Bird's Paradise-Lal Bagh
- Debashish Das
- Apr 3, 2016
- 4 min read
Anyone who stays in Bangalore would have heard about Lal Bagh or Lalbagh Botanical Gardens for sure. Lalbagh houses India's largest collection of tropical plants, has a lake, and is also home to few
species of birds.
Did I hear the word bird ?? Well this is good enough for me to start planning for a trip to Lal Bagh.
Lal Bagh being at the centre of the city, commutation was never going to be a problem but I have to keep in mind that lot of people come there for morning walk & jogging. More people means not an ideal place for bird photography as birds in general are very shy & want to be in their world without any disturbance.
Having said that I did some research about Lal Bagh & what persuaded me to come here is the presence of a lake with a small island if i may call it. Lake means birds & that is what matters to me.
All set, I decided to visit the garden on 2nd April 2015 with my wife.We started from home at around 5:45 AM & reached the place at around 6:30 AM. I have been to Lal Bagh before on the occasion of famous flower exhibitions but never came for bird photography.
As soon as we reached I was little circumspect, can already see hundreds of people who came for jogging.We made our way through the entrance, no entry fee between 6 to 9 AM (and again between 6-7 PM) though.
People of all ages were going through their routines of jogging & running but my ears were already hearing chirping sound of birds. I can also see people feeding seeds to a bunch of pigeons.
I wanted to visit the lake area first to see what all bird activities (fishing probably) were going on. As we move forward, saw some photographers looking towards a tree with lenses pointed towards it, "bingo I got my first shot" is what i murmured. Guess what, all of them were looking at a big Mottled Wood Owl sitting pretty on a branch & probably enjoying the attention.
But common, when so many people started staring at that guy,it started feeling awkward & eventually decided to fly away.
Great start I must say as we left the spot & marched towards the lake. On the way to lake, we saw one cute spotted owlet, a squirrel eating his breakfast I believe & a Great Egret looking for fish in a nearby pond.
Without any further distractions, we reached the lake side & can see a group of Cormorants (White Breasted one too), a White Throated Kingfisher & a beautiful Purple Moor Hen.
Lot of fishing activities were going around (fish for breakfast ?) & was fortunate to get a click of it.
Also witnessed Cormorants diving inside the lake & drying their wings by spreading it off towards sun, such a beautiful sight it was.
We witnessed whatever was going on from the lake side & enjoying every little moment. The way they were hunting, the skills they possesses & of course the fightings for the territory; just incredible to say the least. All right time now to move out of lake side & proceed towards the garden area which has lot of huge trees, so potentially more birds.
And were not disappointed with what we saw in the garden area - Indian Ringneck Parrots (one was stretching its neck out of its nest), Coppersmith Barbet & ever swift Purple Rumped Sunbird. Man I love birds !!!
It was around 11 AM by the time we clicked the above images & sun being so harsh on Bangalore nowadays, it was no more an ideal situation for birding. We slowly started to move towards the exit & saw this guy crossing the road; I took my position (parallel to the road) & pressed the shutter button. Must say he was such a sport, saw my effort of lying in the road but didn't ran away from the scene. The image came out good in the end, looked like it was clicked on a desert.
I was more than happy with my sighting & images I clicked at the end of the day. The highlight of the day for me was of-course Mottled Wood Owl which was so big & photogenic.
If you may ask who irritated me the most, I have no hesitation to say - Mr Crow (not Mr Russell Crow) it was. It chased every bird that I saw & thanks to him missed quite a few shots. Next time before going out for birding, I need to come up with a strategy how to handle Mr Crow. Wanna see how Mr Crow looks like ?? OK, there you go !!
That's all what I have to share with you guys for today, I hope you liked it & enjoyed it.
Take care & see you soon, adios !!!
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