My Sunbirds In Bangkok

Olive-backed Sunbirds are common in Thailand, even in Bangkok where I live. I am often amazed that these beautiful little birds manage to thrive in such a polluted, busy, urban area but thrive they do and a pair frequently visit the few plants that I have in my yard and balcony.

It is really interesting to watch these little sunbirds visiting flowering plants to drink the nectar and forage for insects - they are a real jewel in a concrete jungle.

The Olive-backed Sunbirds that visit our house have not only entertained me and my wife but have captured the attentions of family and neighbors. Hopefully in this lens I can pass on some of my enthusiasm for these beautiful little creatures to the readers; they are one of my favorite birds.

Before I say anything more about Olive-backed Sunbirds take a few moments to listen to this colourful little male chattering away to itself. This type of call is known as a "subsong". Not quite the full song, not the call, but a sort of warm up to the main event of full song.

A Little Bit of Ornithology

Olive-backed Sunbirds are fun to watch whilst feeding. In fact I often watch them feeding whilst I am feeding since they frequently come down to forage whilst I am having my breakfast in the morning - in a way they are my breakfast companions!

Olive-backed Sunbirds have two different feeding strategies:

1. Nectar Drinking - It is obvious from the photos that the Olive-backed Sunbird has a special bill, this is for drinking nectar. However, it often does not insert its bill into a flower's aperture to get nectar (although it often will), therefore assisting in the pollenation of the flower, but instead pierces the base of the flower, "stealing" the nectar. A neat little trick!

Olive-backed Sunbirds usually perform this trick whilst perched, although they sometimes hover in the fashion of a hummingbird as the one in the photo here is doing.

They will also drink from nectar feeders designed for hummingbirds: hummingbird nectar feeders.

2. Insect Gleaning - This species is rather partial to small insects and other tiny invertebrates, something which should please the local gardeners. Rather than picking insects from leaves or pecking at them, the sunbird "gleans" the insects with a sort of sideswipe action with the bill across leaves and petals. Occasionally this species will make a special effort to chase an invertebrate and I have even seen them chasing insects around in mid air.

Something that is a constant surprise to me is how small a patch of vegetation is needed to attract Olive-backed Sunbirds in Bangkok, in fact there are quite some number of species that are able to survive in this concrete jungle.

At our house we only have a tiny patch of habitat available for these birds in our yard and balcony, but they still come every day to have a feed on whichever flowers are blooming at the time. In this photo you can see the small collection of plants that attracts the sunbirds.

These plants are watered daily so that they are healthy and bloom quite frequently and they are also not treated with any type of insecticide meaning that insects are abundant and the sunbirds come down to eat these too; in this way the birds act as a natural bio-control. In fact birds are great at controlling insect and other invertebrate populations and when you eliminate slugs, snails, insects and other creepy crawlies from your yard you also help to eliminate birds too; many species are scarce or close to extinction now because of the use of pesticides in gardens, but not in our yard!

In particular, in our yard, the sunbirds seem to enjoy feeding from these flowers pictured above. As you can see they are tiny, clustered flowerettes, with no apparent opening for a bird or insect to get into the nectar chamber. This highlights the Olive-backed Sunbirds flower piercing ability and role as a "nectar thief".

Of course it is not just my plants they feast on but all the neighbors' too who have similar collections of plants in their yards and on their balconies - these are community sunbirds! In fact when you put together all the plants in similar yards along our street, it becomes obvious that these little birds have quite a territory even in what at first appears to be a wildlife free zone.

This species is a remarkably ecologically tolerant bird being able to adapt to living in Bangkok it would have to be. Its natural habitat is forest and mangroves but it has managed to adapt to live in virtually all habitats including monocultural palm oil and rubber plantations, cities, gardens and all sorts of cultivation with scattered trees.

It is funny, actually, that when you are out bird watching in Thailand you are far more likely to see this species of sunbird in a park or garden than you are in its natural habitat; spend some time in one of the parks in Bangkok and you can see this species quite easily.

Now that you know a little more about these charming birds you can choose a few more of these video clips to watch and get a better idea of how they behave; there is nothing like seeing a bird in action to really get an idea of its character, often photos do not do birds justice.

The abundance of Olive-backed Sunbird video clips on YouTube highlights how this lovely little species brightens up many people's lives and how common it is throughout much of Asia, not just Thailand.

Enjoy watching their cheeky behavior of these garden birds in a few of these videos.

I am lucky enough to be able to lead bird watching tours around Thailand which gives me plenty of opportunity to see many species on a regular basis. Sometimes these tours focus on photography which then gives me the chance to get some shots of some of the colorful birds that we see. I use just a compact digital camera but such is the quality of these gadgets these days that I am able to get quite a lot of good pictures; here are just a few of them.