Some close encounters with Greater Painted Snipes

 Another "exotic" bird (at the Buffalo Wallow!)

Ringed as it is by a colony (and many a high-rise)...and not much more than a mere of water held back by an earthen bund, the Buffalo Wallow is a replete with murky pockets and shadowy, reed-fringed pools. Especially so, in the mornings and evenings, when the light is best for photography.

At other times, the surface of the water can be so dazzling as to be blinding...and the light so rude and harsh that photography is just an utter waste of time

And if that wasn't enough, a lot of the time, when the action happens, the sun is right behind the birds. One can of course walk around and get the sun behind one's camera, but then, it would mean having to be able to walk on water.

That too, water that is far from clean, even by the standards of a Buffalo Wallow.

Cumulatively, all these occupational hazards mean that, I get to watch more than I can get to photograph...which I will honestly admit, is a good problem to have.

Cumulatively, it also means that, many a time, months pass before I can get the chance (in my "stumble upon it" fashion) before I can get to properly photograph a bird that I am sure is somewhere there -- in that vast realm of "murky pockets and shadowy, reed-fringed pools".

Like the Greater painted-snipe for one.

Seen here is the female bird that I photographed today -- spending almost an hour to get not more than 10-12 usable photographs (because at first sight of me, the bird would simply sink into the grass, and become immobile, merging with the brown of the mud).

Surprisingly, it was only after Lady Painted-snipe did it for the umpteenth time (and when the light had more or less gone) that I could see the male bird. Relatively dull and smaller in size, and totally out in the open.

But then, with the way our water bodies are littered, even totally out in the open means a frame full of plastic and other shit of civilization.

So I will hope that I can get to photograph this couple again. And get to showcase the male too. In a frame worthy of such magnificent birds!

(First encounter, April 21st, 2015)

Her & Him...

One of the most peculiar things about the nomenclature of birds, and a very evident ornithological oddity is that it is mostly (almost always) the male of the species that is used to name (and ID the) bird.

When you think about it, it is natural...because among birds, it is (mostly) the male of the species that is dazzling and resplendent, while the female is relatively dull and drab.

But then, there are exceptions too; after all, these are birds we are talking of :P

The Greater Painted Snipe is one of them, and gloriously so. Not only is the female the nominative half of the pair -- by virtue of being both "greater" and "painted", relative to the male, it also "outshines" the male in other areas.

Like, for instance -- courtship. It is the female bird that actively courts the male bird...and from what I can see -- the female bird is by far the bolder of the two, many a time feeding out in the open unconcernedly, while the male is to be seen nowhere.
 
Hmmm....

(This photograph was made at the Buffalo Wallow today...and is as serendipitous as it gets. I was hunkered down and waiting for a male Greater Painted Snipe that had well and truly gone to ground in the grass and slush, when I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. And spied these guys totally out in the clear. By the time I could blink, these guys went to ground as well. Meanwhile, the camera did its work.)

(Second encounter, April 30, 2015)

The courtship rituals of Greater Painted Snipes  

With close to three days of (what the Met. Department is calling) pre-Monsoon showers here in Hyderabad, the heat wave that battered most of Telangana (and AP) now seems to be a thing of the past...but while certainly not as beastly, the humidity that the rains (and cloud cover) have brought with them is no less intimidating than the heat.

This relative "cooling down" and humidity is the trigger for a number of bird species which have paired (and probably even mated) to get around to the serious job of parenting and bringing in more birds into the world.

At the Buffalo Wallow, the star couple among these parent birds is a pair of White-throated Kingfishers, who start on a flurry of activity beginning about now.

But this is not their story :-)

While waiting for the Kingfishers, I tried sneaking up on the other star couple -- the Painted Snipes...and surprise, oh surprise, found both of them out in the open (at least by their standards) and gazing at each other in the lovelorn fashion of birds with barely 4-5 feet separating them.

While I waited and waited and went down on my haunches and then onto my knees -- sweating so profusely in reminded me of my hike up to Tungnath -- the birds stayed more or less in the same place, in the same pose, almost as if they were carved of stone.

They did not get down to courting, they did not get intimate. And I couldn't get them both in the same frame. But then, maybe it is early days yet.

After all, what do we know of the courtship rituals of these guys anyway?

Another photo-shoot of two well-behaved young birds

In between seeing the fledgeling Shikras for the first time and the time of writing this post (one day)   as is my wont, I spent a lot of time on the Internet, reading up and researching on my subjects, and it seems (on the basis of some reading material shared by a good friend who is a fellow birder and raptor aficionado) that Shikra fledgelings are more or less totally dependent on their mothers for something like two months!

When I do the math and recollect from my own memory of sightings past of these birds, Juvenile (as opposed to fledgelings) Shikras -- with noticeable barring on the breast and spots on the belly and legs -- seem to make their "first" appearance as the rains are at their fag end, in the first weeks of September.

So there, huh?

But two months does seem such a long period of time, for what look like so capable birds, no?
But then, they have so much to learn -- from their mother and Mother Nature, before they can be skilled hunters worthy of being called the Leopards of the Sky!

Meanwhile, on the basis of what I saw (after yet another long, sweaty and bone-numbing walk) they seem to be doing a good job of growing up and watching the world around while waiting for their mother like well-behaved kittens in the shadows of this protective Neem.

They did sally forth a couple of times, but their flying seemed to be imbued with a sense of wonder rather than the power and grace one would associate with an adult Shikra.

Seeing them fly was both fulfilling and bemusing...I have never seen a Shikra fly so slowly; for a minute I thought I was in the presence of Kestrels trying to hover in a strong crosswind!

(No, I did not even try to make a photograph; somehow I didn't even feel like raising the lens, I was so entranced.)

In between this and other photo-shoots, I spent some time snooping around to see the amount of human footfalls that this area gathers.

Two spotty teenagers with scraggly beards and tattoos were the first. They had come by on a Scooty with what looked like at least 6 bottles of beer, a packet of smokes, some paper plates, etc, etc. Their open air bar was barely 50 metres away from the Neem. I walked over to it and spoke to them at length about littering, Swacch Bharat, the Police, the Indian Army, etc, etc.

I also asked them to go and drink a bit farther, where they would be a bit less noticeable for the Police, the Indian Army, etc, etc.

By now, one of them looked as if he wouldn't notice it if a two headed snake popped up right in front of him and the other seemed genuinely contrite, so I decided I had done enough. Then came along some worthies out for a walk, headed generally in the direction of the Neem. These guys were easy meat. I just brought up the topic of snakes...politely asking them if they had seen any Cobras around.

When it was evident that they weren't exactly thrilled at the prospect of seeing Cobras -- I helpfully suggested that they could go on their walks on the paved roads (and away from the Neem) because Cobras stay away from paved roads.

I waited and waited for them to take the hint, and even turned my back on them...but they walked to the Neem and sat right under it. All this while, when I was indulging in these lies and deception and generally being a badass with both the teenage beer drinkers and the walkers, I was surreptitiously watching the Neem and hoping and praying that the Shikras don't sally out of it.

Luckily they stayed put there, swaying up and down in the breeze, and if I wasn't looking out for them, I wouldn't have seen them.

Two more months...

The acceptance of birds

The little I know about India's wilds, and of the ways of the Ghoom (and hunt) hasn't been learned on Facebook :-)

But, by reading and re-reading classics (of word-smithy and storytelling) by doyens such as Kenneth Anderson and Jim Corbett.

And, of course by sheer dint of being out in the sun, being footloose and fancy free, being in no hurry at all -- like a dim-witted student (in a class of one) who learns each lesson slowly, but learns it well.

So, I acknowledge in all sincerity that the little I have achieved in terms of "pro" quality photography nature and wildlife photography is because nature (and specifically birds) is a good teacher, and because I have being a willing pupil.

While I lug around a "big gun", I am no "set your rig on a tripod and fire away" kind of person...because the "chase" is what motivates me the most. Pitting my wits against the terrain, the bird and the light conditions constitute the chase for me.

The chase, the joy of being outdoors, the awareness of so much of "life" all around me is what constitutes "birding" for me.

The photograph is a bonus.

This is a photograph made in January of this year (2015) that is close to full frame, taken with the sun almost below the horizon, and like most taken by me, handheld. 

But, that is not what matters.

This bird has been the reason I have been on a Ghoom for more than a month. But that is also, not what matters.

What matters is, though the bird -- perched deep in the foliage of a tree -- could clearly see (and hear me) approach and repeatedly point a long thing at it, till I was just 8-10 metres from it, it did not fly away.

Even when I walked away and then walked all around to get the light (or rather whatever remained of it) behind me and was probably 7 or so metres from it, it still did not fly away.

I could have sat there, totally out in the open (to the bird's gaze) watching it and it would still have stayed put.

In fact, I did just that, sat there and wondered...and still it did not fly away...as if it now recognized me and accepted my presence

That this "acceptance" took a lot more than a month is not what matters.

That it did come about, does.

Thank you Shikra X, I will remember this chase, and all that you taught me.

Nikon D750 review

From the very day I have read about the Nikon D750 (and checked out its specs with an eagle eye) I have had no doubts about the fact that this is a camera that will kick some serious butt -- when it comes to nailing "lifers" in bird and wildlife photography.

At 750 grams, its lighter (by 100 grams) than the D600 / 610 -- something that I could instantly feel, as I assembled it onto my 600 mm f/4 lens and hefted it out of the car, for a bird walk on the Gandipet lake bed on what was already a pretty advanced hour on a bright and sunny day in February (2015).

Also, size does matter! The D750 is also more compact than the D600 / D610 (which is in itself pretty compact for a full-frame camera that outputs 24 mp image files)...even if its just 4 mm less thick. 

I had a little more maneouvreability, when I was down on the lake bed's slush, and crawling towards the waders -- in my by-now-patented-to-perfection imitation of an infantryman's advance through the trenches.

(What does an infantryman's rifle weigh, by the way?)

When even with 850 mm reach (I habitually use a TC 1.4 on my 600 mm lens) you still use field-craft and bird sense to get really close to your subject, many a time you can get into impossible situations -- with no elbow room, a narrow field of view and a frame that consists of a little bird and a pebble and a tuft of grass...and for some pernickety reason best known to itself, the camera's AF decides to focus on either the pebble or the tuft of grass.

                                             

Or on the sun's bright (and blinding) dazzle from fool's gold (Mica or whatever else) at the water's edge.

So, while you are cursing your situation and trying to refocus on the bird, it just walks out of the frame...and all you can do is think up unprintable variants of "I am large, I have multitudes..."



Little wonder then, I was pleasantly surprised (to put it very mildly) to see that the D750 was on the spot -- again and again -- when it came to acquiring focus, and keeping it nailed! To be honest, I had even expected this (remember that remark I made earlier, about reading up specs and an eagle eye) but still performance in the field is just that, performance in the field.

Once I was done with getting some lifers of the Little Pratincoles, next up, or rather once I had clambered up (no, I don't use the 600 mm f/4 as a staff / support) from the embrace of Mother Earth -- I made a beeline to the lake's edge...and had a go at photographing some River Terns.

Again, the results were extra-ordinary. The 51 focus points were at work and (even though the light was very harsh and more or less impossible to shoot in) I could get exceptional flight shots, without really trying hard!

And yes, these are full-frame images!

Here are two more images, slightly cropped, one of a Glossy Ibis and another of a Blue-tailed Bee-eater (which incidentally is a passage migrant through Hyderabad).

So, even though I could get to test the Nikon D750 for a little less than two hours, and would certainly not call it a proper review (which I hope to do, soon!), my verdict is out.

If you are looking for a full-frame camera with top-notch AF speed capable of delivering exceptional, professional grade performance -- for bird and wildlife photography, go for the Nikon D750.

Yes, the Birdman recommends it.

Face to face with an other-worldly bird

There is something surreal and hypnotic about the whole experience of scouting for and photographing an owl. Something that borders an encounter with the paranormal or the other-worldly, even...

Its not just the mien of this bird -- owls are probably the only birds with front facing eyes -- though it doesn't take much imagination to see something human in the expressive countenance looking at you. Its not just the knowledge, weighing on you painfully -- that this is a nocturnal bird and you aren't only trespassing on its territory, but even impinging on its rest and slumber. 

 

Its not just the lack of knowledge either -- science is still "discovering" a lot of facts about this silent predator of the night -- that makes you wonder if you are in the presence of something "unknown", something beyond the ken of your so called civilization.

It is all this and more.

Natural then, that every-time I photograph an owl out in the wilds, I am thrilled to bits, left tingling all over, and can't stop grinning from ear to ear for quite some time after.

 

Here's a full-frame (and hand-held)  image of a Jungle Owlet that I had made in Kullu, (Uttarkhand) in May 2014.

 

A bit more than a year after, there are still some lovely memories of this encounter...and of the other-worldly experience of seeing this amazing bird in the eye, through the larger than life magnification of 850 mm focal length. 

 

Looking back now, it felt as if the Owlet was gazing unimpeded, deep into my soul and being.

 

The green blur in the image adds to the overall surreal quotient, does it not?     

A Snakebird taking to the skies

What does it mean to be a bird? What does it mean, to be able to fly; to be of this world (when perched on it) -- the terrestrial range of hooves, paws, feet and other rooted things -- and also intimately know the realms of another?

Mankind can only imagine, and fail. Because for all our imagination, we are a species totally lacking in bird sense. And, (even if I say so, strictly in passing), a species utterly incapable of piloting away from the traps that we, in our so-called evolution, have set for ourself -- development, consumerism and greed. 

But then, I digress. This isn't about man, anyway.

What does it mean, to be a bird of the water? What does it mean, to be able to lord it over another realm that is not exactly terrestrial, to be able to dive and scythe through the water, with a fluidity and grace akin to someone born to it?

If I could talk in the language of the birds, and had to pose these questions to any one of them, it would have to be to the Snakebird. For this is one bird that rules both of its realms with supreme elan -- a powerful flier capable of really long hauls (unlike Cormorants, Snakebirds don't really "colonise" a particular lake / pond, and are relatively footloose), it can also prowl the waters with the silent menace (and relative invisibility) of a submarine.

All that is visible (that too, if you have a really keen eye) is that slender neck, gliding through the water snake-like, as the bird darts this way and that -- reading the scripts of bubbles and fish-tails on the surface of the water, and readying for another dive.

And then, it will disappear. Most often than not, to come up with a smallish fish -- already impaled and half-dead, in its bill. Then, with the nonchalance of a master conjurer, that snake-like neck comes into play again, as the fish is tossed up, to be gobbled down head first.

Seen here as it is about to take off -- in a welter of water drops -- the Snakebird is a bird neither of water, nor of air; and also, Janus-like, for this one captured instance, one of both.

There are two stories being told here; the immensity of that wingspread can only mean a mastery of the skies. And, of what happens below the waters, we can (again with the limited grasp and imagination of our kind) make a guess.

With that powerful neck cutting through the murky depths like a boat's prow, propelled (among other things) by the working of that tail -- what chance does a fish stand?

Two well-behaved young birds

When I look back at my eight plus years of bird photography -- a lot of which has consumed all my "spare time" and a substantial part of which has been pure and simple work -- there are days when I have a thousand misgivings.

For one, purely from a professional view-point -- when one considers the aesthetic quality of the photographs and the amount of back-breaking labour involved in making images of birds in the wild, this is a bleak field to be in. 

Like I keep saying, I am a professional when it comes to bird images, but then birds don't / can't pay me for my labour, what to talk of the artistic merit of my work!

For another, like any other thing that becomes a "fad", the bird photography "field" in India is also choc-a-bloc full with those who go about their photography solely with the intention of ticking off boxes from a list -- the type who count the number of species they have bagged, or exult about having photographed "rare birds".

And as can be expected, most of these folks are pretty good when it comes to PR, etc, etc.
Which means, the field that is bleak to begin with, gets even bleaker.

And yet, when I shake my head to get rid of all these meddlesome misgivings, and look at things with the right perspective, I realize that there is so much that I have already gained from the time I have spent in the pursuit of birds.

That, I have a treasure trove of moments that no money in the world can ever buy, and that most often than not, I have managed to capture those moments by using a keen intellect, sharp reflexes and quite a lot of woodcraft.

Its one of those days when that perspective is at work. Because these two young Shikras delighted me with their presence for almost an hour...while I circled the Neem tree in which they were roosting, a tree that is incidentally full of knots, snags and apparently full of gnarled branches -- which meant that these guys were will-nigh impossible to spot most of the time whenever they turned their backs on me.

And then, while I was footing it yet again, going round the tree one more time -- I struck gold. Or you could say, I simultaneously struck two veins of gold.

Does seem as if they wanted to pose for me, no?

P.S. -- A well-deserved plug for Nikon

This image was made on a Nikon D610, with a 600 mm f/4 lens (and thanks to a Teleconverter, an effective reach of 850 mm). I had to crouch from a standing up position, to be able to focus on the birds through intervening branches; and was hand-holding the lens. The tree was back-lit (that accounts for the blown out white spots in the foliage in this image) and all that my eye could see was two pale washes of white, and yet the AF performed immaculately and delivered this outstanding photograph!

A Blue-faced Malkoha, in a summery blue setting!

Normally, I am not the kind to stay at home (or luxuriate under the vents of an AC pretending to work, for that matter) even on the hottest day in May, if there is birding to be done.

In fact, birding in the peak of summer has one distinct advantage, the weather is mind-bogglingly "sunny" and the light is the kind that will make any photographer go ga ga with delight!

But then, this May was different, thanks to the heat wave that battered most of North and South India, accounting for a lot of deaths (mostly of the poor, those unlucky enough to get any work other than the kind that calls for getting broiled in the sun) and the weather was certainly not something that can be called "sunny", in a flippant, or conversational way.

But as I keep saying, a man has to do what a man has to do, so I  tried to put in a spot of "hot weather" birding, as is my wont, and braved the dust devils and the mirages while striking it afoot, looking for birds.

Then again, at some level this is work for me, and I better keep at it -- sun or rain, no?

I made this image of a Blue-faced Malkoha on a May evening, after spending almost half an hour patiently tracking the bird as it worked its way through a couple of thorn thickets, a Ber tree and then, through this Tamarind.

This is a full frame image, and seems just about perfect. And, that dazzling blue sky in the background gives an idea of the light that was on offer.

P.S. -- I never knew Tamarind flowers were pink

Nor did I know that the Blue-faced Malkoha is NOT a brood parasite. So much to learn daily, while in the pursuit of birds. I better keep at it -- sun or rain, no?

The Koklass pheasant -- regal hauteur lighting up a gloomy Himalayan morning

By now, J and I -- thanks to our umpteen trips into the hills -- know a thing or two about the pheasants that forage on and across the less frequented roads that criss-cross through precipitous heights and sheer drops : the (relatively widely seen) Khaleej, the (relatively rare) Cheer and the Koklass.

(I don't mention the Himalayan Monal here because, immaterial of the fact that we were successful in Mission Monal, this magnificent bird will always occupy rarefied ground for me...and its certainly not a bird that I would expect to see "besides the road"... but rather out in the open, with its iridescence blazing gem-like across the greens of a tussocky expanse :-)  

On second thoughts, I wouldn't exactly mind if the Monal graces me with a car window "opportunity", either. )

And, we also know a thing or two about that constant companion of the inveterate stumble-about birder -- failure and defeat.

Because, there isn't much you can do when you are on a road that is on the dark side of the mountain (and draped by trees) and a pheasant shows up on it, as a shadow that is slightly lighter than those around. Even as the car stops and you hoist the bean bag onto the window, and then hoist the lens onto it, many a time you realize you have been slow -- a lifetime too slow, for the bird has long disappeared into the early morning gloom.

(At other times, the bird will just walk on the road, right in front of the car and clearly in sight -- but who wants to photograph a bird through a thick car windscreen? And yes, tiptoeing out of the car, even on cat's feet also doesn't mostly work, for somehow the bird catches onto what's afoot and vamooses.)

But then, if you persist and back yourself -- sooner or later you are at the right place at the right time.
And you get to experience the regal hauteur of yet another wild bird, right in the vastness of its chosen domain.

Seen here is a full-frame image of a Koklass Pheasant (male) that we encountered somewhere in the forested swathes of the Kedarnath Musk Deer Sanctuary.


This guy was totally unaware of our presence and in fact, we slowly drove off, letting him be, while he bent down to forage, since we were in a bit of a hurry and had other birds to bag.

Exif : Nikon D610, Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 600mm f/4G ED VR, Nikon TC-14E II AF-S ; f/5.6, 1/125, ISO -- 800

A fledgeling with a kill

An intriguing upside of being a slowpoke-on-a-walkabout birder (and bird photographer) is how you discover and rediscover the sentience of the world around you -- starting (of course) with a deeper understanding of the lives and living of the common birds around, and then evolving to a level when you are aware of the wildflowers your tread may crush, or the hundreds of toad hatchlings that literally spring out of the rain-soaked, unpaved earth in front of you even as you walk amidst them, as if they were clods of soil, or...


The downside is that you see every bird you encounter as a character, and every story that you want to tell is weighed down with its backstory.

So, first let's get the backstory out of the way.

For almost a month, I have not been able to go birding in my usual carefree and footloose way because a mother Shikra wouldn't allow me in "her" territory, beating me back by the simplest expedient in a raptor's repertoire -- dive-bombing me.

The first two times this happened, it was dusk and I was besides a well (that I have written about here earlier) and waiting up for a pair of breeding White-throated Kingfishers.

While I knew where the Shikra's nest was, I wasn't too keen on taking photographs of a nest or nestlings and the wildly-in-ferment foliage of the Eucalyptus in whose heights the nest was did not allow it either.

Hence, I certainly had NO design on the nest or its contents.

But obviously this was not known to the Shikra, so I beat hasty retreat, badly shaken and congratulating myself for not having toppled into the empty depths of the well.

However, a part of my faculties also optimistically concluded that probably the bird was going for the well to get a drink of water and I just happened to be in the way. So, the next day, in the considerable heat of the afternoon, I was at Ground Zero again, but this time, the well was between me and the Shikra's nest. My objective of the day was to spend some time photographing the Baya weaver birds busily building their nests in a tree that grows out of the side of the well.

I did that and then moved on, going walkabout in search of other birds and keeping very clear of the Shikra's nest. That evening, when I was returning and by the tree again, flying out of the gloom and barely seen till the last nanosecond, the bird again came for me.

That was the third dive-bomb.

I decided to see if it was another "stray" attack and held my ground -- which, as a Shikra flies, was easily 80-100 metres from the nest -- but then the bird came at me again. And again. So, I bet another hasty retreat...and on the long walk home, concluded that the bird is present (and in an attacking mode) at dusk...and the afternoons are safe for me to wait up for the White-throated Kingfishers and take some good photographs of the Baya Weavers.

This conclusion meant that I was at the well the next day, after another long, sweat-soaked and bruising walk...and totally out in the open, to first peer down into it -- and on not finding anything happening there -- peering up at the Weaver Birds.

Yes, I was stupid enough to take my eyes off the "enemy's position", the Eucalyptus was on my blind side and almost behind me. While I was wiping the sweat off my brows and taking another breath, preparatory to lifting the lens up to make some more photographs of the Baya weavers, all of them just blew out of the tree, in a manic commotion, as if borne on a gale.

Some bird-like instinct that I have acquired of late made me turn my head in time to spot my nemesis arrowing straight at me.

I ducked, flailed my lens arm and I screamed...I don't really remember what it was.

Before I could get out of there, the bird dive-bombed me one more time.

Naturally, by now -- in just a matter of 3 days -- the Shikra had made it clear that it was her territory and that I was clearly an interloper whose presence wouldn't be tolerated.

So, I stayed at home.

Or went out to the Buffalo Wallow...involuntarily ducking at the sight of a solitary dove or a pair of Mynahs flying above my head.

A week passed. Or was it a fortnight?

One fine afternoon, when I was again in the general surroundings (and easily some 200 metres from the Eucalyptus), a shadow deliberately moved up through its foliage, to then perch itself very visibly on a dead branch.

It was the mother Shikra, limned in the light and showing itself clearly in order to dissuade me from getting any closer.

So I walked away, glancing over my back all the while.

The day after, on another fine (or not so fine) afternoon, there was no "see-I-am-here" warning...she just came at me. And, as she pulled away from the dive, I saw a flicker in her eye that made me think, "Man, she seems to be enjoying this!"

This attack (and one more that followed) was a bit unprecedented, even by the standards of this fierce mother. So, I went away, to quietly return back, ducking from tree shadow to tree shadow, and then sitting on my haunches in the depths of a Lantana bush, I glassed the Eucalyptus, using the lens as a telescope.

This story (in all probability) starts here.

So, what do I see?

There is a bird as big as the fierce one, with spottings all over the breast and chest, stripes across its throat and a lot of yellow on its face. Hello there, Shikra fledgling -- I mouthed to myself, grinning from ear to ear. That was a little over a week ago.

A little after, I cycled over (without the lens) to do a recce -- to see if I get attacked, if you will -- and found (while maintaining my distance and using my bare eyes) that there were three shadows in that tree.

One Shikra mother and two fledglings? Or, three fledgelings?

The day before yesterday, staying at a fair distance, observing through the lens, I saw a fledgling having a go at the Baya Weavers...and landing up all at ends in a thicket of Ber.

Yesterday, half expecting the fierce one to dive at me once again, I made it close to the Eucalyptus, to see two of the fledglings sitting in its swaying branches and looking for all the world, as lost as kittens who have strayed up a tree.

Then, the idyll was shattered as the fierce one arrived, with a kill.

Before I knew what happened (and while I stayed in the shadows) the mother seemed to have passed on the kill to a fledgling and gone...

Or maybe it was the fledgeling itself which got the kill. I am thin on detail, I really don't know...one's visibility -- looking up into tree canopies isn't very good, even when one is in less extenuating positions

The photograph here is a Shikra fledgeling with a Scaly-breasted Munia kill.

And yes, the Mother Shikra allowed this photograph to be taken.

The first of this season's Juvenile Shikras

 It was a totally overcast today, with sub twenty-five degree (centigrade) temperatures and an on now, off again drizzle that threatened to become a downpour any minute.

Such weather isn't exactly conducive to birding, because mostly at the very first hint of rain, the birds shut shop...and take refuge from the deluge -- in whatever shelter they can find.

Then again, there is the light (or lack of it)...shooting under grey skies not only means that the background is blown out, but for some weird reason, somehow rain-wet birds don't look that great either!

So, I was home-bound for most of the day, and then, in the evening, finally the downpour I was expecting materialized.

It mayn't have rained cats and dogs, but it did seem to have rained a Shikra!

To recount the story the right way, I happened to glance at the little bit of greenery that is still left around my place and spied a bird that looked like a cross between a dove and a cattle egret perched on a wall, and barely 30 metres away.

A dash downstairs to grab the lens, and another careful dash through the slush and puddles on the road got me to the wall, while a fine drizzle fell all around me.

But there was no sign of the bird.

Then I spotted it again, another 30 metres or so, away.

Surprisingly this time it was perched in a Neem that grew right at the edge of the main road...a main road that sees quite a bit of traffic, rain or shine!

Then again, that isn't that surprising, considering that this was a Shikra.

And perfectly understandable, considering that this was a Juvenile.

Some quick and careful lens work gave me a bunch of keepers, then while I was trying to get into a position that got me a better background, the bird took off.

To perch even closer to where I had seen it first, this time, on an pole meant for the power lines that criss-cross the colony.

So, I had some more quick lens work to do.

As expected, the bird stayed put even when I was some 12-15 metres from it.

As I turned homewards, it was still there -- wet and bedraggled, a juvenile bird making sense of its first Monsoons.

The parenting peculiarities of White-throated Kingfishers

Come the monsoons -- or to be exact, come the weeks of intense humidity and heat that precede it -- cupid strikes the White-throated Kingfishers that are resident around the Buffalo Wallow (and of course, other places across Hyderabad and climatic zones similar to it) and they pair up.

While one can never know when and where exactly the birds get intimate, theirs seems to be a long courtship, extending across the fag end of April and all of May. There is courtship feeding, there is also a lot of flying into and out of tree canopies (these are after all tree Kingfishers), and stiff winged displaying on prominent perches.

 A nest, comprising a tunneled burrow is made in a mud-bank close to water (which in our case is the water of the Buffalo Wallow) and 3-4 eggs are laid. And then, with the wisdom ingrained in their DNA, and a prescience that's beyond our ken, somehow the eggs are hatched, right at the onset of the Monsoons.

All through the days when the Monsoons are still "coming", when the build-up comprises of overcast skies and light drizzles (mostly of the sneaky kind, in the silent watches of the night) the parent birds are active in turns, fetching a variety of grub -- grasshoppers, crickets, dragonflies and what look like cockroaches to the nests.

Both the birds also have a tendency to chill out, while on the job (which incidentally at times involves going into the nest and spending 5-10 minutes inside, in the abominable heat) by going hard at the water surface, Kamikaze fashion, in quick succession...and then preening leisurely.    

But in a way, its only when there has been a decent amount of rain that the activity of the birds seems to go up by a couple of levels, and the birds repeatedly bear -- on the basis of what I have seen across the last three seasons -- still-alive and writhing skinks to the nest.

Going by the pace at which the birds enter the nest and exit it, literally bolting out of it, one can easily get an idea of the fury with which the nestlings must be dismembering the skink -- a furious frenzy that any parent bird would be ill-advised to stick its beak in!

And, one can also assume that these are nestlings right at the threshold of fledging.

(Not that I have a very exact idea of how many days it is since the eggs have hatched, because it is almost impossible to document nests in the wild without interfering in the ways of nature...)

Which brings me to wondering -- how in the blazes do these birds estimate things so well?

              A parent White-throated Kingfisher with a skink catch. 

Close encounters with an apex avian predator

When you are someone who is a stumble-about (oh yes, I am being self-effacing and self-deprecatory when I say that) birder, immaterial of how well you read the terrain and what the trees and the undergrowth have to tell you, immaterial of how good your field-craft is, the success you enjoy (in photography terms) is mostly a matter of a lot of luck and even lots more of persistence.

Especially so, when the bird in question is a raptor, and an apex avian predator like the Crested Serpent Eagle at that -- especially when you are birding in a locality (let me use that term fairly loosely) for the first time and have no idea of where (assuming that locality has resident CSE's) the bird likes to perch.

Immaterial of such odds, somehow J and I literally keep running into these magnificent birds during our trips, averaging at least one CSE sighting every-time.

I know that does sound freakishly lucky, and maybe it is...but there is lot more than only luck involved here. And yet, even if it were only a matter of luck, as opposed to a keen eye and an understanding of the way of birds, I will gladly take it!

Even "luck" however couldn't explain away the fact that we were averaging almost a CSE sighting daily on our recent birding trip to Uttarkhand in May...as also that, on an afternoon that was so hot that it reminded me of Hyderabad, we spotted three of these magnificent raptors, gliding over the dense forest canopy below us and then, with a stealth belying their immense wingspans, catching a thermal to swoop right over our heads!

Naturally then, we have added a "Raptor Point" to our list of places we need to return to. I say Raptor Point because we also saw any number of Lammergeirs, Himalayan Griffon Vultures and quite a few Kestrels and Shikras at that point. And, one immense Black Eagle (or so I think) -- that was totally out in the open long enough for me to shoot a couple of bursts -- that I missed because I activated AF too early.

So, someday again, we will be there at the Raptor Point. Till then, we have enough memories of close encounters with these apex avian predators -- to keep our pulses racing.

                                                      The lord of all it surveys!

                                                    Badass, really badass; no?

                                       See that wing-spread; and that look in its eye!

Mission Monal -- A massive success

The Himalayan Monal is probably the most sought-out of the pheasants that make birding in the lower and middle Himalayas, the pure unadulterated joy that it is.

Peculiarly enough, for a bird that is considered holy across most of its range, for one that has been accorded "State Bird" status across Himachal Pradesh and Uttarkhand -- and, national bird status in Nepal -- the Monal (immaterial of the protection one assumes it enjoys) isn't that easily seen.

For one, this has to probably got to do with the fact that like most pheasants, the Monal also is active out in the open only early in the morning and late in the evening, when light in the hilly regions can be at its most trickiest.

For another, it has got to do with the fact that the habitat of this magnificent bird, like most other wild and open spaces across the length and breadth of India is fast dwindling.

Then again, a swallow doesn't make a summer, and one sighting of a Monal doesn't make for a "Monal Point". And yet, considering how optimistic most birders are; how willing they are to give currency to rumors, there are quite a few Monal points all across the hill states.

J and I should know. We have driven and then footed it up to a fair number of these, with our last such trip being up the sheer vastness of the heights that tower over Pangot, a little less than a year ago. While we saw no Monals on that trip, we did see a lot of mountain mist and banks and banks of what could be fog or cloud, cloud or fog.

So, this time around when we were in the hills in Uttarkhand in May, our preparations and groundwork was a few notches higher than the usual, and our intensity as coruscating as it could get. And yes, oh yes -- one does need to have intensity of the coruscating type to successfully bird in the hills because its bloody cold and "early mornings" can mean rolling out of bed at hours as early as 3.30 am.

It was yet another morning typical of the hills, as we drove for an hour or so out of our village home-stay, going up and up on the curves of the road, through the gloomy murk of pre-dawn, encountering the usual, barely seen silhouettes of probably the most easy to see (and also photograph, thanks to "baiting", eh?) of the pheasants -- the Khalij, to finally reach Chopta, even as the skies started lightening.

Chopta is where one takes the path up, to ascend, while walking with the clouds, to Tungnath -- incidentally, the highest of Shiva temples in India. But on this morning our quest was for a holy bird, and hence, after carefully glassing the meadows all around for any signs of the Monal, we went on ahead, making a beeline for the Kedarnath Musk-deer Sanctuary.

Here, as planned earlier on our recce the preceding day, we had to exit our car and foot it over a long stretch, before we finally came across a solitary Monal feeding out in the open. 

           
I probably make it sound as if it was as easy as a proverbial duck-shoot. But it certainly wasn't so. Because, the bird was above us and moving through tussocks of grass in what was still tricky light. Either way, immaterial of how tough or easy it was, this was it -- there was a Monal in our sights!



       

And, I am blogging again!

Whoa!

Looks like its been ages, feels like its been a lifetime...and truth be told, its been close to a year (or is it more?) since I haven't really done any blogging.

Why?

Mostly because -- hey who blogs anymore?

And also because, I have been very very busy with the birds that stray my way -- getting intimate with them and photographing them in a way that that does justice to their glorious miens and birdiness :-)

And believe me, its no easy task considering the standards I have set for myself and the weight of my lens!  

Then again, you could say all this while I have been blogging somewhere else.

That then, is the back story, if you feel like it, do take a look at Stray Birds on Facebook

And hey, don't forget to like it, OK?

Also, since this is the first blogpost on Stray Birds, and in a way this blog is a thread in a continuing narrative of which my book of bird poems is a substantial chapter (in verse), its but natural that a image of my book cover be here.

Who knows maybe I can get around to making it available on Flipkart once again!

Do wish me luck :-)