Kaggaladu: Phase 2 visit 3 - The birds are here!

Date of visit: 14^th Feb 2010

We had been informed by the teachers of the government school at Kaggaladu oner phone that the arrival of the birds had been delayed this year, which was worrying. They usually arrive by the end of December, whereas this time they arrived early February. But they did come, and so we visited the village that had been chosen by the birds for reasons that are not very clear.

What a sight they are! This was the first time I saw them personally, and I realized why they are called painted storks. Vividly coloured beautiful big birds sitting aplenty on top of those five trees they use every year for nesting. We counted an approximate of 150 birds.

We received a heartwarming welcome by the kids of the school, who were playing around. They remembered our names too! We handed over photographs of the school that we had taken on our previous visit and the children were thrilled. After that, we settled down in a comfortable shady place in the school premises to watch the birds. Binoculars were also used. Time just flew watching the birds perch on the tree tops and fly around.

One bad news was that the lakes were in bad condition with no water in either of the 2 lakes in that village, which meant that the birds would have to do a bit of extra flying in search of food. We do not have adequate statistics to compare our bird count with those that may have been done in previous years, but we hope to keep a tab on it. After a walk around the dried lake, we were offered tender coconuts by a local friendly farmer. A great trip all in all.

Seeing those birds is really something special. I felt an attachment to them as soon as I saw them and Swapna seconded my view on this, stating that she had felt a similar feeling when she had seen them for the first time. These birds have made a long journey to get here after all!

Team members who visited: Swapna and Adithya

To view more pictures of the birds, use this link: http://picasaweb.google.com/lets.integrate.for.environment/Kaggaladu14Feb2010#