Birds in Bihar: January 2015

On November 6, 2014, I started my journey from Muzaffarpur to Bihar Sharif around 11 AM.But we hardly managed to reach Patna at 3 PM due to Sonpur fair inauguration ceremony and ongoing maintenance work on Gandhi Bridge. This delay hampered my initial planned to visit Patna zoo considering sunny day and I have to proceed to Bihar Sharif through the new highway, I stopped twice to capture birds (Red-wattle lapwing, Common Myna and Indian Pond Heron). When we left the highway and turned right towards Bihar Sharif, I noticed some Green Bee eaters were on the Power transmission cable near a big water body. I did not resist myself to stop for few minutes. As expected, I observed some Green Bee eaters and White-breasted kingfisher, a pair of Great cormorant and a Great egret besides Indian roller. However, the captured photos quality compromised due to poor light. After this short break, we moved towards the destination. On the way, my lens came across Indian roller, Black winged kite, Intermediate and little Egret, Spotted dove etc.

The next day, I started at 7 AM from the Circuit house to visit the archaeological remains of Nalanda Monastery and other prominent tourist places. At sunrise, I found a huge pond and therefore I decided to spend some time for birds watching. I noticed more than thousand Lesser whistling duck were present on the green surface of the Gidhhi pond. Several species of birds also observed inside the pond such as Common moorhen, Eurasian coot, Bronze-winged jacana, Little grebe, White-breasted water hen, Purple swamp hen, Indian pond heron, White-breasted kingfisher. In addition to these I also noticed and snapped pied myna and Rufous treepie nearby the pond. After an hour, I visited Kundalpur, Nalanda Nav Mahavihar and memorial of Hsuan-tsang. We found some of the birds in the Nalanda Nav Mahavihar pond as noticed previously in the Gidhhi pond. Besides, I snapped folks of Great cormorant, an Asian Koel and a few Rose ringed parakeet in the campus of the memorial of Hsuan-tsang. Around 11 AM, I finished sightseeing of remains of Nalanda Monastery. Interestingly, I only saw a brown rock chat; however, I engaged taking photos of colorful butterflies. In the afternoon, we visited Ghorakatora Lake in Rajgir and spotted some wagtail and Red vented bulbul. On the way I also came across a Grey Francolin and a Painted spur fowl. Near the Ajatshatru’s prison, Indian robin, Jungle babbler, Yellowed eyed babbler were spotted and snapped by us.