Birds News From Subhojit Chakladar
A cloudless blue sky at dawn, (relatively) moderate temperatures and low winds – its the kind of day birders look forward to! After the brutal winter, it was an absolute pleasure to walk around the Uiwang reservoir. A total of 30 species spotted in about 4.5 hours of birding.
It started with White Wagtails (both lugens and leucopsis) playing around in the rice stubble. Followed by some courtship display by 3 pairs of Great Crested Grebes. The numbers seems to be a bit reduced when compared to last weekend but the courtship displays are becoming more intimate. There were also a couple of them in their winter plumage. However, the Little Grebes were all in their summer plumage, and one of them gave close and prolonged views near the eastern shores of the lake. There is a housing construction going on in the North-eastern corner of the lake but inspite of the noise and distraction, I found quite a few birds in the woods around, including a nesting Marsh Tit and a couple of extremely inquisitive Varied Tits.
In the farms on the western periphery of the lake, I found a couple of obliging Long Tailed Tits and Naumann’s Thrush. There was also a Grey Headed Woodpecker in the woods and a Common Buzzard in the sky. I searched for the Red-Billed Starling that I spotted last Sunday but no signs of it. Instead, I found a Red-Flanked Bluetail (which is a lifer for me). There were plenty of Barn Swallows on the wires and moving around.
