Well, yes... It all started during my school days with a few crows' nests in the two mango trees that bowed down to our terrace in the Customs Quarters that we occupied at Wellington Island, Cochin. The year - early to mid 90's... seems way back in time and very sweet & nostalgic too. Oh! you want to know what started?? My interest in birds or let's say most things in Nature...
My Dad always had an interest in birds - that is what I had got to know from the stories of his childhood that he narrated to us. However, it was an interest of a different sort in his teenage days - it was hunting them or catapulting them down from their nests. However, as he grew up, the 'Dasyu Ratnakar' in him turned into a calmer 'Valmiki' and soon his interest in birds developed around their habitat, habits, species - in short his interest was more subject oriented now. Gradually, the interest passed on to his daughters - though my sister being a bio-technologist was more interested in the anatomy, that too microscopic.
Later, when I read about Salim Ali's autobiography, 'The Fall of a sparrow', I realized his interest in birds also started from shooting them down and later developed to be more scientific.
Anyway, Dad spent his early mornings walking on the terrace and feeding birds - mostly crows. From there started his observation of the crows. For the first time we realized that birds did not stay in nests. They built them only at the time of breeding. In fact so many birds did not even build their own nests - the cuckoo for example.
Every breeding season we saw the crow couples getting busy building their nests in both the mango trees. Then the laying & incubation of the eggs would follow. It was during the incubation period that the cunning cuckoos either threw one of the crows eggs or adjusted their own eggs in the crows' nests. The cuckoo - crow fight was something I had always thought to be folklore. But we observed it every season.
The fun was to observe when the adult crows used to train the young black birds to fly and 'caw' - there had to be one or two black birds which called out a 'coo' instead of a 'caw'. Not just that, these birds always used to be the first ones to leave the nests, leaving a surprised crow family. I am sure the birds thought - how did this one turn out to be so different from the others!
This was just the beginning. Soon we were observing sparrows and pigeons as well. Golden orioles and sun birds also gave us some chance to observe them. After Cochin, Dad got a transfer to Rourkela and we had our quarters situated almost in a fairy-tale location. A sweet little cottage surrounded with almost an acre of land just at the foot of the hills. The entire setting was so apt to study birds and flowers and their habitats - just that I was in my final year in school and most of my time was spent in preparing for entrance examinations. But that did not stop me from developing some knowledge on birds as well as flowers (or plants in general).
The next few years were busy with studies - but thankfully my campuses provided me with enough opportunities to keep up with my interest in Nature and Her ways. Right now, I stay in a flat, where my bedroom window faces a row of deodar trees.
The deodar tree is such a houseful of life, my mornings are well spent and my day begins with a cheer looking and listening to the birds that visit the deodars. At the suggestion of a friend, I have started this blog to note down my observations. Thus starts my observations by the deodar trees...
My Dad always had an interest in birds - that is what I had got to know from the stories of his childhood that he narrated to us. However, it was an interest of a different sort in his teenage days - it was hunting them or catapulting them down from their nests. However, as he grew up, the 'Dasyu Ratnakar' in him turned into a calmer 'Valmiki' and soon his interest in birds developed around their habitat, habits, species - in short his interest was more subject oriented now. Gradually, the interest passed on to his daughters - though my sister being a bio-technologist was more interested in the anatomy, that too microscopic.
Later, when I read about Salim Ali's autobiography, 'The Fall of a sparrow', I realized his interest in birds also started from shooting them down and later developed to be more scientific.
Anyway, Dad spent his early mornings walking on the terrace and feeding birds - mostly crows. From there started his observation of the crows. For the first time we realized that birds did not stay in nests. They built them only at the time of breeding. In fact so many birds did not even build their own nests - the cuckoo for example.
Every breeding season we saw the crow couples getting busy building their nests in both the mango trees. Then the laying & incubation of the eggs would follow. It was during the incubation period that the cunning cuckoos either threw one of the crows eggs or adjusted their own eggs in the crows' nests. The cuckoo - crow fight was something I had always thought to be folklore. But we observed it every season.
The fun was to observe when the adult crows used to train the young black birds to fly and 'caw' - there had to be one or two black birds which called out a 'coo' instead of a 'caw'. Not just that, these birds always used to be the first ones to leave the nests, leaving a surprised crow family. I am sure the birds thought - how did this one turn out to be so different from the others!
This was just the beginning. Soon we were observing sparrows and pigeons as well. Golden orioles and sun birds also gave us some chance to observe them. After Cochin, Dad got a transfer to Rourkela and we had our quarters situated almost in a fairy-tale location. A sweet little cottage surrounded with almost an acre of land just at the foot of the hills. The entire setting was so apt to study birds and flowers and their habitats - just that I was in my final year in school and most of my time was spent in preparing for entrance examinations. But that did not stop me from developing some knowledge on birds as well as flowers (or plants in general).
The next few years were busy with studies - but thankfully my campuses provided me with enough opportunities to keep up with my interest in Nature and Her ways. Right now, I stay in a flat, where my bedroom window faces a row of deodar trees.
The deodar tree is such a houseful of life, my mornings are well spent and my day begins with a cheer looking and listening to the birds that visit the deodars. At the suggestion of a friend, I have started this blog to note down my observations. Thus starts my observations by the deodar trees...
