Wednesday 22 March 2017

Sri Lanka 18.2.2017

We left the Sinharaja area in the morning and moved onto Embilipitya where we stayed in the rather plush Centuria Hotel, just for the one night unfortunately. The hotel was situated right on the shore of Chandrika Lake which held hundreds of Whiskered Terns along with impressive numbers of Indian and Little Cormorants feeding. In the evening we visited an area of open shrubland immediately outside of Udawalawe National Park. I saw my first ever Indian Elephant just inside the park boundary, plenty more would come the following day. This proved to be an interesting area as it was one of the first lowland dry zones sites we visited. Our only new endemic of the day was Sri Lanka Woodshrike, one of the few endemics restricted to this zone as most of the others are found at higher elevations in rainforest habitats. We stayed late for some nightjar action and very shortly after sunset we encountered Indian and Jerdon's Nightjar in quick succession.

Pale-billed Flowerepecker

Pheasant-tailed Jacana

Yellow Bittern

Whiskered Tern

Purple Heron

Intermediate Egret

Intermediate Egret

Green Bee-eater

Sri Lanka Woodshrike

Sri Lanka Woodshrike

Yellow-wattled Lapwing

Yellow-eyed Babbler
Paddyfield Pipit

Paddyfield Pipit

Paddyfield Pipit

Crested Serpent-Eagle

White-bellied Sea Eagle

White-bellied Sea Eagle
Indian Scops Owl

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