Life At Mitthi

There are times when life give you a blot from the blue!! Or a bolt with a dash of blue😀. Indian Pitta or Navranga Last year in the month of July , I had joined bird expert @arpitdeomurari and three other enthusiasts  to catch a glimpse of this bird ( in Udaipur )  in migration from the foothills of Himalayas to southern India and Srilanka . We were fortunate to spot it but I missed having my camera to capture it for my records.  Come July 2025, while having lunch in our dining area, I spot some movement behind my Adenium pot . I was expecting a snake which is common in our premises. In order to identify the kind of snake lurking around,, I kept keen watch and what I spot made me rub my eyes twice!!  Camouflage of this elusive bird. Despite its vibrant colors, it blends itself so well in the surrounding!! It was the movement of black lores of the bird which caught the attention initially.  Finally it revealed itself. An Indian Pitta ( Navranga ) foraging on t...

Our garden deck slat, made from old recycled wood shows sign of decay and see how! Intermittent rains followed by brief periods of sunshine, and these wood cracker specialists make a fanning appearance like a celebrity. I am in love with this brilliant transcluscent neon yellow color. It is the brightest fungi I have ever seen. HOwever, they lose their sheen, run dull brown and droop down in dry periods. Only to reappear in glory with slightest of rains. ( see the pic above) The process continues till it forms a big colony generally in a row and breaks the deadwood down completely.  

Green Lynx Spider Here is one slender and beautiful Lynx Spider found while watering my sweet potato creeper. It was unusually big and colourful. Rather I have never seen a spider as colourful as this. The green seemed fluorescent but unless I spot it in the dark, it is difficult to conclude. This specie of spider is easily identifiable due to the presence of large erect spikes on the legs, its darting movement and sudden leaps. Unlike  commonly known spiders, Lynx Spiders do not weave a web for preying. They hide under leaves of plants and trees and wait patiently for their prey. They have keen eyesight and good jumping ability which helps them leap and hunt within fraction of a second of prey coming within their vicinity. Sometimes they jump as high as 2 cm to catch a prey!! Green Lynx Spider on a sweet potato creeper They are diurnal hunters that is they hunt only in the daytime. They prefer to live in tall grass, low shrubs or other wild vegetation on la...

Greater Coucal Deep resonant calls , ‘coop, coop, coop’ often heard in the warm morning hours in our garden. The call is loud with good bass, enough to make one feel it emanating from some musical instrument. And just as a peacock scream is repeated by its fellow mates at different locations within the vicinity, similarly this sound is also carried forward to distant birds until the sound fades away. Acting on a childish instinct, I had tried imitating the call and it responded. This continued for a while till I saw the gardener from the neighboring  house prying to see the new kid in the area. This shy bird remained hidden from my view for many days before I spotted it hopping cautiously from the branches of a mango tree to Shirish. A fairly large bird with black head, purple black upper mantle and undersides, dark copper brown wings , ruby red eyes, short thick black beak and long black feathery tail. It is a very common bird in the Indian subcontinent and is an inhabitant of a...

The Bird Sanctuary  Feeding on millet In your quiet garden wakes a magic tumult   Of winged choristers that keep the Festival of Dawn,   Blithely rise the carols in richly cadenced rapture,   From lyric throats of amber, of ebony and fawn. The bulbul and the oriol, the honey-bird and shama Flit among high boughs that drip with nectar and with dew, Upon the grass the wandering gull parades its sea-washed silver, The hoopoe and the kingfisher their bronze and sapphire blue. Wild gray pigeons dreaming of a home amid the tree-tops, Fill their beaks with silken down and slender banyan twigs, But the jade-green gypsy parrots are only gay marauders, And pause upon their sun-ward flight to plunder red ripe figs. In your gracious garden there is joy and fostering freedom, Nesting place and singing space for every feathered thing, O Master of the Birds, grant sanctuary and shelter Also to a homing bird that bears a broken wing.   -Sarojini Naidu   Sarojini Naidu, a f...

Whi..Whi..Whi… Whi, a quick loud whistling sound heard approaching the tree outside the kitchen, near the waterbody. A distinctly different call from the sweet notes of sunbird, oriental magpie, Indian robin or any of the bulbuls. At first, I expected kingfisher or a variety similar to it since our waterbody has plenty of mollies, which attract such birds. By the time I could get a good look at it, it flew away with its catch. I could not get a glimpse of its prey nor its features. Could only gauge its size and color, which is not sufficient information to identify it. Thereafter, whenever I was in the kitchen, I would keep my ears on guard for the whistle. We had good supply of its food so was assured of it. And as expected it did come again. A small bird, dull grayish brown in color, with a dark cheek patch, a pallid white brow patch above the eye, a strong head and a sharp hooked bill. It fed on dragonflies hovering on the water-body. Announcing its arrival with its pec...

Oriental Honey Buzzard Gujarati Name : મધીયો બાજ Hindi Name : Madhuya Ahmedabad gets really hot in summers ( around 45-48 deg Celcius). Even though we stay indoors, it becomes unbearable without air conditioners. Even animals around our house, dogs, cats and birds reduce all their activities post 11 am only to resume at around 4 or 4.30 pm. So, it is unusually quiet in the garden in afternoons in this season. Last week, while busy with my meeting online one evening, sitting near a window, I saw a shadow of a large bird flying by. Suddenly, all the birds dispersed frantically for shelter. It was definitely a predatory bird which had come for surveillance. I wanted to leave the desk and investigate but that would seem so unprofessional. Oriental Honey Buzzard So, once I was disengaged, I leapt for my camera to take a chance and see if the bird was still around. Fortunately, things had not returned to normal out there. Changing into dull earthy colored clot...

Gujarati Name : તેતર , ધુળીયો તેતર Hindi Name : सफ़ेद तीतर Most of the common birds of India such as parrots, sparrows, peacocks, crows etc play a significant role in our folklores in the form of tales, poems, proverbs or riddles. One of the most popular riddle has Grey Francolin as the lead. तीतर के दो आगे तीतर तीतर के दो पीछे तीतर आगे तीतर पीछे तीतर बोलो कितने तीतर The first time I heard this, I admit, I paid little attention to ‘Teetar’ and was least interested in how it looked. Even though most of my childhood summers I have spent in villages (Baramati) in Maharashtra or (Kapadwanj) in Gujarat, I had never seen nor heard this bird. The first time I heard it was in 2016, when we moved to ‘Mitthi’. For many months I could only hear their call ….’ka…tee..tar…ka…tee…tar’ or ‘ pa…tee..la…pa…tee..la’ while they remained camouflaged. These birds come to feed on the grains we scatter for them at the far end of our garden. One quiet afternoon, a casual glance towards the feeder...

Common Iora Male Common Iora Male Gujarati Name: શૌબિન્ગા, શોબિગી Hindi Name: शाऊबीगी What would you do when you are chatting with a close relative, discussing ‘Lockdown’, and you spot an unfamiliar bird few feet away across the French window, in the garden? Cutting short would have been rude and the conversation was nowhere close to an end. So, keeping the person engaged in our talks through monosyllables and on speaker, I tried to get a better glimpse of the bird, all the while remaining indoors. Over my last few months of studying behaviors of various birds, I have noticed something which was very unusual or rather unknown to me. Birds also like to follow a 'Schedule' and 'Pattern'. Post my first sighting of Iora on my purple Kachnar tree at around 4pm, I kept a check on their visit in the same place at around same time. And I was pleasantly surprised to see them visit it again, almost daily. Due to the temperature going up, their timings ...

Indian White Eye A slight movement on a neem tree drew my attention while chatting with my daughter. Was it just a gust of wind or was there something I spotted from the corner of my eye? Cutting our conversations short, I tried to confirm my intuition. The movement shifted from one branch to the other and from one tree to the other, the subject camouflaged all the while in the new sprouts of the neem and saptaparni trees. Many times, lost the subject and felt a slight despair. Should I go and get my camera to be prepared for a sudden appearance and may be miss the spotting or should I stay and see it first? I stayed there believing that I might get the chance to click it some other time. And so glad I did not move. Straining my eyes to their last nerve, could see a greenish yellow bird, size of a thumb with a bespectacled look. Had never before see it in all these years. A very restless bird, kept hopping so fast that was difficult to keep track. It ne...

They say it is one of the birds which has adapted well to urbanization. But I could never spot or hear them while staying in the city, neither in Ahmedabad nor in Chennai. My early memories of this bird are of the times when we have been to Himachal or Uttarakhand. Hence I thought they were only found in colder regions of India. So, when I first spotted a bulbul in my garden, i was overjoyed. Thankfully it was not a one-off sighting, they are regular visitors at Mitthi. One of the most talkative bird with a very distinct voice. Ptigroo, ptigroo… or pic pic ptigroo…. almost like big rain drops falling onto some metal! No wonder the Persians named the bird – BulBul- after the word ‘BolBol’ meaning a Nightingale. An apt name even by its Hindi meaning (which is talkative). 😊 Bulbul is a monogamous bird and usually bonds for life. I have mostly seem them in pairs. When one of them is not around, their call is distinctly different. The way it tilts its head before calling...

When I first thought of writing , I wondered which bird would make it for the first post. But well , the answer lay pretty much out there next morning, strutting with its long colorful train seeking attention from females around him, including mine.  One who has the honour of being our National Bird. Who has probably the greatest presence in art and history of ancient India : the seal of emperor Kanishka, coins of Gupta Empire, the famous Peacock Throne of Shah Jahan, state symbol of some dynasties or carvings in stone and wood across ancient monuments in the country.Whose feather adorns the crown of Lord Krishna and one who is said to be the vehicle of Lord Kartikeya.  And one who screams and wakes us up every morning. As such a shy bird, but can be bold enough to peck on the glass window to ask for more food or can be audacious enough to peck on tender leaves of Tulsi or Ratrani plant to show their unsatiated appetite. Who roam around with their hea...