Sri Lanka – Colombo Bats and Birds
In November 2025 I went with old friends to Sri Lanka for a three-week trip around the island. I was last there when I was three years old, so there was a seventy-year gap between visits. I had planned the trip as a mixture of sightseeing and photography — wildlife, seascapes of the south coast, landscapes of the tea plantations and highland country, and if possible some street and macro work as well.
We started with a few days in Colombo, where I had not expected any wildlife opportunities. Luckily, however, a very kind friend arranged a visit to Diyasaru Park on the outskirts of the city. This wildlife reserve is part of Wetland Link International, a worldwide education group led by the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust originally founded by Sir Peter Scott. I was able to get some fine shots there, including of flying foxes, and along the way met a charming bird and photography enthusiast who then took me on a guided tour of a similar wetland reserve at Beddagama Park nearby.
After two fruitful mornings at these wetland reserves, it turned out that the canal in front of the old parliament building in Colombo, ten minutes from our hotel, was also a fine location for seabirds — so the final set of shots is from there.
On a technical note: I purchased the Olympus 50-200mm f/2.8 lens specifically for this trip. It is a lightweight lens that in theory can shoot images up to 800mm full-frame equivalent — about the practical limit for birds in flight. Nine of the images here were taken at around 800mm with the MC-20 teleconverter attached. See if you can guess which; the lens information is visible via the “i” button in the lightbox.
Photographs in this album include: Flying Fox (Fruit Bat), Purple Heron, Monitor Lizard, Jungle Crow, Grey-headed Swamp Hen, Rose-ringed Parakeets, Orange-winged Groundling, Red-vented Bulbul, Brown-headed Barbet, Black-hooded Oriole, Spotted Dove, Grey Heron, Spot-billed Pelican, Painted Storks, and more.
For camera settings, techniques and equipment used in shoots like this, see the Technique posts on mcaughtry.photo.