ECO-WATCH
An avian gathering near a Chandigarh stream
Baljit Singh

ON a misty, cold January morning in the Chandigarh Rose Garden, there was no mistaking the rasping, clipped bird call "kree" and it was repeated twice more at brief intervals. I froze in the hope that the bird might show up. Instead, the bird embarked upon its song again. I was reasonably sure by then of the presence of the Himalayan whistling thrush (lately classified as blue whistling thrush).

Could I believe my ears? The blue whistling thrush breeds and lives in the Himalayas, keeping generally between the altitude of 5000 and 9000 feet. Its favourite living spaces are the boulder-strewn Himalayan streams, wooded gorges and steep ravines. When hungry and in search of food, the bird takes to long hops over boulders and short sprints along the edges of streams. But when satiated, almost always it perches on big boulders mid-stream. And that is a setting which seldom fails to inspire the bird to burst into its long, fluid, whistling song, yodelled to the music of the stream. There are occasions when the bird keeps up the song for a minute and even two. The bird is then a picture of joy and laughter. When the spell is broken on an impulse, it takes wings and reverting to its harsh call "kree-kree," vanishes into the darkness of the Himalayan woods.

Two weeks later on February 5, again a very cold morning and again in the Rose Garden, I froze in my tracks on hearing "kree", loud and clear. Not more than five metres away was one blue whistling thrush looking up from the streambed. In sunlight, its glossy feathers shone deep blue with shades of purple. The tail feathers and wings near the tips were a few shades lighter. The creator certainly must have been in a happy mood while creating this avian species. The bird has a striking bright yellow beak and its crown, nape (hind neck), mantle (upper back), throat, breast and the flanks are generously splashed with glistening silver-grey streaks and splotches. That is not all, on the wings was a crescent — made up of 5 to 7 prominent silver-white spots — which can send the heart aflutter. Sounding a tentative "kree", it alighted on a branch of a bottlebrush tree, at level with my eyes. After nearly five minutes of our silent communion, the bird flew away keeping to the contours of the stream and was then gone.

Whether by chance or by instinct, the bird must have stopped over at the Rose Garden because the area is a close replication of its natural habitat. There is the meandering stream, alas sans the rushing water and boulders, and both its banks are covered with bottlebrush trees. The trees are sturdy and tall, their canopies dense and the inward spread of foliage forms an arch over the stream for most of its length. Regrettably, the water in the stream has neither the vitality nor the music to inspire the thrush to sing.

How was the bird here? Back home I scanned the two latest bird books, one by Grimmett and Inskipps’ (1998) and the other by Krys Kazmierczeck (2000). Not fully satisfied by them, I opened Whistler (1924), which happily resolved the issue thus: "... strictly speaking a resident species (Himalayas), its fine powers of flight tend to make it wander a good deal and in the winter months numbers move down into the foot-hills while stragglers even appear in the plains far out of sight of the hills." So now there is something to look forward to in the coming winter!

Whistler had a special empathy with birds. Note the sensitivity in his narrative on the blue whistling thrush: "... the bird seems the living embodiment of all the qualities of vitality and fitness that one associates with Nature and the hills." That was so when the bird went by the name Himalayan whistling thrush.

A mere coincidence that in the radius of 50 metres from where I encountered the whistling thrush, I met three other species of birds and all of them from areas distant to Chandigarh. Of these, the black bulbul shares its breeding space in the Himalayas with the whistling thrush. From all accounts, this bird is a vagrant and a rare visitor here. So I was pleasantly surprised when I met these bulbuls on ten different mornings in February and always in batches of three to eleven. And then, one day they were gone; at least from the Rose Garden. Like so many other bird species, the black bulbul finds the nectar of seemal blossoms irresistible.

The looks and the call of the bird may not endear you to it but its greyish-black form with bright orange-red beak, legs and feet coupled with a jet black, untidy and spiky crest catch the eye at once. Even if that fails to arrest your attention, its sharp nasal "weenh, wur-kiyu" chorus is sure to get to you. If we do not pay attention, this bulbul may cease to visit Chandigarh altogether. For, over the last two seasons, I have noticed that rickshaw-pullers from Bihar-U.P. snap up the seemal buds from the branches before they blossom. They tell me that the tender skin of the bud makes delectable curry. The Bihar and UP countryside was once considered the home of seemal but not anymore. Now I know the reason why; if the buds won’t be allowed to blossom, there will be no propagation of the seed.

These thoughts were interrupted when a black redstart, a regular winter migrant at the garden, crossed my vision. I have encountered it in the Rose Garden on an average four days a week from December till mid-March. His nearest and largest breeding ground lies in the Tibetan Steppe, comprising the desolate dry mountain ranges. But out in the Rose Garden, this bird seems the happiest among trees and shrubs, especially those bordering the dying stream. This exquisite little bird is essentially in two colour tones: it is rust-orange from breast down to the lower tip of the tail, while the rest of its body is charcoal black. Its presence is unobtrusive but it is most entertaining to watch its jaunty walk and the way it flicks its tail. As birds harbour no malice, their joys too are innocent.

The last of the birds encountered was the chestnut-tailed starling (more commonly the grey-headed myna), which breeds in the east, northeast, Western Ghats and the Andaman islands but spends the winters in central and south-western part of the country. From all known accounts, you might see a few of them in Chandigarh in winter and perhaps one-odd bird in summer too. I saw a few in February-March this year, again on the seemals in and around the Rose Garden. This bird has delicate, sober colours and that makes it a pretty sight. Its head, neck and throat are powder white, upper body rufous-brown; the rump and tail — true to its name — are deep chestnut, whereas the vent and the lower body is buffish-chestnut. If you happen to look at the bird through powerful binoculars, you will be dazzled by the mellow, pastel shades of its beak, yellow at the tip and greenish-blue towards the base. From up close, you will see the black dot of the pupil surrounded by a yellow iris. You can never have enough of the chestnut-tailed starling. So here is one more reason not to allow our seemal blossoms to be vandalised. Is anyone listening in the Chandigarh Administration?