Marina Grove Birding (3)

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When: Christmas Day 2025 Weather: Cool 23C and perfectly overcast

OM1mk2 Zuiko 150-400mm Pro

Having been tweaking our OM1 mk 2s to try and optimise our exposure combinations, we headed back to the unexpectedly lovely Marina Grove pond to put them into action. An overcast morning made for good but not harsh light and about 30-40 birders were already there at 8am…..the nice thing about this place is the concentration of birds in a pond no bigger than 50m long. Many bare trees provided perches for those inclined to perch and the pond provided food aplenty for the water foragers…..

the blue tailed bee eaters welcomed us
the oriental reed warbler posed willingly
the numerous yellow bitterns were feeding actively
But one of our targets was to get better shots of the little grebe family…..and here was a first glimpse of mother grebe with baby on her back…probably just a few days old
Then number 2 appeared…with a beautiful red patterned crown
Is there room for another, mum?
There’s room for 3!
all present and accounted for…the beautiful stripes of the babies remind me of the baby tapirs we saw in the Amazon…the so called watermelon babies
and then it was time to let the babies get their feet wet with a swim…mum at one end and dad at the other
follow the leader…
Now what have you done Junior??
It wasn’t me, mum!!
action!
Interestingly, these little grebe parents had had an earlier brood, now nore than 2 months old…..
independently swimming juvenile little or Australasian grebes
a female pied triller watched us bird watching
white throated kingfishers were busy
the ornate sunbird in eclipse plumage joined us
as did the yellow fronted canary

We then tried to find the Baillon’s Crake which was the star bird here that attracted so many birders….and eventually it appeared!

Baillon’s Crake
the very beautiful Baillon’s Crake
juvenile scaly breasted munias
we then walked over to the short end of the pond where we had seen the lineated barbet fly, and she duly obliged
Junior waiting to be fed
checking out the world around
and just before we left after an hour and a half….the bare trees hosted a white throated KF and two blue crowned hanging parrots……

So just 1.5 hours in this spectacular location allowed us to practise our camera settings and take lots of pictures. If you are in Singapore in the next few months till the end of the migratory season, don’t miss this place….the ROI on time and effort is incredible.

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