The flash of a cardinal

Flash of red
from bench to tree
A northern cardinal;
Harlem Meer.

Coral beak
Cocky crest;
No shyness
in his breast.

Central Park
On the wall
his lady sits
Ignoring his flash,
disregarding his call.

Rain catcher: on Jacobin Cuckoo - The Hindu

An interesting article about the Jacobin cuckoo, with pictures from Sagarika's sightings this April 2019, around Perumbakkam, part of the larger Pallikaranai marsh area.

Rain catcher: on Jacobin Cuckoo - The Hindu

The Jacobin Cuckoo heralds the monsoon in north India

Abhishek Gulshan

The Jacobin Cuckoo is one lucky bird indeed. At least according to Indian myth. Also known as the Pied Cuckoo or Chatak, this bird heralds the onset of the monsoon in India.

Being an agricultural economy the rainy season is considered one of the most auspicious seasons in the country. And so, the Pied Cuckoo in North and Central India is a welcome sight.

It is a bird with black and white plumage (pied) with a fancy crest on the head. Its scientific name is Clamator jacobinus. The genus ‘Clamator’ literally translates to being a shouter, a bird which is quite vocal, so you’ll hear yourself surrounded by the calls close to the monsoon. The word ‘jacobinus’ relates to pied birds.

Pictures are from Sagarika's sighting in Chennai

There are two populations of the Pied Cuckoo in India. One is a resident in the southern part of the country. The other, according to tracking by birders, makes its way to North and Central India from Africa by crossing the Arabian Sea, along with the monsoon winds. When the monsoon arrives in all its majesty, its sighting also spreads widely.

So this is a resident?  I didn't know that.

The bird is primarily arboreal, which means that it mostly lives on trees but often forages for food in low bushes, and sometimes even on the ground. Considering its arboreal nature, it prefers forests, well-wooded areas and also bushes in semi-arid regions. These birds are primarily insectivores and feed on grasshoppers, beetles and are also often seen feeding on fruits and berries from trees.


The species, like all cuckoos, is a brood parasite. It lays its eggs in nests that belong to other birds, preferring similar-sized birds like babblers and bulbuls, as their ‘hosts’. The hosts are often distracted by male cuckoos, and the females quickly lay their similar-sized and coloured eggs into the hosts’ nests. The hosts then take care of the eggs and the chicks that hatch from them, as their own. The parasitic chicks are fed by the hosts and then leave the host parents once they are ready to be on their own.

A few years ago, birdwatchers set out to test the truth behind whether the bird does signal the coming of the monsoon. We began a monitoring process, collecting data around bird sightings, and other habits. This is being documented online on ebird.org, an Ivy-League initiative for birdwatchers all around the world.

A large number of birdwatchers reported the sighting of the Pied Cuckoo on the online documentation forum, and when these dates of sightings were compared to the monsoon's arrival, as available with the Indian Meteorological Department, the results were fairly clear. Pied Cuckoos did indeed arrive before the monsoon in most parts of central and northern India. In a few areas, it was also observed that wherever the monsoon was to arrive earlier than usual, the Pied Cuckoo also showed up a few days earlier. So the Chatak is not an old wives’ tale anymore.

To join a trail in Mangar, Haryana this Sunday and spot the Jacobin Cuckoo, email ninox.edu@ gmail.com

The writer is the founder of NINOX - Owl about Nature, a nature-awareness initiative. He formerly led a programme at WWF India as a naturalist, and is the Delhi-NCR reviewer for Ebird, a Cornell University initiative, monitoring rare sightings of birds in the region

The treepie

The treepie called me to my window.
Softly,
Like water dripping in a pool
Bob-o-link, bob-o-link.

The teak tree leaves and the wind did their best to hide it from me.
I caught but a glimpse.


Why do I smile so?



Rufous tree pie (Dendrocitta vagabunda) on the teak tree (Tectona grandis) in my neighbour's garden.

Sentinels

As dusk descends, the sentinels of solitude arrive.
I do not fear them.

ZITTING CISTICOLA - AT SHOLINGANALLUR

More delightful pictures from Mr Ramanan

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Sholinganallur through the lens of Mr Ramanan

Sholinganallur in southern Madras is home to wetlands that are an extension of Pallikaranai.  Now known more for being part of the IT corridor, the area is in urgent need of preserving of the remaining grasslands, scrub, water bodies and wetlands.

These are the soak pits and groundwater charging areas for the city and support an important ecosystem.  Here are a few glimpses of that.

A beautiful capture of the conical silver bill, black tail and white breast of the White Throated Munia (Euodice malabarica), by Mr Ramanan.  These birds move around in large flocks and feed on grass seeds found in scrub and grasslands.  They are found usually in the winter months in south India.

A Black Shouldered Kite (Elanus axillaris) stares menacingly, just before taking off on its hunt for mice.  Its feet are usually clutch the perch from opposite sides.  These smaller kites live on a diet of mice, and it is amazing to see them hover in the sky as they hunt for lunch, dropping silently and speedily onto their prey.  Photo by Mr Ramanan 

The streaked fantail warbler (Cisticola juncidis) displays its fantail.  I prefer to call them Zitting Cisticola which is apt, as their call is a "zit, zit", as they zip past from reed to reed.  They are easily hard, but difficult to spot through the binoculars as they are always on the move.  Photo by Mr Ramanan

In the lake, Mr Ramanan's lens captured a winter visitor, the black tailed godwit, (Limosa limosa) a large wader, with the characteristic pink bill with the black tip.  The bar-tailed goodwill is more streaked 

Meanwhile on the shores, Mr Ramanan finds the brilliant colours of a yellow wagtail (Motacilla flava) in breeding plumage.  The wagtails, well, wag their tails quite incessantly and can be found on the dry periphery of lakes and other water bodies looking for insects.  This one seems to be a male with its olive upper parts.

Another species found in the dry scrub is the ashy-crowned sparrow-lark (Eremopterix griseus).  They look like sparrows.  This is a male with the well marked black collar, while the female is sandy brown.  They have an interesting courtship display with the male kind of shooting up vertically into the air, and then descending also with a whistle.  These are ground birds, foraging for seed and insect and also spending the night on the ground.  We need to leave enough undisturbed ground for these birds to survive and propagate.

The Common Flameback

Photo by Mr Ramanan - A STILL FROM 4K VIDEO-FZ300 + 1.7 TC=1020MM,ISO 125,F/2.8,-1/3 EV,AT 1/125 OF SECONDS

This Flameback (Dinopium javanense) was seen by Mr Ramanan outside his home.  What a beautiful capture of its moustachial stripe, the three toes, and its golden back!

For the last two months, there is one that visits the Terminalia catappa tree outside our bedroom window, and its rattling morning greeting unfailingly improves my mood.  

The tree is so thickly grown that most days I am unable to spot it, so I'm happy for this picture.

The Flameback has now replaced the White Breasted Kingfisher, who stopped visiting when the Millingtonia was uprooted in the storm a few monsoons ago.

BIRDING AT YELAGIRI

All these great photos by Mr Ramanan

White bellied drongo - (Dicrurus caerulescens), endemic to the Indian subcontinent

Indian Robin - Copsychus fulicatus

Brahminy Starling - Sturnia pagodarum

Red whiskered bulbul - Pycnonotus jocosus

Weekend and the Odhiyam tree

The Odhiyam tree (Lannea coromandelica) in our neighbour's garden is bare at the moment.  No, not dying or anything just going through its annual shedding phase.  It is a wonderful time for backyard birding.

At dawn, I heard a Flameback woodpecker at the tree, but it moved into the more leafy Badam (Terminalia catappa).  Later in the morning, the sunbirds hurried through it, they never seem to have a moment to sit and stare, always moving, always calling impatiently and gone in the blink of an eye.

Later, there was a female rose-ringed parakeet, and she fastidiously held a twig with neem fruits (from the neighbouring tree), and ate them one by one.  Once done, she stretched until she was almost upside down looking to finish her meal with some flower buds of the Odhiyam.    She seemed in no hurry to move, and I enjoyed watching her blood red curved beak and that long tail with a streak of blue.

In the afternoon, a treepie stopped for a while, surveying the neighbourhood.  Obviously not up to his high standards, as he flew off with that trademark scratchy call.

After lunch as I lounged around lazily with the crossword, I heard the white breasted kingfisher too, but I was too comfortably stretched to get up and look.

The Odhiyam's leaf shedding  coincides with the koel season, and every year, the males use that tree to woo their lady loves.  In 2012 there was one persistent chap who kept us awake from 3 am.

Today evening there were three gorgeous black young males, and one disinterested speckled female.  They called in turn, and tried to chase each other off,  but all they succeeded in doing was chasing the lady away!

A crow  stopped by, and seemed rather bemused at the frantic calling.  One loud caw and the koels were off in a trice!

Trees.  Birds.  Squirrels.  Butterflies. Family.  All connected.

World Environment Day

The Flameback at our window

I miss the barbets outside my window
coppersmithing all day on the Millingtonia.

The Millingtonia came crashing down one windy monsoon day,
and the Badam has flourished instead, in the sun.

A woodpecker has been calling these last few days
and today we saw it, knocking wood.

Surprise, pleasure and delight.
A beautiful start to the day.

‘Just look out of the window’

‘Just look out of the window’ - Madurai - The Hindu

A chat with Geetha Iyer, well-known consultant on science and environment education, leads one to view spiders and other insects with a tolerant eye

What would you do if you saw spider’s webs around your house? The majority would go into a frenzy of cleaning. But not Geetha Iyer.

This science teacher of many years and well-known consultant on science and environment education thinks of spider webs as the first line of defence against household insects.

Geetha is also a passionate advocate of raising awareness about neighbourhood biodiversity. “It means,” she says, “look out of your window and observe.” “Observe” is another favourite word with this sprightly lady. The cornerstone of our biology lessons is observation, she points out. “But looking at a formalin-bleached cockroach or frog in a jar is not observation. Observation is something that will evoke a previous memory, raise a question in the mind, or evoke a sense of awe. It is the beginning of learning,” she says with great feeling. “And there is nothing like neighbourhood biodiversity to promote observation.”

There’s that term again. By now, I begin to understand what she means. So far biodiversity conjured up visions of soaring mountains, dense forests, and animals like tigers, lions, elephants and pandas.

But Geetha is talking about something much simpler. She’s talking about flies, spiders, lizards, butterflies, moths; about crows, mynahs, pigeons and sparrows.

“I’ve lived in cities like Mumbai, Delhi, Jaipur, Chennai…. And everywhere there are trees. Where there are trees, there will be birds even if it’s only a crow or a mynah. Did you know there are different kinds of mynahs?

“People see a black bird and immediately say ‘Oh! Crow!’ But if they ‘observe’, they might see the red eyes and greyish-green beak of the male Asian koel.”

She brings up the issue of spiders and lizards and how many people run screaming from these harmless animals. Lizards feed on insects and mosquitoes, she says, and are not dangerous unless they fall into your food.

“This business of lizards licking food is a fallacy,” she says scornfully. “Most likely it was there because of an insect on your food.” She agrees that one really can’t have spider webs in one’s living rooms but “in the backyard or on balcony corners is okay. One kind preys on cockroaches but is rarely seen.” Spiders definitely have my vote then, I think.

Speaking of spider webs and pigeon droppings, something she says sticks in my mind. “A super-sanitised environment is not good for one’s immune system. Biodiversity is also closely linked with well-being and health. By not allowing biodiversity to flourish around you, you are denying space for those that could well check the population of dengue/malarial mosquitoes.”

Even if children are asked to write about biodiversity or environment, it’s usually downloaded from the Internet, rarely about first-hand experience. She narrates an incident from one school. The Std. V NCERT textbook had a lesson on laws to protect wildlife and instructs teachers to discuss the implications with students. The teacher asked if the decision to make snake catching a punishable offence was correct. One girl’s answer was: Catching snakes and exhibiting them is for livelihood, so give them other ways of making a living before you make this a punishable offence. Otherwise they will be forced to beg or left without any way to live a decent life. “And do you know what the teacher said?” Seeing her expression, I could guess. “This is a wrong answer. Go check the textbook and write what it says.”

She reflects on her days as biology teacher and how she used to look for opportunities to take children out of the classroom. “At Apeejay School, NOIDA, the Yamuna was across the road. In winter, there would be many migratory birds. I used to take the children bird watching. Today, there’s a four-lane expressway. No way can you cross the road now.” What if the school is in the middle of a concrete jungle? “Use potted plants. There will be grasshoppers or flies.”

She has quite a bit to say about flies. “In the insect world, the fourth largest group is flies. Not all are the kind you want to swat. Many are beautiful. They are pollinators and pest controllers. For us, fly means carrier of disease. But if you watch a fly carefully, you’ll see it cleans itself more often than we do. A fly tastes its food with its feet, so it has to land on different stuff. Humans throw garbage in the open, defecate in open spaces and then complain about the fly carrying disease.”

In an attempt to create more awareness, she has curated the content for the Biodiversity module of Wipro’s Earthian programme for schools. Geetha shows me the pamphlet of commonly seen fauna, which helps one spot the difference between a chameleon and a garden lizard, or a grasshopper, a mantis and a Katydid. There’s a card game and a booklet with activities to facilitate observation  and personal experience of biodiversity. The material for schools is available for download athttp://www.wipro.org/

earthian/school.php#HTP

As we wind up our chat, Geetha says, “We don’t need any new curriculum. If schools can engage with forest departments, they can actually use the forest to study the regular curriculum and fulfil the classroom requirements. Even parks and gardens can be used for biodiversity studies, if natural areas of wilderness are not accessible. And environment education won’t be the namesake project it is today.”

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Biodiversity is also closely linked with well-being and health..

Not changed much has it?

Familiar fauna

Maramallis dripping their white fragrance. At home and here in Abu Dhabi.

Little brown doves on the pavement, sparrows in the bushes, sandy beaches and Indians on the streets.

All familiar, in an unfamiliar landscape.

Treescapes - Hong Kong

The trees stand proud and erect, and are well cared for.  (Bombax)

I loved the trees of Hong Kong.   It always amazes me what green does to a place.

An ode to commerce, glass and concrete, but to me, the trees of HK just added that little bit to make my heart cheerful.

On the streets, I would see large trees, carefully labelled....not nailed, but with a flexible wire going around.

....And with a spring that allows for the growth of the tree!

Of course the city is blessed with rain, lots of it

The trees very familiar and similar to what we have here.  Lagerstroemia

We also saw trees being chopped down in half an hour with electric saws, when they were in the way.....but from what I could make out, these were trees that gre easily and not the large tropical trees that take a long time to grow.

Tree planting in Hong Kong is very much a part of the urban planning,  there is no random and enthusiastic planting, and what is planted is cared for and tended.

The Victoria Peak trail was delightful and invigorating, and I of course meandered and wandered, looking at every little insect, listening to the crickets whirring, and the bulbuls calling!

The trail all around the peak is lined by a track like this, and seems to be a favourite place for expats to walk their dogs and work on their fitness.

At midday, we saw several serious joggers!  Sweating profusely and carrying that water bottle to hydrate. 

The pathway was lined with tree boards, but I was very unsuccessful in matching the board and the tree.  Hmmm, I wonder why. 

The Peak tram - gets you to the top of the 500 odd m peak, almost vertically!

The Peak - certain parts of it - are protected, and the green cover is lush.

Masked laughing thrushes were a plenty, especially in the city parks

As were the little red doves.  Sparrows were also in abundance, which seems to negate the cellphone theory.

These crickets buzzed in unison all through our walk, the chorus rising and fading to some mysterious rhythm.

The butterflies were as big as birds.....

....but difficult to capture in our little cam.

This light vented bulbul, though, obliged, posing on the lamp post for us.

This was labelled as the India Rubber Tree - brought by the Brits - and with no known pollinating agent in Hong Kong. Views of the bay  a ....Kowloon .....and the bridge and port.  It must be pretty to do the walk at night as well. Next time! We headed back to this monstrosity called the Peak Tower, with a viewing gallery (extra charge for that) A morning well spent and the hotel room and shower were welcome after this!