White-eared Bulbul

Not forever does the bulbul sing
In balmy shades of bowers,
Not forever lasts the spring Nor ever blossom the flowers.
Not forever reigneth joy,
Sets the sun on days of bliss,
Friendships not forever last,
They know not life, who know not this.”

 ― Khushwant Singh, Train to Pakistan

24,November 2013
Sanjay Van, Delhi

House sparrow,Male bathing

“Imperfection is beauty, madness is genius and it's better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring.” ― Marilyn Monroe

Location :Karkardooma,Delhi-92,India
 Date: 12 January 2014  Time :1259PM
A group of 50 sparrows are regular at this place.
Around 8 of them assembled for water bath on puddle collected on road.

Indian Peafowl

"The pride of the peacock is the glory of God" William Blake

              On 26th of January afternoon, I landed in Sanjay Van from Vasant Kunj Side. In fact I had plan to visit Aravalli Bio-diversity Park but lost the tract despite my GPRS.
"Can I help you" someone called me. The voice turned out to be Air Vice Marshal(Retd) Vinod Rawat.He was with pack of young kids on an education visit to the Sanjay Van.
I decided to walk with the group learning about aravalli hills,the degradtion of forest by villaiti kikkar and attempt to restore it with Aravalli trees.The kids were shown ronjh, dhak,papadi and other trees.
My eyes kept looking for birds.There were lot of babblers,House sparrow and peacock.A partridge kept on calling from a distance.Could also hear a treepie. Few prinias and tailorbirds made appearance.
"Do we have a water body here" I asked AVM Rawat. He led me to a large lake being fed by treated water from vasant vihar. A nice looking lake with few Black-winged stilts,Common moorhen,two sandpipers ,red wattled lapwing and a WT Kingfisher taking bath. The light was bad and not worth a shot.
This lake feeds feeds Hauz Khas lake, I learnt.
As the light dwindled, I decided to go back and took a track back. I kept on walking till I realized that I was lost.With guidance from a cylcist, I reached a broken wall facing Vasant Kunj road.Had to walk a bit to trace my car.
This peafowl was a parting shot when I re-entered the Van to have a last look for birds. Could see Robins,Magpie and silverbills too.
This peafowl was on top of a kikkar tree and sensed my presence. It flews off as I took its shots.

Sanjay Van,Delhi 26.1.2014

Common Hawk Cuckoo,Juvenile

“Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.” 

― Marthe Troly-Curtin, Phrynette Married

Delhi is foggy in winters as was the day on 14th of January.Met Mr TK Roy,an environmentalist in Okhla bird Sanctuary.It was a lean day in forenoon as a birder at Okhla which otherwise is in bad shape this year.

We decided to explore Okhla Bird Sanctuary from Delhi side where a marginal road is being constructed by Flood Department.Drove on muddy road encountering few trucks on construction site. There were lot of purple swamphen in the water hycinths.Suddenly Tarun asked me to stop.He had spotted a bird on the tree. I realized that it was a cuckoo, a lifer for me 

  

My First Look of Bird 

The bird too looked back 

There some feast under the tree.

The feast 

Location:Okhla Bird Sanctuary  Date: 14.1.14 Click Images to enlarge

Black-shouldered Kite

Greater NOIDA
 15 November 2014

Fewer migratory birds visit Delhi

NEW DELHI: The cold may be making many of us uncomfortable, but currently, the capital is a warm stopover for thousands of stunning migratory birds. Biodiversity parks and wetlands are seeing a surge in the number of birds that began their journeys from Europe, Siberia, the Himalayas and other South Asian countries at the onset of winter.

However, in some areas there is a gradual decline in the number of species that visit every year. At Okhla Bird Sanctuary, about 38 species of winter migratory birds (a total of 5,545 birds as per Asian Waterbird Census) were seen last January, but this time only 22 species and a far lesser number of birds have been spotted till now.

Link Fewer migratory birds visit Delhi

Flirting with feathers - The Hindu

The 21-year-old Ramit Singal, who has mapped 206 species of birds in his university town of Manipal, talks about how his passion took wing.

As I waited for the official book launch of A Birder’s Handbook to Manipal(Manipal University Press, 2013) in the open-air amphitheatre in Manipal, the author Ramit Singal, a wiry, bespectacled, shy 21-year-old lost in his beard, kept identifying all the varied twilight bird-calls all around us. His ear seemed more attuned to bird-call than the human gabble of congratulations. Singal’s book lists 206 species of birds found in Manipal, the coastal university-town. Nestled in the rich bio-diverse valley of the Western Ghats, the region hosts “many endemic and rare species”, threatened by the accelerated development of the last decade.

Link : Flirting with feathers - The Hindu

Common Hoopoe

20 October,2013
 Jagatpur Khadar,Wazirabad, Delhi, India

Demoiselle Crane

Species of the Day: Parvinder Singh Anand,Delhi

Elements Of Khichan: Three Major Elements Which Attract Everyone Towards Khichan - Sand Dunes , Blue Sky & Demoiselle Cranes , I Feel Lucky To Have Witnessed All Of Them In My Recent Trip...
Parvinder Singh Anand,Delhi

Ashy Prinia

24,November 2013
Sanjay Van, Delhi

Indian Pitta.. one of the most beautiful birds. in diff shades

Sudhir Garg,Jaipur Rajasthan

White-breasted Waterhen

White-breasted Waterhen with chick
 12July,2013
 Basai Wetland,Haryana

Black-headed Ibis

23 June,2013
 Okhla Bird Sanctuary

Wire-tailed Swallow

Basai Wetland
 12July,2013

Black Headed Jay- Dr Arpit Bansal

Species of the Day

One of the Commoner From the Hills.... Unfolding Uttarakhand Series...

Black Headed Jay, Chopta, Uttarakhand, Dec'13


Habitat : Forests, preferring mixed pine-oak and cedar-oak woodlands. Shows distinct preference for more open forest.

Feeding : Omnivorous. Chiefly invertebrates during breeding season, also small lizards and the eggs and nestlings of small birds; diet includes variety of seeds and berries, especially in autumn and winter, including pine seeds. Scavenges discarded household food scraps around villages.

White-tailed Lapwing

Location: Okhla Bird Sanctuary,UP,India
 Date:29 November,2014

Citrine Wagtail,1st Winter

Location : Okhla Bird Sanctuary, NOIDA, Uttar Pradesh, India 29 November 2013

Date :

29 November 2013

Temminck's Stint,non-breeding

Location: Okhla Bird Sanctuary,UP,India
Date:19January,2014

Common Geenshank

Breeding Plumage,
Okhla Bird Sanctuary ,UP
19.1.14

Bronze-winged jacana,Juvenile

Location: Okhla Bird Sanctuary,India
 Date : 19.1.14

Red-breasted flycatcher

Female
Location: Budha Garden,Delhi,India
Date: 12 January 2014
 Note: The bird repeatedly visited the manhole for picking up insects.

Black Redstart

Female, Location: Karkardooma, Delhi, India
Date : 25 March 2013

Yellow-bellied Prinia

Location: Okhla Bird Sanctuary
Date:31 March 2013

Greylag Goose

Location:Basai Wetlands, Haryana, India
Date : 23 November 2013

Red Avadavat

Female
 Okhla Bird Sanctuary, NOIDA, Uttar Pradesh, India
Date : 7 April 2013

Common Rosefinch

Female,
Location:Cultivation near Okhla Bird Sanctuary, NOIDA, Uttar Pradesh, India
Date:7 April 2013

Black-headed Bunting

Male in breeding plumage
Location:Cultivation near Okhla Bird Sanctuary, NOIDA, Uttar Pradesh, India
 Date:7 April 2013

Graceful Prinia

Location: Yamuna Khadar
Date: 14 April 2014

The Greater White-fronted Goose that has never come down south makes its appearance in Koothankulam

It was amazing, recalls birder Mansur Ahamed. He was at Koothankulam Bird Sanctuary, often referred to as birder’s paradise, and he spotted thousands of bar-headed goose, the highest flying migratory bird. “We have seen them in 50s or 100s in Tirupur. Seeing them in such huge flocks was a sight in itself,” he says.

As he furiously clicked photographs, he noticed one bird that looked like the odd one out. It was slightly bigger in size than the rest of the birds. “We initially mistook it to be Greylag Goose,” he says.

Read News

Purple -rumped Sunbird

Male,
Location :Botanical Garden, Hyderabad, India
Date :26 December 2013

Here's Why Birds Fly In A 'V' Formation

There are two reasons birds might fly in a V formation:
 It may make flight easier, or they’re simply following the leader. Squadrons of planes can save fuel by flying in a V formation, and many scientists suspect that migrating birds do the same. Models that treated flapping birds like fixed-wing airplanes estimate that they save energy by drafting off each other, but currents created by airplanes are far more stable than the oscillating eddies coming off of a bird. “Air gets pretty darn wiggy behind a flapping wing,” says James Usherwood, a locomotor biomechanist at the Royal Veterinary College at the University of London in Hatfield, where the research took place.

 READ MORE...

 Bird Data Confirms That V’s Help Save Energy

Common Myna

Location: Budha Garden,Delhi,India
Date: 12 January 2014

Common chiffchaff

 Location: Okhla Bird Sanctuary,UP,India
 Date:14January,2014
 Note: Observed four Common chiffchaff foraging at one site on water hycinths.