Last birding at Amruthahalli Lake

Perhaps, last birding at Amruthahalli lake. I have relocated to new area to move near to the office. Consequently, this seems to be my last birding at this lake for now. Even though lake was empty throughout my stay of 8 yrs, I have emotional attachment due to the birding opportunities. Now the de-silted lake is blooming back with support from summer rains. Hope the works of authorities fructify and brim the lake to full mark! So whom we got for last turn.

I have been waiting for these swallows to settle down on perch. Today finally I had opportunity to photograph them still. The birds were busy preening and basking. Unfortunately, poor light from east shadowed by clouds did not provide ample light to photograph them. The blues need stark sunlight to capture in camera. I moved away after birds also moved due to annoying photographer :-).

The pond heron was in contemplation mood. The reflection was drooling. The clear water was boon!

The absconding waders are back to lake now. The spot billed ducks, the eurasian coot, bronze winged jacana, glossy ibis and many are back to lake. I did not capture black-winged-stilts though. 

The lake bed finally. There is plenty of water now. Hopefully the lake would fill 30% by end of monsoon.

Good bye Amruthahalli Lake!

Great NeighBird!

A birder in twitter gave the title when I posted picture of Malabar pied hornbill which is dwelling in our village from couple of years. The reply was clear that I have a great neighbor (idiomatically neighbird!). I like the comment and thought of putting into a tiny blog to honor the benign birds. This pair makes visit daily in our backyard inside the forest but hard to photograph due to shyness. In one of the lucky day, I took the picture of female clearly.

The bird later flew to casuarina tree which enabled me to capture clear pictures. The bird spotted me and flew from location

There she goes after spotting the human!

But male, I could only capture the "HornBill"

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Chestnut Headed Bee-Eater

Our plan was to visit Hemavathi Ugama Sthana (Birth Place) but ended up with disappointment. The place is under renovation and hardly can find the spot of river spring. The old look is lost. Do not understand why natural things need modern look. The 10kms additional drive went futile. For interested people, May 28th is festival day and one can celebrate the revived place with grandeur.

Nothing goes wasted. While walking through the debris of construction materials, heard call similar to green bee-eaters. I was surprised as how green bee eater choose such dense forest. When I looked upwards, they were none other than chestnut headed bee eaters. This is perk of travelling to deep jungles of Western Ghats! These birds usually dwell in deep forest and exhibit similar behavior as green bee eaters i.e. fly high, catch the prey and savor it! I saw them happy to be around human population than being shy beings. Here are the pictures I shot during that graceful day! The cloud cover was negative for a crisp shot but happy with maiden spotting!

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Transit time birding near Mulbagal

08 April 2023,

Joyed after visiting the World's only Garuda temple near Koladevi, we were heading back to Mulbagal to visit Narasimha Swamy temple. The town of Mulbagal and surroundings contains ancient temples and sacred places which I will write soon. On the way to mulbagal, we chose a different route which landed us to this beautiful lake. I thought of exploring it briefly.

Initially I did not take out my camera but soon I dragged it to my hand. First look gave me the commoner red vented bulbul with beautiful background. This bird is omnipresent in India and can be spotted in backyard as well!

Few moments later, this guy popped up. It has been long time since I saw Eurasian moorhen. The bird was closer by which enabled me to shoot clearly. Later the bird noticed me and flew to distant place.

Biggest surprise was the pied kingfisher hovering over the sky just before hunting its meal. I took few action pics but couldn't grab entire series especially the dive. It's hovering resembles the large kites and feels like bird is tiny kite. It has been singing from long time but I couldn't recognize its voice early on. Perhaps I could have pictured it on perch. Once catching its meal, bird moved to inaccessible part of lake. It's captivating to watch this tiny hunter flapping it's wings in mid air, locking its target and diving towards the pond for its meal

I have been trying to get the pied kingfisher in frame clearly but its difficult to spot them in urban areas. You need to travel to rural areas to spot them!

The silence of bucolic world draws you to stay away from city mayhem. The Kolar district is regarded as arid region which uses to face severe water shortage in earlier days. There are not many waterbodies in district, I guess has no rivers. The only water survival mantra here is the lakes spread throughout the district. They are designed to sustain the water shortage during summer. Thanks to copious rains from past 3 years, the water bodies are healthily flowing even in peak summer and avian world is thriving. The long term plans of designers of such areas is paying off even now.

From maps, this lake is named as Mudiyanuru lake. The lake current storage is healthy despite the scorching summer. The recent pre-monsoon rains have also brought up fresh grass shoots. These regions received torrential rains during pre-monsoon recently. Even though the lake seems dirty due to twigs and leaves, they are pure than well maintained city ones. Please do not trash such pristine water bodies.

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Target - Tiny birds

02 April 2023

Nowadays, Sunday morning routine is changed to refreshing in Jakkur lake. It has become usual to visit the lake early Sunday morning and dabble in avian world. Only confusion is whether to visit front or rear gate. This time I chose front-gate due to blooming flora of spring. Plenty of tiny birds devour nectar from the fresh flowers early morning which is treat for bird photographers. Their nectar devouring alongside the colorful backdrop of fresh flowers creates memorable frames. Jakkur lake has plenty of avid birders who patiently wait for their favorite frame to be snapped.

Lets start with the spring blooms. Here is a three in one bloom along the promenade.

The pink trumpet blossom in Bengaluru which is news all over India for its spring beauty. Entire city seems to engrossed in capturing and flaunting their beauty in social media. Let me flaunt a simpler one

I started my stroll with hope of spotting cinereous tit or white-eye. The purple sunbirds are used to human movements are easy to photograph. The grand flower blooms accentuate the beauty of frames. Here are few of those frames with bird engrossed in pulling juicy nectar. The bird amidst the colorful bouquet makes it captivating to capture for bird photographers. 

As I strolled further, heard voice of cinereous tit. I patiently stayed for a while and it succeeded. I managed to get some good glimpses of bird. The bird was close enough to photograph cleanly but I committed a mistake. I should have used lesser focal length. Since I used 600mm full focal length, some of them turned out blur due to violation minimum focusing distance. Hope I learn such lessons cleanly.

I heard white eyes in thicket but those areas were inaccessible :-(. I was happy to capture cinereous tits considerably clean.

Later I moved to wetland area. Farmers were busy cutting grass for their cattle and hence many avian creatures had moved farther unfortunately. One of those rare frames with zero concrete structures. Hard to photograph nature in Bengaluru without man-made element.

The reflection of apartment over the still water is pleasant to photograph but not worthy of praise.

I missed to capture coppersmith barbet on the way back. It was peacefully perched for longer time but flew away far off as I grabbed camera. Better luck next time :-(

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