For much of the year the three species of weavers in Thailand are rather dull birds which are normally seen feeding within rice fields. Certainly they are nice to see and many people are very happy to finally catch up with Asian Golden Weaver here but seeing these birds in non-breeding plumage is not much of an event compared to seeing them in full breeding plumage and busy building their complicated nests. Right now that is exactly how they can be observed and quite frankly they become a big highlight of a short birding trip at this time of year.

I recently returned from a three day trip, with Michael Livingston, spending time at Kaeng Krachan national park, visiting rice fields near Petchaburi on our way back to Bangkok. It is easy to find weaver colonies in this area with many of them nesting right next to the road and we were able to watch these interesting little characters engaged in nest-building, mating and chick-feeding activities for as long as we liked.

Baya Weaver nests (below) are the most intricate constructed by the three species in Thailand. The nests are almost exclusively built in trees and watching the birds build them is amazing. Most humans would not be able to weave such a creation but with their dexterous bills the male Baya Weavers come up with some impressive nests.

Some of the Baya Weaver colonies we saw contained dozens of nests and it was fun to watch the males frantically building nests while the female came to inspect them, often leaving looking very unimpressed. It was interesting to see that males were building new nests at the same time that females were feeding young.

Baya Weavers are by far the commonest of the three weaver species in Thailand and are very widespread. They can be found almost anywhere in the country where there are some wetlands with nearby trees to build nests in.

Asian Golden Weaver males are stunning. Their transformation from dull, non-breeding plumage into a golden gem is incredible. It is always nice to get into the breeding season and start seeing these birds in the roadside ditches building nests. The nest of this species is a bit of a messy affair being just a scruffy ball of grasses almost always in vegetation emerging from water, very often small, twiggy bushes.

This female Streaked Weaver shows the streaking on the upper breast the species is named for. Their nest is a sort of halfway-house between that of Baya and Asian Golden Weavers being fairly elaborate, which a small spout at the bottom but more scruffy than Baya Weaver’s and in the same emergent vegetation as Asian Golden Weaver’s. We found a colony of Streaked Weavers where the females were coming in frequently to feed noisy, begging chicks and I noticed that on every trip they arrived with small, green grasshoppers; the nearby farmers should be thankful of these birds, instead some of them sometimes erect nets to catch and kill them. This is very sad to see and also very stupid as the economic value of birds as pest control can be hundreds or even thousands of dollars per square kilometre – The Economic Value of Birds.

If you are a photographer don’t miss out on these three species of birds, they really are a joy to watch and they provide a never-ending supply of photographic opportunities.