Bird Spotting at the Najafgarh Lake

A triptych of Bar-headed Geese at the Najafgarh Lake

A visit to the Sultanpur National Park on the 19th of February turned out to be a disappointment because when my brother and I reached the park, it was to learn that it had been closed to visitors since the Governor was visiting it later in the day. However, the closure of the National Park was a blessing in disguise as we then decided to locate the 'Sultanpur Flats' but ended at the Najafgarh Lake close by! We were pleasantly astonished by the huge scale of the wetland and the huge number of birds we could spot there. The Sultanpur National Park doesn't even play second fiddle to the Najafgarh Lake. The Bar-headed Geese that had been missing from the Sultanpur National Park were present in huge numbers, and they were not even scared of us, unlike the birds in the Sultanpur National Park. We were able to spot Brown-headed Gulls, Sarus Cranes, Open Billed Storks, Spot-billed Ducks and Greylag Geese in large numbers.

A flock of Bar-headed Geese stretches across the horizon!

A visit to the Najafgarh lake will afford one a close glimpse of Open Billed Storks in large numbers. Incidentally, the juvenile storks have closed bills while the adult ones have bills that are open in the middle, hence, Open Billed Storks.

The Sage-An Open billed Stork in the morning sun

Open Billed Storks face-off

A Sarus Crane pair watch a flypast of an assortment of Ducks and Ibis

It was a great surprise to spot a large number of Brown-headed Gulls at the lake. What I took to be the ubiquitous Lapwings turned out to be a large number of Gulls, both Brown-headed as well as White-headed wading on the water. I was able to capture one of these in flight, not a very clear photograph, but then distinct enough to identify it as a Brown-headed Gull!

Brown-headed Gull

Brown-headed Gull

Brown-headed Gull

The Najafgarh Lake is fed by the Sahibi River, an ancient canal that draws water from the Yamuna River in Delhi. Lately, damage in the embankments of the river caused widescale flooding of the area causing it to become a massive wetland, that doesn't mean that the Najafgarh lake is a new wetland. In fact, historical evidence suggests that the area was a wetland in the past too. Bar-headed Geese come out rather nicely in photographs, provided you are close enough to them, without of course spooking them. 

Open Billed Storks foraging for food at the Najafgarh Lake

Bar-headed Geese at the wetland