Birding Evenings – An evening at Okhla Bird Sanctuary

I attended a 12-day Summer School at Amity University from 27 May to 7 June. It was then that I found out about an amazing Birding Spot only 10 mins from the university. I decided to pay a short visit to the Sanctuary on the evening of the last day.

So, as planned, on the evening of 7th, me and my dad visited the Sanctuary in the evening after getting free. I entered the Park at around 5.

We were welcomed by a group of 4-5 Black Kite who gave me a couple of good shots. but being short on time, we hurried and kept moving.

Next, we had a Purple Heron, who was sitting quite close by on Water Hyacinth. Here, I tried a reflection shot for the first time. Though I could not manage the best shot but still it was pretty good enough.

Surprisingly, the number of Black-crowned Night Heron was exceptionally high. I saw almost a hundred of them in just one hour that we spent there. So, I took full advantage of the opportunity and made my best shots of the bird.

Another bird whose number was exceptionally high here was a Coppersmith Barbet. I had always wanted to photograph this bird and this was my chance and again I took full advantage of it to manage my personal best shot of the bird.

There were quite a lot of Purple Sunbirds there but I didn’t pay much attention to them which was a big mistake for I had never managed a great shot of them and it was my Golden Chance.

The Ultimate thing about the trip was my sighting of a Red-whiskered Bulbul, my long-awaited lifer. I managed a super fantastic shot of the bird on my first sighting. Those few minutes when I waited for the bird to come close were totally magical because it came within a couple of yards of distance from me. This was the something I would never forget.

Next in the line was an Asian Pied Starling fledgling who was sitting on the nest which was built on tree close to the walkway.

The last one for the trip was also something I had wanted to photograph since a long time – Indian Golden Oriole. There was a pair of them but one of them was in a hurry and it left too early. The other was quite patient and gave me enough time to make a decent shot.

The sighting of this amazing beauty was the last one for the trip and ended the trip with a happy note.

~Arjun Basandrai