Ranganthittu Bird Sanctuary

While on a shot trip of Mysore and Srirangapatna - Ninad, Manish and myself decided to check out the close by Ranganthittu Bird Sanctuary. And although we spend only 2-3 hours here it was completely worth it!!! In fact this might rate as one of the best laid back birding outting ever... Birding here is truly effortless..

This amazing wetland along the Kaveri river is an important nesting ground for birds, and has been a protect area since 1940 under the Wodeyar kings of Mysore, who were persuaded to do so by none other than the great ornithologist Dr. Salim Ali.

Even though we were too early to see the nesting spoonbills .. we did see a lot of nesting activity of Black-headed Ibis, Great Egrets, Black-crowned Night Heron..

Starting with photos at the main lake:

Black-headed Ibis (Threskiornis melanocephalus)

almost everywhere you looked you could see these Ibis

and the waters had many Mugger crocodile (Crocodylus palustris) mostly hanging around below the nesting trees waiting for a chick to slip down..

here a nesting Black-headed Ibis (Threskiornis melanocephalus)

Black-crowned Night Heron (Nycticorax nycticorax)

another Black-headed Ibis

and suddenly out of nowhere we heard the flapping of some giant wings and not too far from our boat was this majestic Indian Peafowl (Pavo cristatus).. I have seen these birds fly before ..but generally its very short distances .. but this fellow flew at least a good 100m across the crocodile infested lake ..

there were loads of Little Cormorants (Phalacrocorax niger)

Black-crowned Night Heron (Nycticorax nycticorax)

... amongst a group of Little Egrets and Ibis I found a lone Grey Heron (Ardea cinerea)

Juvenile Black-crowned Night Heron

and another Black-headed Ibis flew by ... but this fellow had some nesting

but you would always sense some tension in the air ... check this Black-headed Ibis watching a Mugger

some Great Egrets (Ardea alba)

and the not so common Great Stone-curlew or Great Thick-knee (Esacus recurvirostris)

even a White-browed Wagtail (Motacilla maderaspatensis) made a great guest appearance..

wagging his tail away before taking flight

and just after that we had a couple of fly pasts - first was a Purple Heron (Ardea purpurea)
..then far far away in the distance was an Oriental Honey Buzzard (Pernis ptilorhynchus)
and finally we saw our first mammal of the day - an Indian Flying-fox (Pteropus giganteus)and not far away was a great big tree full of them...

After about an hour at the lake we decided to move on walking along one of its edges into a small forest batch very close to where you catch the boat.. And we were rewarded with an excellent sighting .. that of a beautiful

Tickell's Blue Flycatcher (Cyornis tickelliae)

who sat calmly for some 10 mins letting me taking more than my share of photos of it : )

Not far away was another beauty - this time a damselfly - a female River Heliodor (libellago lineata)

and then yet another damsel

this one was a White Dartlet (Agriocnemis pieris)

then Manish found an emerging Bamboo Treebrown (Lethe europa) at the top of one of the bamboo trees..
..we then watched a White-browed Fantail (Rhipidura aureola) jump around a tree for a bit.. after this we decided to get a cup of tea and call it a day heading back to Mysore..

But while we were waiting for the tea I found this fellow -
a Pioneer (Belenois aurota)
In fact it sat nicely for some photos..

just after that I found this Chocolate Albatross (Appias lyncida)

and on our way out of the sanctuary we saw a

Rhesus Macaque (Macaca mulatta)

And what a great day we had !!!

We were now back in the car and driving away but around 300m before we hit the highway that led to Mysore I noticed a large bird sitting on a scarcely leafed tree and I shouted to the taxi guy to hit the breaks..

And as I walked towards the tree I found what I hoped it was - an amazing raptor

a Crested Serpent Eagle (Spilornis cheela)

but sadly I was a bit too clumsy while I walked towards it's direction and it swooped down from the tree and flew by me - but not before I managed to steal a couple of snaps : )

Wow - what a day!