Birding around Dechu : Rajasthan

Having spent a good time at Khuri, it was time for another outing with birds this time around the Manvar resort where we stayed. Religiously we spent our early mornings and evenings in birding. After knowing our interest in birding, our driver ChandaRam, enthusiastically stopped the jeep whereever he spotted one, and explained us with lot of local details about the bird. I wish we could have followed the way it was taught to us in NTP, nI just have go back to photos to id the birds. A good lesson learnt, better late than never!

Black Shouldered Kite

Common Raven, locals believe that, if this bird enters a house during Deepavali, it is considered as good omen and its believed that the house will be blessed with lot of fortune :-)
Little Brown Dove

Indian Peafowl: These are so common, across the country side in Rajasthan, you are guaranteed to spot a few every time you venture out!


Indian Roller


Rose Ringed Parakeet (Male &Female)

Red collared dove
Variable Wheatear

Id needed for the following! the first two should be some female Wheatear, but we weren't able to ID them yet.
Common Babbler.

Rosy Pastor or Starling.

Birding at JLR-NTP, Bannerghatta

Here are some shots of a few birds we spotted at JLR Bannerghatta Nature Camp during our NTP. The shots are few in number and average in quality - as the emphasis was more on learning the process of birding rather than shooting them well.
Blue bearded Bee eater

Coppersmith Barbet, just outside the tent
White cheeked Barbet, whose loud call we woke up to in the mornings
Rose ringed Parakeet (female)
Spotted Dove, early in the morning
Laughing Dove
Brown Fish Owl
Eurasian Eagle Owl, which we almost missed the firs day but spotted the next day
Little Egret, showing off clearly, black legs and yellowish feet (lesson learnt in the previous class)
Golden Fronted Leaf bird (Chloropsis)
Here's the entire list of birds spotted during the course:

1. White Cheeked Barbet
2. Coppersmith Barbet
3. Little Cormorant
4. Great Cormorant
5. Red Wattled Lapwing
6. Black Crowned Night Heron
7. White Browed Wagtail
8. Blue capped Rock Thrush
9. Black Drongo
10. White Bellied Drongo
11. Ashy Drongo
12. Black Naped Oriole
13. Red Whiskered Bulbul
14. Red Vented Bulbul
15. White Browed Bulbul
16. Golden Fronted Leaf Bird
17. Great Tit
18. Rufous Treepie
19. Blue bearded Bee eater
20. Scaly Breasted Munia
21. Black headed Cuckoo Shrike
22. Indian Robin
23. Brown Fish Owl
24. Eurasian Eagle Owl
25. Small Green billed Malkoha
26. Gray Jungle fowl
27. White Browed Fantail
28. Grey Heron
29. Oriental Honey Buzzard
30. Green Leaf Warbler
31. Asian Paradise Flycatcher
32. Small Minivet
33. Stork Billed Kingfisher
34. White Throated Kingfisher
35. Common Kingfisher
36. Common Iora
37. Asian Brown Flycatcher
38. Plum headed Parakeet
39. Rose Ringed parakeet
40. Jungle Babler
41. Tickell’s blue flycatcher
42. Purple rumped Sunbird
43. Purple Sunbird
44. Black redstart
45. Chestnut Tailed Starling
46. Large Billed Crow
47. Spotted Dove
48. Laughing Dove
49. Oriental Magpie Robin
50. Little Egret
51. Black Naped Monarch Flycather
52. Black Kite
53. Brahminy Kite
54. Asian Koel
55. River Tern
56. Greater Coucal
57. Shikra

It was a great beginning to 'stream-lined' birding at JLR-NTP conducted by a wonderful teacher and a knowledge bank - Karthik (S.Karthikeyan), Chief naturalist of JLR. Though we have been doing birding from a few months, in this session we learnt to emphasize on a systematic process to follow while birding, which is very necessary, especially as beginners. I still remember our initial days when we used to spot a 'new' bird and google to find out what it was, or call up pur friend Chandu, giving him crude description about what we saw! We have come a long way from there, but then there is a much longer way to go....