Day 3 - The dawn chorus

 Jun 30th 2025

Red-vented Bulbul (Pycnonotus cafer)

I love the mornings when the crow chorus is muted and I hear the other members of the  dawn orchestra.

Today was one such.  The crows were in the distant trees and the red vented bulbuls were on the closer Teak tree. I lay in bed listening to their to-to-doo calls, back and forth.  As I lay in bed, I pictured their alert coal black heads cocking this way and that, as they called.  Sometimes tails fanning. 

Birding by calls.  I enjoy it these days.  I don't need to see the birds, I just enjoy their calls and don't get into a frenzy trying to find them.

The bulbuls have been active these last few weeks in my neighbourhood, flitting from the teak tree, to the wire (in the picture), and even to our balcony plants, they in their morning busyness me in my morning pre-caffeine sleepiness.

It is a bird of low concern, seeming to be doing well in urban India in green neighbourhoods.  SOIB reports that its presence in TN is stable

As the bulbul flew off this morning, a tailorbird came by - what a sharp shrill call it has!  And they call incessantly as they go about their foraging, with a reply coming from further afield. It was so close I could see the black bib on his chest and the delicate pink legs.  

Let me see what tomorrow brings.