Harrier, 6 Sand Larks, Delicate Prinia, 4 Striated Babblers, 8 Siberian Stonechats, an Eastern Yellow, 2 Citrine and 2 White Wagtails and a Rosy Pipit. We returned across the river to the tea plantations and birded some remnant forested patches at Beraku Wildlife Sanctuary looking primarily for Rusty-belied Shortwing although I only managed poor views (what was sadly to become a bit of a recurring theme for me with small birds in dark places). An Abbott's Babbler was little compensation. After a lunch stop where we were entertained by several Dusky and Greenish Warblers, Common Tailorbirds, Indian White-eyes, a female Daurian Resdstart and a Little Pied Flycatcher we split into two groups. I opted for another try at the shortwing with Rofik and the two Nicks, the others returning to grassland visited the previous day. We'd failed completely on our return to the shortwing site but Rofik knew another at a nearby small holding where he enticed a male Rusty-bellied Shortwing into view. Nice bird, as was an a mobile Slaty-bellied Tesia. We joined the others at the Maguribeel grasslands but the light was going and we saw little. We were back in Tinsukia after dark. During the day I had also seen 20 Lesser Whistling Duck, 60 Ruddy Shelduck, 8 Indian Spot-billed Duck, 6 Ferruginous Duck, 2 Asian Openbills, Lesser Adjutant, 6 Little Cormorants, Little Egret, 3 Indian Pond Herons, 2 Eastern Cattle Egrets, Asian Barred Owlet, White-throated and Pied Kingfishers, Black-hooded Oriole, White-throated Fantail, Grey-backed Shrike, 4 Cinereous Tits, 6 Red-vented Bulbuls, Grey-throated Martin, 20 Barn Swallows, 3 Yellow-browed and a Tickell's Warbler and an Olive-backed Pipit.

Black-breasted Parrotbill in Dibou-Saikhoma National Park

Jerdon's Babbler in Dibou-Saikhoma National Park

Asian Barred Owlet in Dibou-Saikhoma National Park

hotel window view, Tinsukia

Sunday 12 January. We left Tinsukia at 05:15 and drove to a forest patch in Digboi Oilfields where we had breakfast then birded from 06:30-08:30. Our main target was Chestnut-backed Laughingthrush, skulky like most laughingthrushes but we had reasonable views of 2 or 3 in a small mixed Greater and Lesser Necklaced Laughingthrush flock. Four Collared Treepies nearby were much more obliging while a Spotted Elachura remained in a dense thicket long enough for me to get a view. We moved on to the Dihing Patkai National Park where birded to 16:20 with a break for lunch. Here foe me the highlight was 2-3 Grey-lored Broadbills with a supporting case of an excellent White-browed Piculet, Yellow-bellied, Rufous-faced, White-spectacled, Chestnut-crowned and Yellow-vented Warblers, Rufous-throated and 2 Nepal Fulvettas and a brief view of an Orange-headed Ground Thrush. I also had disappointing views of 4 White-winged Duck and heard Grey Peacock-Pheasant and a close White-cheeked Partridge, some seeing the latter and a flock of Long-tailed Broadbills which was as gripping. The return drive to Tinsukia took over 90 minutes, not helped by heavy traffic – bikes, rickshaws, jeeps and trucks. Other birds for me included 2 female Red Jungle Fowl, 30 Yellow-footed and a Pin-tailed Green Pigeon, Crested Serpent Eagle, Collared Owlet (heard), White-throated Kingfisher, Pied Falconet, 2 Scarlet Minivets, Black-headed and Maroon Orioles, Bronzed Drongo, Grey-backed Shrike, Jay, 2 Sultan Tits, 2 Ashy and a Black-crested Bulbul, Pygmy Wren-Babbler (heard), Mountain Tailorbird, 3 Pin-striped Tit-Babblers, Velvet-fronted and Chestnut-bellied Nuthatches, Indian Pied Myna, Blue-throated Blue Flycatcher, Blue-winged Leafbird and Black-throated and Crimson Sunbirds.

Collared Treepie at Digboi Oilfields

Monday 13 January. We left Tinsukia at 05:00 and arrived at Dihing Patkai National Park at 06:15 where we birded to 12:00 concentrating first on a forest clearing at Margherita we’d visited twice the previous day. This time, after what seemed like quite a long wait but probably wasn’t much more than half an hour, a pair of Pale-capped Pigeon flew into a tree top. An increasingly hard to find species. Next an allegedly semi-tame male Grey Peacock Pheasant took a bit of tracking down before giving itself up spectacularly. The same was true of a calling White-cheeked Partridge, apart from the spectacularly bit, my views were brief but good. Other birds at Dihing Patkai were Asian Emerald Dove, Blue-throated Barbet, Pied Falconet, a heard Blue-naped Pitta (although my mono hearing may not have differentiated it calling from playback), 3 Rufous Treepies and Black-backed Forktail. The Asian Emerald Dove flew in through the forest and was about to land in the Peacock-Pheasant tree but saw us and shot off flushing the Grey Peacock-Pheasant as it did so. After lunch we returned to Tinsukia and the Maguribeel grasslands on the edge of town where I saw 2 Swamp Francolin, Red-wattled Lapwing, Green Sandpiper, Cinnamon Bittern, Grey-sided and Spotted/Baikal Bush Warblers (in flight - not easy to see in grass taller than I am), Striated Grassbird, 2 Siberian Stonechats and a White Wagtail. We were back at Tinsukia after dark, a successful three days in the area although it would have been nice to have had another day in the hope of catching up with Blue-naped Pitta (which I’d not seen since January 1980), Long-tailed Broadbill and Chinese Rubythroat.