iCampers: Birding

My first Birding Trip...Bhigwan

When my father surprised me by telling me that he had booked me on a trip to Bhigwan, I was totally overjoyed and could not wait for the day to arrive. The night of 27th, I could barely sleep and was up in a flash as soon as my father woke me up at 4:15 AM. All excited, my sister Tanvi and I got ready in a flash and we set off to the Sahakar Nagar pickup point at 5:00 AM. Most of the fellow campers had already gathered at the meeting point waiting for the bus to arrive. the wait for the driver was killing us all. So, after waiting for almost 30 mins, we decided to move down the street. The bus finally arrived at almost 6 AM and we climbed aboard and set off for Bhigwan. We picked up a few more campers on the way and arrived at a spot close to the backwaters around 8 AM. Excitedly, we all got off only to realize that we were at the wrong spot as we had taken a wrong turn. While some of the travelers took this opportunity to relieve themselves, we did a quick birding and could spot cattle egrets, wire tailed and barn swallows in air and little egrets in waters

Little Egret

Once we were ready, we set off armed with the correct directions to our destination and reached there in no time. On arrival, we were served with breakfast of hot poha followed by tea. Some of us moved towards the gallery, breakfast in hand, and were lucky to spot a magnificent grey heron in flight about to perch a tree. We all ran to fetch our cameras and started clicking away like crazy.

Grey Heron

We, the baccha party quickly finished our breakfast and climbed down when we found a mother dog with her three cute pups.

Pups

After having breakfast, we started towards the lake for the main course of this trip i.e. birding. The boats were already waiting for us. As the capacity of each boat was around 8-10 people, we were split into 4 groups and each was assigned a boat. Our boatman's name was Kundan and he was very knowledgeable and experienced in birding. As we set off towards the other side, he gave us information on the kind of birds that could be seen at this time of the year. The boat ride was to take around 30-40 mins to reach the spot. On the way, we could spot Asian open bill stork and intermediate egret. We could also spot river terns, whiskered terns, brown headed gulls etc

After half an hour journey, we reached our main spot where we spotted a flock of flamingos. Kundan took us as close to them as was possible without alerting them. This gave us many opportunities to take many photos of these magnificent birds.

Flamingos

Flame is going

Closeup

While we were clicking away, our guide pointed to a flying bird and amazingly it was a marsh harrier! Finally we had seen a raptor! We also saw many flying birds of which some were

Bar Headed Geese

River Tern

Painted Stork

Whiskered Tern

Osprey

Our guide had a wonderful surprise in store for us. He had brought fishes with him to be used as a bait for the birds. So we started throwing fish in water and gulls started to fight amongst them, and we had good opportunities to take many more snaps, which we obviously did not waste. We saw superb sights which included stealing of food by terns and vice versa.

While we were feeding fish to the gulls and other birds, something alerted the flamingos and they decided to take off. They spread their wings and took off to an unknown destination. it was like paradise for bird watchers.

Brown Headed Gull

After spending some more time watching some other birds, it was time to head back. We got to see small waterbirds on our way back. Some on menu were little ringed plover, common sandpiper, grey wagtail etc.

little ringed plover

Little Ring Plover and Sandpiper

Mayureshwar
We reached the shore in another 30 odd mins, and then set off towards the next destination which was Mayureshwar. On the way, we stopped for lunch which was buffet course of paneer masala, jeera rice, dal tadka, roti and bharla wanga and gulab jamun. Refueled with the energy we left for Mayureshwar sanctuary, which was another hrs drive. Some of the campers used this opportunity to catch up on sleep :) We reached Mayureshwar around 3 PM and there we saw lot of Chinkaras.

Chinkara Taking Off

Run run!!

My Habitat

Happy and contented, we left for home around 5 PM. On the way, we made a side stop for some hot tea and tasty vada-pav. We finally reached Sahakarnagar at 8:15 PM. I thoroughly enjoyed the company of the campers who made this trip full of fun and enjoyment. Thanks all,especialy Kedar kaka and his family. See u in upcoming trips

List of birds sighted on this trip:

Grey Wagtail
House Swift
Singing bush lark
Rose ringed parakeet
Spotted dove
Painted stork
Black winged stilts
Brown headed gull
Whisked tern
River tern
Bar headed geese
Greater flamingos
Marsh harrier
Grey heron
Little ringed plover
Common sandpiper
Little egret
Little cormorant
Purple swamphen
Northern shoveller
Indian pond heron
Barn swallow
Wire tailed swallows
Bramhiny kite
Common kingfisher
White throated kingfisher
Cattle egret
Northern pintail
Asian openbill
Bay backed shrike
Ashy drongo
Little green bee-eater
Western reef egret
Purple heron
Lesser sand plover
Black tailed godwit
Palla's gull
Chinkaras (Indian Gazzeles)

iCampers

Friday, 16 August 2019

Nagzira Pics - June 2019

Monday, 9 January 2017

Bhigwan Mayureshwar - Dec 2016 - Camp 28 - (Author - Mihir Joglekar)

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