Chilika lake – Don't hold your breath

Fresh catch

Are you as lost as me in a fish market? I love to cook and eat fish, but when faced with the variety and number of produce in a typical fish market, I’m lost. On my last weekend of my retreat in Odisha, I went to the local fish market for a dose of bewilderment. I don’t know what the small fish in the photo are called, but I’ve eaten them two ways. Deep fried, they are great accompaniment to a cold beer. Another way I like it is in a thin curry flavoured with ginger or galangal, and coriander leaves.

And these? Are they some variety of catfish I suppose, going by the long whiskers. But they were a little larger than the catfish I’d eaten, and more silvery in colour. Of course much of the fish in this market was the morning’s catch from nearby Chilika lake. The rest were equally fresh catch from the nearby Daya river. It is possible that this catfish is a local variety.

This fish was misleading in appearance. I thought it was a black pomfret, but when I asked the vendor, he said “No. Chand.” The word chand means silver, of course, and refers to a fish I’ve heard of spoken as a special delicacy. But from the descriptions I’d come to the conclusion that it was a variety of pomfret. I was now confused. It looks like a pomfret, but it isn’t.

And then there was this striped fish. Never saw it before. I was about to take some of these, when I saw a pile of large tiger prawns nearby. The ones with blue claws are said to be the tastier river prawns. They had blue claws. I got myself a dozen of them, enough to last the week.

Whiskered Tern: bird of the week VIII

Another victim of whimsical naming, identifying the whiskered tern (Chlidonias hybrida) seemed impossible to me. I couldn’t see the whiskers at all. It turns out that in summer breeding plumage when its head turns black and its body becomes a dark ashy gray, a remaining white band across its face reminded some of human male facial fuzz. India is home to breeding populations of these terns, and also receives climate refugees from the north in winter. In principle I should have noticed the whiskers on the resident birds. But I do most of my birding in winter. So I’d missed the colour change that had just set in between my two visits to Mangalajodi. The featured photo is from early February, the one below from mid-March. You can see the darkening of the feathers. This will continue for another month, I think. It’s too hot to get go back and check.

There aren’t many places on WordPress where bird watchers can share posts. If you post any photos of birds this week (starting today and up to next Monday), it would be great if you could leave a link in the comments, or a pingback, for others to follow. There is no compulsion to post a recent photo, but it would help others to know when and where you saw the bird. You might consider using the tag “Bird of the Week” in case people search for old posts using it. I hope you’ve had the time to look at what others have added this week and in the previous weeks.

Small village, small house

The house would not have remained in my memory except for a quick glimpse of its door as we drove by. I came back a couple of days later to look for it near the northwestern shore of Chilika Lake. It was a small village, not particularly close to the main fishing areas, and although I remembered nothing about it except the door, it didn’t take me long to find it.

Now that I’d walked up to the house I saw that it was a small thing. Going by the shutters on one side with egg crates piled up on it, part of the house served as a shop. If this was a city I would have just taken photos and gone. But in a village I collected a small crowd of watchers. One asked why I was taking a photo of this place. I indicated the door and said because it was so pretty. He immediately claimed responsibility, “It’s my house.” I complimented him on his taste and asked whether he bought the door from town on made it himself. He waved vaguely and said “Got it from here.” No further information was forthcoming. He had turned to the rest of the crowd and started explaining that his house was so pretty that people like me come from far to take photos. It was true in a way.

When the onlookers melted away I could take close ups of the door which I’d found so attractive. The panels are beautifully carved. Even in the absence of a varnish they look beautiful. You can see a closer view of the panels at the top in the featured photo. The flowing lines of the antelope and the vegetation are superb. I wish the man had been a bit more specific about who had done the carving. Odisha is full of pleasant surprises.

Intermediate Egret, bird of the week

Was it an Intermediate egret (Ardea intermedia) that had just given me that aggressive look? Egrets are always confusing. An expert might look at the size of its bill and identify it. I had to look at its feet to make sure. It had black legs for sure, and when it took a step, I saw that its feet were also black. So A. intermedia it was. Early spring, and it was into its breeding season already. Its bill, normally yellow in winter, had turned black, and it had the long neck feathers that it wears when it is in search of a mate. You can tell why I was confused when you see the photo of a Little egret (Egretta garzetta) which was foraging nearby. In breeding season you can only tell the difference by observing that its feet are yellow.

There aren’t many places on WordPress where bird watchers can share posts. If you post any photos of birds this week (starting today and up to next Monday), it would be great if you could leave a link in the comments, or a pingback, for others to follow. There is no compulsion to post a recent photo, but it would help others to know when and where you saw the bird. You might consider using the tag “Bird of the Week” in case people search for old posts using it. I hope you’ve had the time to look at what others have added this week and in the previous weeks.

Ruddy Shelduck, bird of the week

My eyes kept closing on that warm March afternoon as our skiff poled along the shallows of Mangalajodi in Odisha. The weather has got warm really fast this year, and it looked like the winter migrants have all decamped for their breeding grounds. Then we saw the Ruddy shelducks (Tadorna ferruginea). They were bathing and dabbling in pairs, bonded for life, in the channel ahead of us, giving us lovely photos. I love these winter visitors. They are usually late to depart; I’d once seen them high up on the Tibetan plateau in May (where they took the lack of oxygen better than me), on their way back to their breeding grounds in eastern China and Mongolia.

Fruit of the lake

When you enter a famous dhaba which is a short walk from India’s largest lake, you expect to eat fresh catch. You will not be disappointed. Not fresh means that something was caught the previous day. For those of us who have eaten frozen lobster or three day old crab, this is an eye opener. We asked for lobster. As we dug into them, the man asked “Would you like crab?” We did, and then a plate of prawns as well.

And to finish it all we had a choice of dahi or rabri. The Family chose to have dahi. I piled in a few more calories with the creamy pot of rabri that you see in the photo above. We went back the next day again, and had only those things which you can see in the photos here. I’m glad this dhaba is not next to our home.

Gadwall, bird of the week

A typical brown duck, the Gadwall (Mareca strepera) barely draws your eye when you see it in a crowd of ducks. I noticed this one as I drifted past in a skiff on the shallows of Mangalajodi because it looked so plump. I could recognize it by the orange legs, and the noticeably black beak and rear. The shallow waters at the edge of Chilika lake must be wonderful for these dabbling ducks, the ones which feed on leaves and shoots of water plants. This one was clearly getting ready to fly to its breeding grounds in central Asia. Across the northern hemisphere, wintering Gadwalls have begun to fly north. In India, and many places near the tropics, the major sign of spring is of birds leaving for their breeding grounds. I was surprised to find that breeding populations have only recently established themselves in the UK (most Gadwalls there are winter visitors!) and the USA.

Pacific golden plover: bird of the week

Pluvialis fulva, the Pacific golden plover, is quite a remarkable bird. I’d never given it much attention, thinking of it as just another of the brown climate refugees that you find in Indian wetlands during winters. But just a little thought would have told me that it must be a remarkable flyer, crossing from its summer breeding grounds on the shorelines of the northern Pacific to its wintering grounds in the eastern Indian Ocean. In fact, it is among the more remarkable flyers in the world, with some individuals logging well over 12,000 kms in each season.

In February when I saw a group of them in Mangalajodi I realized that they begin to develop the magnificent breeding colours before setting off. You can see in the photo above that the individual at the back has begun to develop the spectacular gold and black plumage that gives the species its name. They are not drab and brown any longer. When I went back last weekend, in the middle of March, they were gone. Good luck with sightings, those of you who are waiting for its return half a world away.

Northern pintail clerihew

Anas acuta
Breeds in Canada, Eurasia, China, Mongolia, Korea and Siberia.
The elegant male
Preens and says “People say I’m a pickup artist. But I’m a dabbler. It’s undoubtable.”

Northern pintails (Anas acuta) are dabbling ducks which breed all across the north temperate zone of the earth, travel south in winter, and return to their breeding ground having already found a mate during the return migration. A Clerihew is a simple verse form.

A fisherman on the lake

Chilika lake was the first of India’s wetlands to be designated a Ramsar conservation site. Several rivers drain into the 1100 square kilometer area of the lake. Since it connects to the sea, the water is brackish, and you can get rays and lobster among other marine food here. This, the largest of the world’s brackish water-bodies, supports a large mass of people, as well as the largest population of winter’s migratory birds in India. The fishing village of Mangalajodi at its northern end perches on extreme shallows. Fishermen poled themselves along on flat-bottomed barges, laying lines. The man you see here wasn’t happy with us. We’d strayed too close to his net.