INDIA Day 1 - 9th January

We arrived in Delhi early morning from where we got the bus to where our mini-bus was parked with many Black Kites floating around the city and the first new birds for me – a noisy group of JUNGLE BABBLERS feeding around the carpark and a gorgeous RUFOUS TREEPIE foraging in a bin!   We then drove all morning to out first stop of Bharatpur NP, everyone was an instant expert as we drove along with all kinds of claims flying around but birds that I definitely saw along the journey included a group of 6 BAR-HEADED GEESE (an underwhelming new bird after seeing lots of escapes in the UK), a single Black-necked Stork, Cattle Egrets, Great White Egrets and Little Egrets, plenty of Black-shouldered Kites perched up along the roads, GREY-HEADED SWAMP-HENS, Moorhen and Coots, Black-winged Stilts, Red-wattled Lapwings, Ruff, Spotted Redshank, Green Sandpiper and Wood Sandpiper, Collared Doves, my first proper wild Ring-necked Parakeets and loads of White-throated Kingfishers, Black Drongos, House Crows, Common Mynas, BANK MYNAS and Asian Pied Starlings.

                After dumping our bags, we walked round Bharatpur all afternoon, concentrating in the dry, scrub areas closest to the entrance; raptors were very obvious with much of the time spent staring upwards as birds included large numbers of Egyptian Vultures were seen along with smaller counts of GREATER SPOTTED EAGLES, INDIAN SPOTTED EAGLE (1), Eastern Imperial Eagle, Bonelli’s Eagle, Booted Eagle, Short-toed Eagle (1 – the only one of the trip that I saw) and several Shikras bombing around.   New birds in the scrub included coveys of GREY FRANCOLINS, YELLOW-FOOTED GREEN PIGEON, a single COMMON HAWK CUCKOO, several SOUTHERN COUCALS, a roosting SPOTTED OWLET, Little Green Bee-eaters, a single INDIAN GREY HORNBILL, BROWN-HEADED BARBET, LESSER GOLDENBACK, INDIAN JUNGLE CROW, PLAIN MARTINS, WHITE-EARED BULBULS, RED-VENTED BULBULS, PLAIN PRINIA, ASHY PRINIA, Common Tailorbird, COMMON BABBLERS, smart BRAHMINY STARLINGS, a stunning ORANGE-HEADED THRUSH, INDIAN ROBINS, Oriental Magpie Robins, GREY-HEADED CANARY FLYCATCHER, PURPLE SUNBIRD and RED AVADAVAT.

                There was also a good selection of wintering passerines scattered through the area including Siberian Chiffchaffs, plenty of HUME’S WARBLERS (the commonest wintering Phylloscopus warbler everywhere), Greenish Warblers, Lesser Whitethroats (presumably S. c. halimodendri), Bluethroats and Grey Wagtails.   We just made it to the edge of the wetlands – it was incredibly dry throughout India with no serious rains for over two years, severely affecting what we saw and what was breeding (there was nothing breeding while we were there where there should have been tens of thousands of Herons, Egrets, Pelicans etc.) but waterbirds we caught up on included INDIAN SPOT-BILLED DUCK, Gadwall, Shoveler, Teal, Little Grebe, Purple Herons, Intermediate Egrets (including a colour ringed bird from just outside the park four years ago), White-breasted Waterhen and a WHITE-TAILED PLOVER.

Eastern Imperial Eagle

Egyptian Vulture

Short-toed Eagle

Bonelli's Eagle

Indian Spotted Eagle

Marsh Harrier

Shikra