Honey4Boyz

Besides the paddy fields, bird-watching is the next best attraction in Sekinchan. You don't have to look for them like in a treasure hunt. They're an open secret - tree birds, water birds, migratory birds; in flight or nestings in pairs on naked tree branches or having a fiesta in the fields or simply watching the day goes by on the electrical cables. A Cinnamon Bittern in the field.  We saw them often, in pairs usually, feasting in the paddy fields. A black-crowned night heron amongst the little egrets. A juvenile black-crowned night heron. I believe this is still a juvenile black-crowned night heron in transition to adulthood. A pair of black-crowned night herons at peak of breeding season. Can you spot the difference? An adult version We've taken so many pictures of the  black-crowned  night herons, but there're so many variations. The stocky bird has short neck, is usually active only at night, thus the name 'night heron...

Sekinchan basked in fields of golden glow and shades of refreshing green against a bright blue sky. We came in time to see the golden crop just a week or two before harvesting. What a glorious sight!  A hive of activity in Sekinchan fields, with farmers in the thick of harvesting. A calm moment frozen in time. I thot the field is always greener on the other side? In another 2 weeks' time, this will be Yellow. Meet the Farmers!  A loyal following of visitors... Extra income: Tour buggies doing their rounds at the paddy fields... A new version of the weather-Lollicock Flying a kite at the overcrowded beach A good pastime to watch fishing boats returning. Indeed, there's more to Sekinchan than meets the eye.

After the tree sparrow episode, we thought that it's a once in a blue moon happenstance. Lo and behold, the boys found a baby robin a few days later. It's learning to fly, but for a baby, it looked rather huge and fat. The robin parents were around and they made very loud, harsh threat calls like hissing krshhh whenever we went near the little one.  "Let's be friends!!" Unlike the poodle, Cookie was very aggressive towards the little Robin-hood. We tried as much as possible not to intervene, except to keep Robin-hood away from Cookie and harms. Cos it remained on the ground, hopping around, it's in constant danger. Fence or no fence, it did't stop Robin-hood from crossing into Cookie's territory. Can you see it squeezing thru? And that spelled trouble!!!! It's very interesting to observe the difference between the little sparrows and Robin-hood. The little sparrows flew almost immediately after they're fledged. Little robin, ho...

We've been hibernating at home in this crazy tropical heat, which sometimes peaked to 40C. One of those things you couldn't avoid during this El Nino heatwave is 'air-conditioning'. We tried to spend some time in the backyard, so we didn't have to coop inside all the time. Only two of the boys were on holidays, so we couldn't really go away, and mainly cos of the kitchen renovation too, which took 3 weeks. Apart from eating out, we gotta bear with the dust, noise and mess in the house. The boys have to look for their own entertainment in gym, playing football and watching our guests in the garden. Once we're excited by 3 bird eggs on our mulberry tree. The nest was badly built, like half-done. We tried to strengthen the nest, but our action caused the parents to abandon it entirely. Sadly, the eggs were destroyed in a bad storm one night. We also saw a hanging nest, like a wasp nest on a tree branch. But nothing prepared us for the thing that's gonna ha...