Birdwing Nature Holidays specialises in birding & natural history holidays in Sri Lanka.

In this website, you will find bird watching and natural history holidays that cater to a wide range of likes. My 14-day Absolute Birding is good for keen bird watchers, as it mainly focuses on birds. This tour also gives opportunity to see other wildlife too, as we visit some of the prime wilderness areas. Therefore, for people with broader interests, the same tour could be done focussing on other aspects of natural history . In this tour wide range of accommodations are used that are closer to the birding sites.

Just to quote one of my recent Absolute Birding tours (14–27 March, 2010) with 2 British birders wielding cameras, we bagged 230 species of birds including all 33 endemics. A special highlight in this was seeing 12 out of the 15 resident night birds of Sri Lanka! (I equalled this record in April, 2010, showing the identical mix of night birds for a lone U.S. birder from Calif.) This beat my previous best of 10 night birds in Feb, 2009, referred further down. Of the endemics, all except Layard’s Parakeet was photographed by the clients. Mammalian specials included 2 separate sightings of Leopard at Yala and a chance sighting of an endemic Red Slender Loris at Kithulgala. We scored 19 endemics in 2 days at Kithulgala on this trip. A detailed report was promised by my clients who went home with 13,000 images between the two of them.

My first Absolute Birding tour for the 2009/2010 birding season was done from 30 Nov.–13 Dec., with 3 British birders. It yielded 246 species of birds including all 33 endemics. Highlights included Serendib Scops Owl at a daytime roost at Sinharaja; Isabelline Wheater at Yala; Hume’s Whitethroat at Bundala; Pied Thrush at Victoria Park; Watercock at Pannegamuwa Tank; 4 Brown Wood Owls: 1 at Sinharaja and 3 at a daytime roost at Surrey Estate; a pair of White-naped Woodpeckers; Citrine and White Wagtails at Udawalawe National Park; 1 Eurasian Widgeon at Debarawewa (a rare visitor to southern Sri Lanka); a nesting Black-throated aka. Hill Munia, and Kashmir Flycatcher at Hakgala Botanical Gardens; and Pomarine Scua, and Brown Booby while sea-watching off Negombo. Mammalian highlights included great views of Leopard resting in a tree at Yala.

Before this, I oraganised and guided an Absolute Birding tour from done 31 Jan.–14 Feb., 2008, with 4 British birders. This was extremely successful and we bagged a whopping 252 species of birds including all 33 endemics currently recognised. Additionally, we also scored 42 endemic to South Asia and 9 of the 15 resident nocturnal birds of which 7 were owls. Special birding highlight was seeing a pair of the newly rediscovered breeding resident: Marshall’s Iora at Lunugamwehera. We also had 2 sightings of Leopard at the Yala National Park, which included a prolonged sighting of a male resting on a rock. To read the full report click here. To view a PDF version of the same with images click here.

An 18-day Birds, Wildlife and culture tour done with two British birders from 24 January–9 February, 2009 yielded 253 species of birds including all 33 endemics. A special highlight in this was seeing 10 of the 15 resident night birds. We also had two Leopards on this tour. Click here to read a blog post that I did following this very successful tour.

My 17-day Birding in style is ideal if you need to enjoy great birding without compromising on the quality of accommodation. In this we use only 6 hotels to cover 17 days giving you ample time to enjoy slow-paced birding & excellent comforts of the hotels used such as spas/infinity pools to name a few, It also incorporates a tinge of culture with visits to a couple of cultural World Heritage sites.

I did my first Birding in style tour from 24 Feb.–10 Mar., 2009 with 4 bird watchers from Australia and Britain. With all the spa treatments, sampling of infinity pools and other such pamperings, we managed to see 230 species of birds and 2 Leopards, among other specials. Click here for a brief report.

My most recent Birding in style tour, done in Dec., 2009, with a family of 4 comprising of a serious British birder yielded 224 species of birds including all 33 endemics. Mammalian highlights included a Leopard in a tree in a rainy morning at Yala. Click here for a 37-paged detailed report in PDF.

My 15 day Birding, wildlife & tea holiday is a mixed-interest one that is ideal for birders as a family holiday with non-birding spouse/children joining in as it offers plenty of ‘other things’ to keep everybody happy. It covers almost all the key birding sites/zones ensuring profitable birding. Again, accommodation used for this is first class.

Moving on to the last set of tours available in this site, my Natural History Holidays include an 8 day Leopards & wildlife safari centred around the Leopard and wildlife hotspot, Yala National Park. In Feb., 2009, while guiding a natural history tour, which included 2 game drives, we recorded 7 Leopards at the amazing Yala National Park. Click here to see a detailed report of our sightings including videos. Finally, the 2 Day Sinharaja Rainforest tour and Birding Day Breaks are ideal if you are on a shorter visit. Click here and here to read a 2-part report of a 2-day trip to Sinharaja and here to read a report of a day excursion to this magical rain forest, which is my favourite wilderness area in Sri Lanka.

You are also invited to view this bird tour report ((3Mb) of a British birder, which contain sightings of two short excursions done with me: a day visit to Sigiriya and a 2-day tour Sinharaja, both of which yielded a whopping 27 of the 33 endemics.

All these holidays can be tailor-made to fit your specific holiday requirements and stand as indicative itineraries. In addition to these tours that I introduced here, I am capable of doing Whale-watching, Wild-cats, Macro photography, Butterfly-watching and Dragonfly-watching tours. Please inquire for itineraries as I have not advertised them in this website.

Apart from the trip reports listed in this web site, all my travel reports and natural history posts can be found at my blog: gallicissa.blogspot.com.

I look forward to opening the door to this magical island of serendipity!
Amila Salgado
BIRDWING Nature Holidays.

BIRDWING Nature Holidays is a licensed in-bound travel agency.