Wednesday, February 3, 2010

The babbler chick who lost its way



Getting ready to hit the gym ,I heard some feeble sounds presumably being uttered out by the young ones of some bird.Quite intrigued and excited,I rushed outside to find out which bird species it belonged to.Jungle babblers were ransacking the leaves since morning and taking the catch to a branch of the mango tree few yards away.Although the branch was not visible due to the obstruction being caused by the wall,I could make out from the behaviour of the birds and their constant chattering that they were possibly feeding their young ones.After a while of searching for the nest from every possible angle and giving up ultimately,I noticed some movement in the heap of leaves lying in the backyard.Scrutinizing for a while,it became rather evident that it was a small bird that was trying to move forward.It seemed to be a juvenile jungle babbler !! Excited by the find,I placed the chick in a tub as there were crows and other predators nearby and tried feeding it some puffed rice but to no avail.The surprising thing for me was that the bird was seemingly unaware of its young one lying on the ground.It was busy searching the leaves for any prey that could be fed to the other chicks perched on the branch. A few hours later,its mother realized that its chick was missing.As soon as she realized this,she came to the rescue,giving instructions that were quite obviously not possible for me to comprehend.The chick obeyed and ultimately it was led onto the branch.Happy ending indeed ! 

Saturday, January 2, 2010

Blue magpie - A rare sight in the suburbs of Dehradun



While playing cricket in the garden with my brother on a rather cold & chilly morning,I heard an uncommon call coming from the mango tree across the road.On further scrutiny,a bird with a long tail & bright plumage appeared,making shrieking calls.Without a second thought,I quickly ran inside and came out with my camera.Knowing that the bird wouldn't be there for long,I tried to capture it in my camera as it flew out of the woods and perched on one of the cables.As soon as I had taken a pic,it went out of sight after being chased by the crows.A wonderful start to the day indeed !