A Kitchen with a View

To Scratch is a fundamental right!

I am lucky to have a kitchen with a view, where I spot quite a few rarely-seen birds in the mornings! Among the most unique photographs are those of a Barbet bird enjoying its early morning scratch! Its closed eyes suggest a great sense of relief, a pleasure in scratching itself! There have been times when I cleared the slab of all the accoutrements and sat on it photographing some of the unique birds that frequent the huge tree right next to my flat in Palam Vihar, Gurgaon. However, spotting a Honey-buzzard can be understandingly amazing, trust me!

A Crested Honey Buzzard looks Terrific!

For a self-acclaimed wildlife photographer, it is a joy to be able to photograph birds that are rarely seen. To spot a raptor, or even a Crested honey buzzard provides great happiness and satisfaction. Green Pigeons are frugivores and they feast on fruits that grow on trees. To spot a single Green Pigeon is amazing to spot a pair can be most rewarding! Green Pigeons are frugivores and they feed on fruits. 

A Pair of Green Pigeons warm up in the sun.

 

A Raptor, or a Shikra is a hunter; spotting it is a joy that speaks volumes! In the early times, Shikras were used to capture small rodents to be fed to the larger falcons.

A Shikra scans the sky for food.

Sometimes, it seems like nature has its own way, and when one looks at birds, one learns a lesson for life: Everything connects, in small ways and big ways! I would like to share a few more photographs that I could take from my kitchen window! The Green pigeons look so great. They afforded me some time to photograph them.

Barbets are amongst the most attractive birds I have photographed. To spot one, that too from one's kitchen window is so satisfying! The bird would have wanted a better image of it rather than one in which it is scratching itself. Thus I have shared a photograph that flatters its amazing beauty.

A Barbet Bird in all its colours

Jacobin Cuckoos, Green Pigeons and Cormorants spotted at the Sultanpur National Park

When I visited the Sultanpur National Park, I thought I would be able to beat the fog and the mist in the morning. The light wind had dissipated the smog and I believed that I would have a one hour window from 7:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. But then this was not to be as the smog returned with a vengeance masking the rising sun in a thick blanket of smog. Strangely enough, I have noticed that this year there have been fewer birds. One reason could be the poor air quality in the region.

Looking at the poor visibility I decided to make do with the birds within closer reach, those that would somehow not require much light. In fact, I was attracted to a parrot that was peering into a bird-house from which peeped a squirrel. It seemed to be glaring at the squirrel probably because it wanted the bird-house for itself!

I have taken umpteen numbers of photographs of common pond Herons but this one caught my attention. The fluffing of its feathers and the contortions that it went through gave it a well, "different look"! The image of a Redstart clinging on to a cage for a sapling was a consolation for not getting to photograph the Northern Shovellers that simply stayed out of bounds.

The Cormorant trying to catch whatever warmth it could get from the weak sun made it lazy enough to allow me to approach it easily. Its eye-make-up seemed to loom large in the view-finder.

And if that was not enough, I have decided to add a snap of a Jacobin Cuckoo from my previous visit to the National Park. I had not been able to identify it previously but then after browsing through my book, I felt I should add it to this post.

Seeing green pigeons was a rare treat as I was seeing them after quite some time. Green Pigeons used to be a common site in Gurugram in times when there were more trees. It is believed that Green Pigeons rarely alight on the ground, preferring to perch on the branches of trees out of reach of predators.