Madikeri Mangalore and around Part 1

Sun Set

I was done with my exams and wanted to do things I love, Friday the 30th of November 2012, just after doing my first Hessarghatta birding trip. I boarded KSRTC's Rajahamsa to Madikeri. My grandparents place, I reached there at about 6.30am. A 5-min walk from the bus stand were my grandparents awaiting my arrival. Madikeri the capital of Coorg is a 7hr bus ride from Bangalore.  Had my favorite Ajji's special  dosa, and then a quick nap. By 2.30 PM I was preparing to go to Raja (raja's)Seat right in the center of the town. The place where the Kings of the day would enjoy their evening viewing the sunset, now a park. There is another story, that this is the place where prisoners given death penalty were thrown down the edge of the mountain to death! and the king would be the witness! 

View point 

Anyway I was not there as a tourist, I was there to do some bird watching. The park ends at the view point, then there is some lantana to the extreme left, right there is a small path way which leads to a thickly wooded area. A great place for a 30 min hike/trek, following the path is simple and easy but if you choose to be adventurous you can go off the path, but be careful, for loose rock, steep falls and snakes. 

The 'Drop Point'!

Birding there is a different experience, you will have to first select a spot which shows signs of bird activity and wait patiently for them to show up while the mosquitoes will feast. Both mornings and evenings are good for sighting birds but photography point of view evenings are not great as you will have the setting sun  for your background most of the time.

A lot of birds can be seen , Oriental White eye,Tickell's Blue Flycatcher,Indian Peafowl,Spotted Dove,Rose Ringed Parakeet,Plum-headed Parakeet,Asian Koel,Spotted Owlet,Common Indian Nightjar, House Swift,Small Green Bee-eater, IndianGrey Hornbill, White-cheeked Barbet, Coppersmith Barbet, Rufous-backed Shrike, Black Headed Oriole, Brahminy Starling, Common Myna, Small Minivet,Common Iora,Red-whiskered Bulbul,Red-vented Bulbul, Black Kite are some of the birds that I sighted that evening but could not get good images...

 

Just After Sun Set

Just at sun down I made my way back to the park area for the musical fountain synchronised to the track 'dhoom machale' and A R Rahman's 'Vande Mataram' a thrilling sight to see water shoot up into the air and then a sudden lamina flow to meet the music. When 'Vande Mataram' was played am sure every one felt very patriotic. If it was a holiday that day, the show would have extended to at-least three more tracks. Damn I miss it. 

Musical Fountain

Once the show was over everyone was in a hurry to leave the park, I waited for all the commotion to end and peace soon followed. I stayed back for some time enjoying the peace, cool breeze and the dark hill side. But then the security guards blew their whistles to signal that it was time to leave. That is when I realized that it was 8:45 pm, very late for a town that closes down by 9pm.   






I headed back home, had a good meal, packed my back-pack for the next two days. I was heading to the coastal capital of Karnataka, Mangalore. Bird watching, sunset at the beach and  Pilikula was on my mind.... 

      

Hessarghatta take one

It was a long planned visit to go birding in Hessarghatta which finally happened in the last week of November 2012. Finally it was set. 28th Nov 2012, Manjunath my Facebook friend at the time, a birder in the making like myself, joined in and we reachd there one hour prior to sunrise, giving us an idea as to what to expect. 

Well Hessarghatta, a grassland about 30km from my place is a good place to sight winter guests, along with resident species with prominence to the raptors.

A Black Kite in Flight

A Kestrel 

Along with them there are many grassland birds like the paddy-field Pipit, Larks etc...

Sky Lark

Paddy-field Pipit

Also we saw Drongos, Indian Rollers, and too many swifts compared to the other birds.

Drongo

Later that morning we saw a Tawny Eagle at a distance that was too much for my 70-300 to handle.

Being inexperienced this was all we could manage.. But this was only my first step...