Kahni tu banti hai! (Story is bound to be made!)

 

May 06, 2023.

While moving towards Chakki Mod, Gurjeet asked,

“What are you going to write on today?”

 

“Let us see. I will find some topic as Chakki Mod never disappoints. The place is full of surprises. I will find something to write about. “Even if I get nothing, at least I’ll take some photographs,” was my reply. 

Enroute, we picked up Arushi Kanwar who had requested to be tagged along when we bumped into her a day earlier. I had met her briefly last year when she was visiting the area with her sister Ankita and her mother.  Both Ankita and Arushi are young keen birdwatchers though it is early days for them. 

We drove straight to Bhojnagar where some coral trees were still blossoming.  We got Common cuckoo, starlings, parakeets, drongos, sparrows, barbets, and many other species. We clicked to our heart’s content. Arushi was especially delighted as she never expected so many birds to come to the flowers. She did mention that her day was made, and she was quite contented.  However, me and Gurjeet were on a little secret mission of our ours.  

We drove out of Bhojnagar and stopped just around the corner. The other day, we did have a glimpse of a raptor. Even though the area is full of species, raptors are not many., We did see a raptor that we are going to investigate today.  Leaving Arushi in the car, we started looking deep into the thick foliage. Gurjeet picked up the sound and signaled that it was there perched on a branch. In the meantime, Arushi stealthily moved out of the car and started exploring. To be very frank, we did not want to reveal what we had seen. It was a rare bird for the region, and we did not want the word to spread.  Her keen eyes saw it. 

“What it is?” she enquired.

To hoodwink her, I said, “It is but a Shikra’ thinking that she will not notice the difference and may just ignore it being a common bird.  

“No, it is not a Shikra. This is huge and has thick barring. Its colour is also different,” the young birder said firmly as she started focusing and clicking the bird. It was a Besra, a bird quite uncommon in the area. 

Many senior birders and bird photographers who have been visiting the area for years have yet to come across Besra. I was clicking it for the third timer during my birding journey in Chakki Mor. Ever since Gurjeet uploaded the photograph. many have called him up seeking the exact location of the bird. 

And here was Arushi , a young birder who has witnessed and clicked Besra quite early in life. She has become a part of the story, the story of not only clicking a Besra but also catching me by my ear for telling her a lie.  

Even though I took many pictures, this story is that of Arushi and rightly pictures clicked by her are being shared. She has been rewarded with a picture of Besra with Purple sunbird as a kill, a rare photo opportunity that she lapped it up.

The Challenge

“When you're following your inner voice, doors tend to eventually open for you, even if they mostly slam at first.” ― Kelly Cutron

As the curtain draw for birding for the time being with temperature's rising and coral flowers having just withered away, the green foliage in Chakkimod-Bhojnagar valley is getting thicker by the day. It is becoming difficult to spot the birds. However. diehards do not give up themselves easily and continue to seek birds.  They go by the adage, " If you seek the bird, the bird also seeks you" and certainly Chakkimod never disappoints and continue to throw some pleasant surprises.

While scouting for the elusive birds, we came across the beautiful blue throated blue flycatcher today. When we started our trip , we held the view that it would be a tough day head. However, Gurjeet Virk remarked that this season we yet have to see the Blue throated blue flycatcher.

Out of nowhere, this beauty turned up and while we zoomed our cameras to take few shots, Aseem Kalia jokingly said, " End of Season's Sale. "

Lips of wine

I tasted your sweet lips, thrilled to my fingertips

Lips of wine, warm with fire, you are my one desire

Lips of wine, and they are mine

While tropic breezes play, while palm trees gently

sway

Lips of wine, come to me, whisper low so tenderly

Lips of wine, and they are mine

When one sees the Red-billed leiothrix for the first time, one would perhaps be reminded of the above song, "Lips of Wine " . It was a popular song of yesteryears 

performed by Andy Williams and written by Sy Soloway and Shirley. 

The very look of Red billed leiothrix is intoxicating and it is popularly called the Bird with the Red lipstick. Perhaps it is the most photographed bird of Chakki Mod in Himachal Pradesh where it has a considerable population. 

It is indeed a beautiful bird. Adults have bright red bills and a dull yellow ring around their eyes. Their backs are dull olive green, and they have a bright yellow-orange throat with a yellow chin; females are somewhat duller than males, and juveniles have black bills. 

One has to just go to Ishwar Dhabha on the Chakki Mod -Bhojnagar stretch and sit there to see these playful beauties on the logs placed by Ishwar Bhatia and his wife. At any moment you will find scores of them feeding on the grains placed by the family. 

Chakki Mod never disappoints given the number of bird species found there. However, on a low day even when no other birds are spotted, be rest assured that you will get the  Red billed leiothrix. 

At the Ishwar Dhaba they are bold and  their playful antics are the finest examples of healthy human  bird coexistence. The credit does go to the caring attitude of Ishwar and his family. 

 In our early days of birding in Chakki Mod, finding even one or two red billed leiothrix was challenging but certainly exciting. It remained in thick undergrowth and just having a glimpse of it made our day. But now you find them all over the place , their population has not only increased , they are no more weary of the humans.

 Lips of wine never get satiated as  more you see , more you will want. 

You will never get bored watching them , photographing them, appreciating  them. 

Red billed leiothrix clicked in Chakki Mod, Himachal Pradesh . 11 February 2023. Nikon D 500, 200-500 mm.

"Owners pride, neighbour 's Envy "

 

Do you recall this ad tag line from  yesteryears of Onida Television? Well, these days, this tag line perhaps fit the blossoms of Indian Coral Tree from our very own birding hotspot, Chakki Mor more than anything else. 

The birding community has been making rounds of Chakki Mor these days to click photos of birds that get attracted to the red blossoms of the Indian Coral Trees . The birds on these trees include the  starlings,  crimson and purple sunbirds, the Himalayan, the black and red vented bulbuls,  drongos, scimitar babblers, woodpeckers , nuthatches, barbets, parakeets, red billed blue magpies, the Orient magpie Robin ,  flycatchers and the Indian Golden oriole and even the kingfishers. 

The photographs of birds on Coral Trees is a delight  to watch as they are  getting increasingly posted across social media forums  attracting likes and appreciation comments. Perhaps the best compliment is from across the border on Instagram account of Aseem Kalia where to one of the posts, a photographer from Islamabad, Pakistan confided that bird photographers from Islamabad have been fascinated by the pictures that they have been searching Islamabad and neighbouring areas for an Indian Coral Tree frantically. Have failed to find one, the photographer requested for a sapling from him. 

When Aseem shared this with some of his birding colleagues here , one  of the friends jokingly remarked ,"We can gift them why just one but many saplings provided they stop perhaps you know what". Well for all you know one day the Indian Coral Tree becomes the ambassador of goodwill and diplomacy. Till then, let it be our pride and their envy. 

Photograph of Spot winged starling clicked by me on Coral Flowers in Chakki Mor on April 12, 2023 on Sony a7 iv, 200-600 mm .

Mother's Day

 Mother's Day ! 

Environment has its own unique way of manifesting itself, surprising us every now and then with the unexpected. It was on May 15, 2023, I drove down to Thapli region in Panchkula District of Haryana   specifically to see if Jacobin Cuckoo had arrived or not. For the last several years, I have been following the arrival of Jacobin Cuckoo.

 As I reached Thapli, it started raining. Disappointed, I drove back and as soon as I almost reached my home, I got a call from a friend in Thapli that the sky had cleared. I drove back as my instincts pointed that some surprise was awaiting me.

 

I walked up a small hillock in the forested area that offered a good view of the area where Jacobin Cuckoo was spotted by me last year. The path was uneven, and I slipped and fell. I was tired as my energies had dilapidated and did not feel like getting up. 

Sitting there still for almost fifteen minutes, I saw an Indian roller perched on a treetop. The roller would fly down making a hissing threatening sound only to return to the place where it was perching. When I looked deep, I observed that the roller was guarding its nest, a hole in the tree and that a huge monitor lizard was clawing its way up the tree and the roller was trying to shoo it away. 

The Indian roller once again flew into the undergrowth and some commotion followed. The roller flew back to the branch and in its beak was a juvenile of the Bengal Monitor Lizard.  I could not believe what I saw. I had never seen an Indian roller known for its acrobats in mid-air hunting a monitor lizard. I captured the moment with my camera. The Indian roller ate the juvenile lizard.

 I got up and walked away with the documentary evidence that Indian rollers are fine hunters as well. Probably the nest contained her chicks, and this was a female roller that would go to any length to save her chicks like any mother would do.  What a sight to have on Mother’s Day.   However, I felt sad for the adult monitor lizard that lost her little one and was no longer in sight.