A photo blog - of a day’s
visit to Najafgarh drain
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| A panoramic view of the Najafgarh drain - now a wetland |
Me and my friend, who is also a keen
bird watcher, had been contemplating a visit to the Najafgarh drain, since last
few weeks that is situated at the outskirts of Delhi, along the Gurgaon border. My friend, Mr. Prabhat Kumar has immense
knowledge about the identity of the birds and their habitats. He is also a keen blogger, but had been
bogged down due to personal difficulties being faced by him since the last one year,
he has a blog running in the name of – Birds
in Delhi (India) - here is the link to his blog - http://birdsindelhi.blogspot.com/. We had planned the
trip twice since November end, but due to some last minute glitches, the visit
could not materialize.
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| Long tailed Shrike |
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| Greater spotted eagle |
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| Territorial warrior - the black Kite |
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| A long distance shot of a group of Starlings |
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| A Baya weaver bird (male) |
Finally, on the 22nd of
December, 2018 we were finally able to proceed ahead with our proposed outing. However, the sun light had started fading,
due to the light veil of cloud that had covered most of north Indian plains and
is an annual feature, at this time of the year, but being determined to make
the trip, we went ahead as planned. The
stretch of drain is vast and the region has been declared as an ‘Wetland’
recently, the length that we traversed was about 20 odd Kilometres and we saw a
plethora of Birds, some I was able to shoot, whereas some just scooted away
before the camera could focus and the greatest disappointment for me was not
being able to shoot the Red Munia (both male & female) that were visible at
many spots. I have spotted around more
than 50 bird species during the trip and here are some of the photographs of
the birds (albeit not the full repertoire), some of them shot against the light, so enjoy the viewing –
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| A flock of Common Coot |
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| Woolly necked Crane |
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| Purple Heron |
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| Grey Heron |
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| A Painted stork about to land |
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| A Cormorant drying its' feathers in the sun |
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| A Red wattled Lapwing |
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| A Jungle Warbler |
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| Great Cormorant in water |
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| Baya weaver bird (female) |
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| Black shouldered Kite |
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| A Jungle Owlet |
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| A Plain flower pecker |
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| Indian Robin |
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| A Plain prinia |
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| A Common Stonechat |
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| A Bluethroat |
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| Siberian Stonechat |
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| A Pied Kingfisher |
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| A White throated Kingfisher |
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| A Pond Heron |
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| A Common Buzzard |
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| A Common Shank |
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| Purple Moorhen |
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| A White Wagtail |
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| A pair of Sarus Crane |
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| A Black Ibis |
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| A Oriental White Ibis |
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| A Black Drongo |
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| A Black shouldered Kite in flight |
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| A pair of Grey francolin |
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| A Spot billed Duck |
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| A Purple Sunbird |
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| Greater Flamingos |
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| The ducks take flight |
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| As the evening sets in the birds fly homewards in a formation |
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| Greylag Geese roosting |
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| The water birds take to flight - as the evening sets it |
© S. Roy Biswas
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