Notes of a Journey on the Upper Mekong, Siam

by H. Warington Smyth

Of the kingfishers I only saw on the Mekong one or two specimens of the pied bird. Crossing from the Meinam, however, there was a very small one we frequently met in the mountain streams flowing down to that river, which would suddenly fly off up stream with a low whistle. I did not procure any, but from its size it was probably the little three-toed kingfisher. Another we constantly saw perched on a bamboo overhanging the water, or poising in the air, must have been, from its high colouring, the little Indian kingfisher.

Of herons, I saw, and shot, the large white heron (as on the Meinam), singly and in flocks, on the sand-banks; the common heron, generally stalking singly on the sand-spits, and hard to get near; the purple, of which I saw two couples in the lowlands: the little black-billed white heron, in flocks on the flat by the paddy fields; the cattle egret, walking about with the buffaloes, or perched on their backs; and the pond heron, which one would almost stumble upon, so invisible was he on the ground, till away he sped aloft, and then the white wings were clear cut against the blue sky overhead.

Of eagles, there was the osprey, with his white head, hovering after fish, and a larger bird in swamps near the jungle, with white and darting broad tail, and the upper plumage and breast brown, presumably the bar-tailed fishing eagle. I saw some small species too, but never shot any, and, except the black eagle in the forest-covered hills soaring above us on the wing, and a large, slow, sluggish bird, like that we saw on the Meinam, with a hoarse cry (qu. steppe eagle), I seldom got a good view of them.

Adjutants, which they call nok karien, I saw in flocks of four, six, or eight in the paddy fields of the Chieng Kong, Nam Ngau, and Khorat plains. They were fairly tame, but with the rifle I could not get nearer than 200 yards; the whistle of a bullet sent them sluggishly flopping their great wings 50 yards or so on, and to follow them was an endless pursuit.

Pea-fowl are very common here and on the Nam Nan.

Often and often, far overhead above the jungle, would come the measured sound which the great pied hornbill makes with each sweep of the wings, an indescribable sound, half a "whirr" and half the "whistle of a sword swept through the air." They were always in couples, and flew high.

The white ibis, walking about in flocks in shallow water, and the little cotton teal goose, also in flocks, in swampy back waters, who would dive and disappear to a man, I saw several times.

Two specimens of the large grey-headed imperial pigeon, with chestnut back and wing coverts, were shot by my Tuon boatman in the hills above the Meinam. The common "wood pigeon" is seen and heard all through Siam. In the open plains and jungles a dove, of which I shot many for breakfast, was very common; this seems to be the Malay spotted dove.

There are other doves common in different parts of Siam, and wagtails and sandpipers innumerable, but I cannot now name them.

As to the nok poot, with his slight crest, dull red-wing coverts and long dark green tail feathers, and his habit of drinking where he finds water, and of running swiftly off into the low jungle, he must, I think, be a pheasant. This is absolutely the commonest bird in the country, and that "poot, poot" sound is never silent for long; at night I have often heard a chorus of this sound from out the jungle all round, and always at the hours of cock crow, i.e. 9 p.m., midnight, 3, and 6 a.m., as mentioned above. The cock in this country is used for a timepiece at night, as well as a fighting champion by day, and not a boat or an ox-cart, caravan, or a cottage in the whole country but has its cock. One result of this cockfighting mania is very funny: the birds become pets, as dogs and cats do with us, and the small boys go out walking with these things carried lovingly in their arms; you may see them stroking them and looking longingly into their ugly faces as if they found some expression therein. But their end is generally in a curry, and very tough they make it. This form of sport is on the whole most outrageously general in Siam proper.