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.
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.
We did birding in four spots around Port Blair, marked by the green patches in the map here. Chidiyatapu was a mix of forest and shoreline. Since the Andaman Trunk Road passes through the forest, and disturbs the birds, our best viewing here was early in the morning. Sippighat and Ograbranj are wetlands, and yielded very good sightings. Mt. Harriet in Bambooflats is another place where a day can yield good sightings. We visited Sippighat in the afternoon of December 22, Chidiyatapu the same night and again in the morning of December 23. We did birding in Ograbranj in the afternoon of December 23, and went up to Mt. Harriet on December 25.
The Andaman group of Islands is full of endemics (marked with a star in the list below), and also has winter visitors. Even though I had done my reading, I was startled by the variety of visitors. I’d never expected to see Daurian’s starlings here. Andaman is so far from our normal birding grounds that our bird list is full of lifers (marked in bold):
Alexandrine parakeet: Chidiyatapu
* Andaman drongo: Chidiyatapu, Mt. Harriet
* Andaman bulbul: Chidiyatapu
* Andaman collared kingfisher: Chidiyatapu, Mt. Harriet, Sippighat, Ograbranj, Neil Island
We are amateur birders, and I hardly have a spotter’s eye. The Family spends more time on it. We did our birding in Andaman with Shaktivel, Gokul and Senthil. Shakti guides tours in the Andamans, and his next project is to take a group to Great Nicobar. Gokul is a zoologist, collecting data for a checklist of birds in the Andamans. This will be the core of his Doctoral thesis. During our three days of birding, we met up with Mark Smiles, who is an excellent birder, and guides bird tours in Dubai.
Don't hold your breath 