Monday, March 2, 2015, Bharatpur, Rajasthan, India

Today we continued exploring the Bharatpur area
(Image courtesy of VENT)
(Click on images to enlarge)

Marble inlay, Bharatpur

Before we went out this morning, I took a moment to photograph some of the marble inlay in our bathroom. We see such cunning craftsmanship everywhere we turn here.

We set out on this morning’s expedition in fairly heavy rain. Our goal was an area of fallow fields near the village of Khumher. The fields belong to one of the agricultural colleges and are known as being good for grassland birds. Looking at it from the highway, one wouldn’t expect the area to have any birds at all, but the birding was sensational. Fortunately, by the time we arrived, the rain had stopped, though everything was really wet. Right out of the bus, we had a new bird, the Black Francolin, two of them. The star attraction of the area is the Indian Courser, a gorgeous bird, and we saw many of them, though they are wary and didn’t let us get close.

Male Black Francolin (Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

Indian Courser, Keoladeo National Park (Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

We had three kinds of pipits as well, plus Crested Lark and other new birds for the trip, including Yellow-wattled Lapwing. One delight was watching a pair of Spotted Owlets preening one another. We were amused to see a beautiful Long-legged Buzzard being ganged up on by the unusual combination of House Crows, Red-wattled Lapwings, and Rose-ringed Parakeets.

Crested Lark, Khumher (Image courtesy of Amy Sheldon)

Has no patience with Long-legged Buzzards (Red-wattled Lapwing, Khumher) (Image courtesy of Amy Sheldon)

We’d gotten very muddy walking about in the field, so before getting back onto the bus, we walked along the road playing in the puddles for a while and getting still more birds. This attracted the attention of the children from the village about half a kilometer off, and they were soon lined up along the road behind us, smiling shyly and giggling whenever we addressed any of them. When our boots were clean enough, we waved goodbye to the children and drove back toward Bharatpur. Dion had promised us that our next stop would be at the “Painted-Snipe Place”:

The Painted-Snipe Place, Bharatpur

Male Greater Painted-Snipe, Bharatpur

That turned out to be a filthy little pond in the middle of town heavily strewn with trash, but it had an amazing group of birds in and around it, including half a dozen Stilts. And it did have Greater Painted-Snipe, two sleeping males, one of which finally woke up and showed us his bill. I’d have loved to see a female, as they are the showy ones (the sex roles are reversed), but this was still a treat (and another new family for us). And then Dion pointed out a Citrine Wagtail, a bird I’ve been wanting for years. There were also Ruffs and several kinds of sandpipers. With our scopes and binoculars, we attracted a crowd of people trying to figure out what we were doing. Charlie suggested that they likely concluded that it was some sort of religious ritual, which, of course, it was. Female Greater Painted-Snipe (Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

Black-winged Stilt at the Painted-Snipe Place, Bharatpur (Image courtesy of Amy Sheldon)

We had just a short ride from there to the hotel, where we joined other guests for lunch. One of our companions reported that she had been talking to somebody who’d asked her if she’d seen “those birdwatchers with their binoculars.” Very amusing. I had time for a short nap after lunch while Lee went through his email. He had decided not to go out for the afternoon, as it was going to be another snark hunt in the national park, an attempt to find just a few difficult species that we had so far missed. Inevitably, that would mean a lot of standing around, which always wipes out his back. The day had turned bright and sunny but not too hot, as we all headed to the hotel entrance. Lee came along, too, because we were all saying goodbye to Zach and Amy, who were leaving in a taxi to drive to the New Delhi airport. We’ve really enjoyed having the time with them and were sorry to see them go.

Entrance to The Bagh, Bharatpur

Later, I heard from Amy that while I was napping after lunch she had been out birding around the hotel grounds (which are very birdy). She had gotten some excellent photos: Peacock, Bharatpur (Image courtesy of Amy Sheldon)

Peacock, Bharatpur (Image courtesy of Amy Sheldon) Peacock, Bharatpur (Image courtesy of Amy Sheldon)

Grey Hornbill, Bharatpur (Image courtesy of Amy Sheldon)

Jungle Babbler, Bharatpur (Image courtesy of Amy Sheldon)

After Amy and Zach left, we clambered into our bus to drive to the national park. On our way through town, I noticed a small truck stopped in traffic. It was filled with freshly-harvested mustard plants, some of them hanging over the sides, from where a very contented passing cow was happily munching them. At the park, we returned to our regular rickshaws for another attempt at some of the more elusive birds. Our driver from yesterday greeted me with a very soft-voiced, “Good afternoon.” While we waited for the others to finish in the shop, I asked if I might take his photograph, to which he assented. When I was showing him the result, one of the other drivers, who wore a pink turban and magnificent white facial hair and had a distinct twinkle in his eye, came over to let me know that he was the handsome one and more worth photographing, so I was able to photograph him, too.

Our bicycle-rickshaw driver, Keoladeo National Park

Handsome bicycle-rickshaw driver, Keoladeo National Park

The first bird we searched for was the Siberian Rubythroat (Calliope calliope), a relative of the Bluethroat. It is a skulker, so we needed a good deal of effort to see it, but we did and I had an excellent look. That crimson throat just glows, even with the bird deep in the shade. What a treat! I recommend this video to give you a better idea of this stunning little bird.

Male Siberian Rubythroat (Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

While we were still in that area, Dion introduced Mr. Bholu Abrar Khan to us, telling us that he is the hero who is most responsible for this wonderful preserve. Mr. Khan is retired now (he was the Chief Forest Ranger at the park for more than twenty years), but still shows up at the park most days. He has a warm Buddha face. Poking around on the web, I found that one of his sons has posted some of Mr. Khan’s photographs from his years at Bharatpur; I especially liked the one of a Fishing Cat and her kitten, which must have required great patience to take. From there, we went back to the Orange-headed Thrush place we searched yesterday, but we’d barely gotten there when loud claps of thunder sounded. We had just enough time to run into an open-sided shelter to get out of the monsoon-type rain that ultimately included hailstones, even with the sun shining and a rainbow. While we were sheltering, I experimented with photographing a Black-rumped Flameback with my iPhone through my binoculars (and the downpour). I did better with the charpoy in the shelter, such a perfect piece of craftsmanship.

Black-rumped Flameback, Keoladeo National Park

Charpoy, Keoladeo National Park

When the rain stopped, we explored the area some more and enjoyed seeing all sorts of little birds and big ones fluffing up their feathers to dry out after the deluge. We got killing looks at a Grey Wagtail, its yellow breast glowing in the sunshine. I dawdled to photograph a Peacock and missed the mongooses running across the road. Walking back, I was able to photograph some female Rhesus Macaques with their young, relaxing in the sunshine atop a temple wall and preening one another. We drove on to another spot to look for Orange-headed Thrush and Ticknell’s Thrush. This required some very muddy tramping through light woods filled with thorny bushes, but we did ultimately find a Ticknell’s Thrush, but it was perched high and was backlit, so it was not a great sighting. It was a relief to get back up onto the nice old brick walkway and then back to our rickshaws and back to the bus and back to the hotel. (I was fairly worn out by then.)

Preening after the rain, Keoladeo National Park

Lee was still busy reading his email when I came in all muddy and bedraggled. There had been rain at the hotel, too, but he hadn’t been aware of hail (not having been under a tin roof as we were). After uploading all the photos and getting the iPhone charging, we headed to dinner with the other folks. We started out with the checklist, for which I owe Dion a hug, as it meant I could duck out early. I had a bowl of soup with some naan and then skipped to dessert, a little bowl of ice cream and two gulub jamuns (I’d never thought of having ice cream with gulub jamuns before), before hurrying back to our little house to write up my journal for the day (feeling a bit like the Red Queen). While we were eating, Dion kindly told us what to expect on the next leg of our trip at Kanha National Park and warned us we’d need to make sure that we didn’t end up being driven around looking for nothing but tigers, as there are so many great birds there. (Tomorrow is the last day of our tour with Dion; we will be going on to Kanha with Gajendra.)

Our little house at The Bagh, Bharatpur

My birds for the day: