It is quiet some time i was thinking of my experiences with birds. I have seriously started watching birds in march 2016. After buying a DSLR camera i used to move about in my surroundings to take pictures. In one month time i was able to take bird pictures with some clarity. I used to go around the Kole Wetlands nearby in the afternoon. Slowly i stared moving around little further and used to visit Kole Wetlands in Thrissur and Pullu. During these journeys I was able to see lot of birders in and around Thrissur and Ponnani.. Days went by and on one day in november 2016 i was able to see Greater Flemingo, Grey-necked Bunting and Great knot from Ponnani beach along with Lesser Sandplover. I was really lucky to capture photo’s of all of them.
Slowly i started to move to Malampuzha to see Amur Falcon and to Nelliyampathy. On feb 5th 2017 i went to Nelliyampathy again, i started from Pothundy dam stopping in between and seeing birds. On that day i was able to see Malabar Whistiling thrush, Flame Throated Bulbuls, Jungle Owlets, Blue winged Parakeet, Greater flameback Woodpecker, Blue capped Rock thrush and the usual birds like Red vented Bulbuls, White cheeked Barbets. There was also a lottery along with this.. I put the picture in some bird sites and nobody was able to identify it at that time. As time went by i joined eBird and started uploading the checklists.. Initially i started to upload the recent checklists and later i uploaded the old checklist in a span of three months. I used to upload two to three pictures of each species usually in each checklists. As i uploaded the Nelliyampathy checklist i kept a bird as unidentified. Time went by and i was able to see more and more species of bird. In last september i got a call from Venugopalan Regunanthan sir the regional viewer, that some one from Australia has doubts about the picture of a female Blue capped Rock thrush, which was wrongly posted as Blue Rock thrush and adviced a review. At this jenture Praveen J reviewed and confirmed it and my unidentified bird was send to experts and in their review it was finally concluded as Blue and white Flycatcher the first report from Kerala.
I went on seeing bird mainly in thrissur ,ponnani occasionally to vazhani and malampuzha and some parts of Ernakulam and Changararam wet lands. I went to Mysuru and visited the bird sanctuary there and also to Thattekad and also to Munnar. As I continued to upload pictures in each checklist, the total number has crossed 6000 photos.
This year I was able to see a rare visitor Black legged Kittiwake on january 25th. Till date i was able to see 301 species in total and 299 species from kerala. I am really thankful to all the birders whom i was able to meet. I am specially thankful to Adithyian NK in helping me to identify birds, kole Birders and Malappuram bird atlas group who always helped me whenever i needed it.. I thank each and all who helped me to continue in this field and finally thanking Manoj Karingamadathil who was always behind me to write t a blog about my experiences in bird watching. I am not fluent in writing and so don’t know you will be able to appreciate what i have written. thank you all
Awesome post Mathew and great effort
Being at the right place at the right time and having an expert to guide you are the primary issues to consider when it comes to bird watching.