Rallina fasciata

Kaeng Krachan National Park, Thailand

My meeting with the beautiful Red-legged Crake was an amazing experience in the dense rain forest on the eastern slope of the Tenasserim Mountain Range in the Kaeng Krachan National Park where the Pranburi & Phetchaburi Rivers originate. Kaeng Krachan National Park is the largest national park of Thailand on the border with Burma, contiguous with the Tanintharyi Nature Reserve. We were in a hide which was originally used for poaching and now it serves as a spectacular hide for bird watchers and photographers. At the time it was a good 45 minute walk from the main track into dense brush to get to the hide. There was only one way in and out of the brush and one needed to keep a wary eye out for the creepy crawlies.

The park was declared a reserve in 1964 and on 12 June 1981 it became the 28th national park of Thailand. Originally covering an area of 2,478 km2, it was enlarged in December 1984 to include the boundary area between Phetchaburi and Prachuap Khiri Khan Provinces, an additional 300,000 rai. The park has been included in the list of ASEAN Heritage Parks. Since 2011, Thailand has proposed that Unesco designate Kaeng Krachan National Park a world heritage site.

The Red-legged Crake is a small, brightly-coloured crake of wet patches in dense forests. It is brown with an orange head & zebra-striped sides with a bright red patch of bare skin around the eye which gives it a somewhat startled appearance. Candy-red legs distinguish it from the Slaty-legged Crake, and dainty, smaller-billed appearance distinguish it from Ruddy-breasted and Band-bellied Crakes. Generally shy and unobtrusive, it moves quietly through wet vegetation and tends to be difficult to see.

Kaeng Krachan National Park is located in Phetchaburi and Prachuap Khiri Khan Provinces, about 60 km from Phetchaburi and 75 km from Hua Hin. It is bounded by the Tanintharyi Nature Reserve along Myanmar's border to the west and part of the Western Forest Complex that covers 18,730 km² across 19 protected sites between Myanmar and Thailand. There are two main rivers in the park; Phetchaburi and Pran Buri Rivers. Both rivers originate from the Tanaosri Mountain Range. In the north, Phetchaburi River flows into Kaeng Krachan Dam and flows further east all the way out to the Gulf of Thailand. Pran Buri River flows south to Prachuap Khiri Khan Province, into Pran Buri Reservoir and out to the Gulf of Thailand.

The highest elevation in the park is a peak along the Burmese border at around 1,500 meters. The park is popular for wildlife which doesn’t necessarily mean it is easy. The possibilities depend on the seasons and seasonal conditions for various types of animals. Mammals like leopards, clouded leopards, bears, stump-tailed macaques, sambhar, barking deer, elephants, dholes, golden jackal, gaur, serows, crab-eating mongoose and tapirs can be spotted in the park. There also used to be a significant tiger population in the park up until a decade ago, but only a few are left now.

Langurs, stump-tailed macaques, white-handed gibbons, sambar, mouse deer, porcupines, monitor lizards, civets and black giant squirrel are frequently seen. White-handed gibbons can be seen or heard nearly every day, often seen at the edge of the campsites.

Featured below are some videos from Kaeng Krachan National Park - The Asian Forest Tortoise, Butterfly Puddling, the Spot-bellied Eagle Owl & the sounds of the forest itself. Read more about my owls.

Read about the tigers I have spent time with.

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Red-legged Crake

The Red-legged Crake (Rallina fasciata) is a waterbird in the rail and crake family, Rallidae. It is a small, brightly-coloured crake of wet patches in dense forests. It is brown with an orange head & zebra-striped sides with a bright red patch of bare skin around the eye which gives it a somewhat startled appearance. It is a medium-large crake measuring about 24 centimetres. Its head, neck and breast are red-brown, paler on throat. Its upper parts are grey-brown. The underparts and underwings are barred black and white and it has a green bill. Candy-red legs distinguish it from the Slaty-legged Crake, and a dainty, smaller-billed appearance distinguish it from the Ruddy-breasted and Band-bellied Crakes. It is generally shy and unobtrusive moving quietly through wet vegetation and tends to be difficult to see.

Found in far north-eastern India, eastern Bangladesh, Burma, Thailand, the Malay Peninsula, Borneo and Indonesia. It is recorded as a vagrant to north-western Australia. With a large range and no evidence of significant decline, this species is assessed as being of least concern.

It is usually found in dense vegetation close to permanent wetlands. Reedy swamps and marshes, rice paddies and taro fields, rivers, watercourses, riparian thickets and wet areas in the forest and secondary growth. In the Philippines, it also occurs on open hillsides and in cogon grasslands. Confined to low altitudes up to c. 800 m, except when on migration, when recorded at c. 1400 m.

The red-legged crake forages by carefully walking through wet areas of secondary growth and forest, and picking up food items with its bill from the wet ground and leaf litter. Its movements not properly understood as these birds difficult to observe and/or flush but the species is both resident and migratory in its normal range. It is also probably dispersive; considered predominantly winter visitor in the southern part of its range. Resident in Thailand; resident and migrant Malaysia; in Borneo, most of the population is resident but may be augmented by visitors in winter; probably resident in Philippines. A local resident throughout the Greater Sundas with the numbers augmented by winter visitors from mainland Asia; normally considered migrant to Wallacea but recorded Apr–Dec, and apparently resident on Flores.

They have advertising calls described as a loud “gogogogok” given at night, and during the day in rainy weather; also a “girrrr” call. The territorial call is loud series of nasal “pek” noises given at dawn and dusk in breeding season; also slow descending trill. Breeding season is August - September in Myanmar, in August in Thailand; April in Borneo; March in Java; January in Sumatra usually in clutches of 3–6 eggs with both sexes incubating.

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