birdwatching – Tonji and Sylvia's Wildlife Refuge

Fruits! Flowers! New Bird! May 2026

The Big Pond has yielded another new bird for the farm refuge!

Bird #122 is White-browed Crake Porzana cinerea. It was walking on top of the lotus leaves, just like the illustration in the Kennedy field guide!

During our visit we also saw:

One Little Grebe. It’s probably a resident now!

8 Black-winged Stilts.

Egrets.

Buff-throated Kingfisher.

Barred Rails. There were two!

Swallows. I think this is a Pacific Swallow.

A lot of Philippine Ducks.

And Wandering Whistling Ducks! When I visited the Big Pond in the afternoon, at first all the ducks flew away. Then they came back and started grooming and settling in for the night. The Wandering Whistling Ducks and Philippine Ducks were mixed togther. It seems that they are now a mixed flock. Later in the evening, I saw the Wandering Whistling Ducks flying around in a V formation while calling out.

I got a nice photo of a Tawny Grassbird. I tend to have a hard time photographing them. This time I didn’t give up and after many shots of leaves and branches and bird bits, I got a good photo!

The Water Lily pond is ready for the upcoming rainy season! Tonji finished widening and deepening the pond.

Tubby climbing out of the Water Lily Pond. He’s a 4×4 puppy!

He also widened the channel that connects the left and right sides of the Water Lily pond.

We are enjoying the fruits and flowers of summer. The grass is all dried up and and looks like straw. But when you look at the trees, they are green and bursting with flowers!

Narra trees in flower beside the paddock

Balai Lamok with Narra in the background

The guava trees that grow wild all over the farm have small and delicious fruit. I am always on the lookout for ripe fruit. Oftentimes the birds beat me to the fruit. This time there were a lot of hantik (big red ants) making nests in the guava trees and crawling all over the fruit. I was able to get a few though!

I also ate a few aratiles. So sweet!

And here’s a cute video of Tubby bounding down to the grass like a little rabbit.

Cold and Windy March

March at the farm refuge is still cool enough to put on a camo cloak to check out the birds in the Big Pond.

We counted 92 Philippine Ducks and 1 female Northern Shoveler at the big pond. The unfinished pond had 2 Philippine Ducks and around 10 Painted Snipes.

We also spotted interesting birds near the cottage.

A Brahminy Kite.

Bee Eaters. So brightly colored and pretty and such a grouchy expression!

Collared Kingfisher.

Red Junglefowl looking like a flock of domestic chickens .. until you try to take their photo and they immediately disappear from sight!

Here’s one photo that’s not blurry!

The Pink Necked Green Pigeons are very good at giving us great poses for photos!

Look at these nice holes! According to Google, Pygmy Woodpeckers make perfectly round holes. I’m not so sure if Coppersmith Barbets also make perfectly round holes.

Is this also a nest? We suspect that this is a duck nest. This is near the Water Lily Pond.

The Salingogogn trees are flowering again! This is the kind of tree whose flowers are best appreciated up close.

February 2026 – Bird #121!

We had another new bird for the Farm Bird List! Tonji spotted a Balicassiao near the cottage! We had just finished walking around with the dogs. I went inside the cottage to use the bathroom when Tonji called me to come out fast because there was a new bird! I finished up in the bathroom as quickly as I could and rushed out to the veranda! You never know how much time you have to grab your camera and bins and spot the bird before it decides to fly away.

Good thing this bird hung around long enough for a photo. There were 2 of them, but I only got one in the picture.

I was so focused on trying to get a good shot of the Balicassiao that I didn’t even realize until I went through my pictures that there was a Rough Crested Malkoha right next to it! Oh my goodness. I was happy that I got the Balicassiao but felt dumb that I missed the Malkoha. Also, it may or may not be a thing, that birds of the same color flock together. We had an experience like that before when we encountered a mixed flock of different kinds of black birds!

The following day I went back to the spot where the Balicassiao and Malkoha were to get better photos of the Malkoha. There is a big Ficus benjamina near the are that was full of unripe green fruits. A big flock of Pink Necked Green Pigeons were eating the unripe fruits. Maybe the fruits were what attracted the Balicassiao and Malkoha also. I didn’t know the birds ate the green fruits also.

Pink Necked Green pigeon eating the green fruits

The Malkoha was not that easy to photograph. It kept hiding its face behind the leaves. Got the face eventually!

Some of our visiting migrant birds were still around. This is the Ashy Minivet .

At the Big Pond, the Garganey, Tufted Ducks, and Eurasian Wigeon were still there along with the 100+ Philippine Ducks.

How cool is it to see 3 different species perfectly lined up?

left to right: Philippine Duck, Eurasian Wigeon, Garganey

Loving view of Tufted Ducks in the foreground, tall grass in the middle, and Philippine Ducks in the back because it looks so natural!

At the Water Lily pond, I had a good view of a White Breasted Waterhen. Look at those long legs and long toes!

I usually don’t take pictures of the crows, unless they’re doing something unusual like perching on a horse or standing in a field in a menacing manner. This one got photographed because it was perched so nicely on a beautiful flowering and fruiting Malabulak tree!

It was a very nice February at the farm refuge. It is such a treat to walk outside and see birds, trees, flowers, and water!

We also did some rearranging of furniture. Now I have a comfy spot for some knitting, napping, and Netflix!

January 2026 – So Many New Birds!

Our first visit in 2026 was .. mind blowing! We had SIX new species at the Big Pond and one new species in front of the cottage. We had SEVEN new species in one trip!

At the Big Pond we had

Around 14 Garganeys

2 Eurasian Teals (formerly known as Green-winged Teal)

3 Tufted Ducks

2 Little Grebes

2 Eurasian Wigeons

1 Yellow Bittern

Plus we had our regular 100+ Philippine Ducks, 8 Northern Shovelers, and at least 2 Wandering Whistling Ducks. The Wandering Whistling Ducks were in flight, and may have been in a mixed flock.

Philippine Ducks and Tufted Duck in the rain

Standing by the Big Pond and seeing all those species together was mind boggling. It brought to mind all those birdwatching trips we made to ponds all over the country to see these birds. Our first time to see Garganey was in Candaba, Pampanga. Our first time to see a European Wigeon was all the way in Batanes. Our good views of Eurasian Teal are from Saud, Pagudpud. Now they were in our own pond, mingling with the Philippine Ducks, and behaving just like they did when we saw them in those far off ponds!

In front of the cottage we had

14 Ashy Minivet

These are migrant birds and we don’t see them that frequently. It was a surprise to see a flock of them in front of the cottage!

January 2026 was amazing

The weather was great, we had awesome birds, and we are looking forward to February!