Uninvited Winter Visitor...!

This Diwali i had an uninvited guest at home... when it is about being at home on these festival days... some what I am not so happy about it. Since I spend most of my days out in the wild as part of my profession even going on outing is not an option.

However the very first day of this Diwali I was so delighted to see a beautiful winter visitor. I was having my lunch in afternoon and my eyes were just browsing the neighboring garden outside the window. A small bird just flew and perched on to a twig next to the window. For a moment I didn’t really notice it… but soon it caught a flying insect and perched back on to the same twig right on to the same position. This is a very common behavior which I have noticed in flycatchers (especially tickell’s blue flycatcher in Bannerghatta & paradise flycatchers too). That drew my attention towards it and just walked near to the window… as I started observing I was sure it was a flycatcher. The plain brown body, with a pale eye ring, lightbrownish color on its throat & breast made me realize it was my first sighting… soon I washed my hands to take the bird book and as I referred I could realize I was looking at a sweet, tiny winter visitor all the way from Himalayas… it was Red Breasted Flycatcher (Muscicapa parva).

Sighting Report:

Red Breasted Flycatcher : Male (Muscicapa parva) Single, Garden, Rajajinagar 1st Block.

Time : 2:45pm.Date : 20 / 10 /2006.

Fishing the Fish Eagle...!

Even though I am into birding for quite a longtime... never got time to put things on paper... & I regret for the fact that I am bad in that...L. This time I have made up my mind to write this so that I can share this information with all birders and also to contribute my bit to bng birders database.

I have been associated with Nisarga Organisation, working on promotion of Outdoor living & wildlife conservation for many years now. We are organizing a series of river rafting programs at Bheemeshwari (Cauvery River) from last month. It is after the first visit to Bheemeshwari in July as part of our Captive Elephants project, I was very keen about knowing more information about Grizzled Giant Squirrel which is almost in the verge of extinction. I used to read anything & everything about Bheemeshwari to gather more n more info about these beautiful animals. In course of doing that I came across a posting in Bng birds about Lesser Fish Eagle - LFE (Ichthyophaga humilis) & Grey headed fish eagle - GHFE (Ichthyophaga ichthyaetus) with photos. I was very amazed to know about them & also was feeling bad that very less is spoken about these animals & birds in the shadow of tiger. Although I compared quite a few photos and referred many articles on web it was hard to analyze the difference between these beautiful birds. However as I visited Bheemeshwari often as part of my river rafting camps I started looking for these birds with white colored lower belly, thigh and tail part which is again a similarity among these birds. On my every visit I used to get information from Gurudat, Naturalist there that they are found more on the up stream of Cauvery from Bheemeshwari campsite. I very less got an opportunity to access the up stream as I had to be with the team always and also rafting happens in the down stream of Cauvery from campsite. My continuous search for them didn’t yield any result in the last 5 visits. My last visit was on Monday 2nd October, Gandhi Jayanthi day, since it was a holiday we had a batch booked again for rafting and we landed there in the campsite. As Nisarga is an organisation concerned about wildlife we always make an effort to introduce our clients / participants with loads of information on eco system, wildlife, birdlife, culture, environmental issues etc of the place where we have visited. It was to my surprise I saw 2 birds flying over head & could notice the white lower belly and tail parts at around 11:45am when I was addressing the crowd there. It was undoubtedly a pair of them flying towards the downstream of Cauvery. I am not very sure to say whether they were LFE or GHFE as I still don’t understand the significant difference between them but I am sure it was one of them because of that characteristic white lower belly parts. That day seem to be very good for us as we could see it again very closely flying on the river again down stream as we were trekking back to the campsite. This time it was very close to me and I could see those startling eyes with a striking yellow & black combo. Other thing I noticed was they were just kite plus in size and there was grayish color around the neck & head part. In fact the tail was blunt, short & under part was lacking that significant white which I have seen in GHFE photos. Unfortunately I didn’t get to hear its call, which I think would have made huge difference. I found raptors very challenging when it comes to its identification because of the wide variety of variation of features among the species in itself. This will always be one of my memorable sightings after that of sighting of Great Indian Bustard in the month of May this year…

Ultimate Care...!

It was a bright Sunday on 23rd of October 2005. The sun rose just as any other day. After a long bus journey penetrating the concrete jungle with the most desired nap of the day I reached my work place Bannerghatta Biological Park. As usual I went on my routine morning rounds inside the zoo premises to meet my wild friends, in whose eyes I could see a ray of hope for a new day with buffer stored for them. The day being weekend was fully crowded with people as if the whole Bangalore has marched in to raid the park.

At around noon I was in my office talking to a 10th STD boy who was keen on learning how to handle snakes & also wanted to know more about them. Right at that moment I heard a voice from the other part of the office asking for someone who takes care of animals. Sensing the depth of feeling in their voice I rushed to them and told them that they can count me as one of the persons who takes care of animals at park. Soon they revealed a small hatchling which they were holding in their palm and narrated the whole story about how they found it and how they snatched it from the hands of a monkey inside the park premises when they were wondering from enclosure to enclosure as any other visitors do. I paused for a while, glanced at the bird and realized it was a juvenile of Purple Rumped Sunbird which had grown big enough to leave its nest & explore the mighty world. The words flowed from those guys mouth while handing over the bird to me, asking me if I would take the responsibility of rearing the bird. I was blank for a moment and then smiled with assurance. With the blank mind for that moment I could recall a small incident which I had read in Newsletter for Birdwatchers where a Weaver Baya nest was restored back to its place for the adult pair to complete their successful nesting story. Soon I asked those guys to take me to the place where they found the bird so that I can make an attempt to locate the nest as I was familiar with Sunbird nests. As they guided me to the place I could notice they were wondering what I was trying to do. On the spot I browsed all along many branches of the surrounding trees and scrubs but all efforts were in vain not find any trace of nest. We were on that spot for more than 15 min now suddenly I realized that the bird in my hand started to scream in distress gathering all the last bit of energy in it. For a moment I loosened my grip wondering if that was the reason but soon I could hear the call of an adult Sunbird right from the top of the tree under which we were standing. After browsing the canopy for a while I could see the adult pair restlessly looking for its lost young one among the rushing crowd. As it is always believed that once a chick is touched by human the flock will not accept them back, half willingly I released the young bird on to a small branch at a height which I could reach upon. Within no time as we were all observing from a distance we saw the mother came down to the branch pecked on its back and flew to the next tree and as an obedient child the young one followed it. Soon both the pairs started feeding the young one as they managed to fly the bird away from us. We were so delighted to see the reunion of the family however at the same time we were also concerned about the threat from the crows and monkeys around. Both the responsible parents managed to fly the young one to a safe place and continued to feed it.

This entire event of 20 to 25 min managed to transform that just another day to a memorable day which I will remember for the rest of my life. This also thought me a lesson of “ultimate care” in nature which we humans think are the only to have possessed it.