Melody Queen Kokila - Koyal

Thank you so much for lovely wishes and motivating me to go step further, we will surely live up to your expectations and will serve uniqueness and many more in years to come.

I was thinking on what to offer today and see what my city helped me with; I was doing birding near my home and found “Koyal” with super sweet sound continuously it was so sweet that I could not stop myself from searching her. It took a bit of time and effort but finally managed for you. Let's learn more about Koyal in the next section.

स्वर साम्राज्ञी

Kokil kanthi, Swar Kokila these are synonymous for Koyal, melodious call of Koyal is unmatched with any other bird in the world. Even best singers are known as Kokil Kanthi, which actually means the melodious sound is like koyal. It has cultural importance across the world. The word "koel" is onomatopoeic in origin. The Sanskrit root is "Kokila" and the words in various Indian languages are similar. 

Koel is known for its unmatched sweetness, the same can be heard in the city (only if you recognize sound) but we in the city hardly recognize the same. Koooh Koooh sugar sweet melodious sound is famous, do recognize when you get the same it will give you peace of mind for sure. 

While we talk about sound let me tell you that bird looks very similar to crow but when you hear the sound you feel like it is the most beautiful bird on the earth and should continue for long. I tried a lot to find Koel but it took a lot of effort to get best pictures as it is easy to hear but certainly very difficult to find in open to click a frame but finally, the effort turned rewarding and I got few good images for you. Now let me tell you the description and facts about Koel.

The Facts File

The Asian or Common Koel (Eudynamys scolopaceus) is a member of the cuckoo order of birds,

The Asian Koel is a brood parasite that lays its eggs in the nests of crows and other hosts, where the foster parents raise the young. (Brood Parasitism: Brood parasitism is a method of parasitism in which the organism lays its eggs in the nest of other birds and let that other bird to incubate them. Brood parasitism occurs in birds)

The word koel is echoic in origin and the bird is a widely used symbol in Indian poetry. It has been compared with the "Nightingale" due to its melodious call

The Asian Koel is a large, long-tailed, cuckoo at 45 cm. The male of the nominate race is glossy bluish-black, with a pale green or grey bill, the iris is crimson, and it has grey legs and feet

The female of the nominate race is brownish on the crown and has rufous streaks on the head. The back, rump and wing coverts are dark brown with white and buff spots. The underparts are whitish but are heavily striped

The Asian Koel is omnivorous, consuming a variety of insects, caterpillars, eggs and small vertebrates

This bird has a strong association with the Traditional new year celebrations of Sri Lanka. In the literature around the festival, the song of the bird regarded as a heralding of the traditional New Year. The Sinhala speaking community knows Koel as the koha in Sri Lanka

Do search for Keol when you hear some very melodious sound in the near vicinity, our city offers best birding but we don’t focus on them hence request you to keep your eye open and respect the Mother Nature available in your vicinity, while ending the blog do take a tour of DSLR section

A Message of the Day 

After they disappear, will you then shed a tear? Save wildlife. Save life 

Author:

BT Wild Art
Life is Safari. Enjoy it.

The Photo Safari

Koel Female

Koel Male

The Journey of Wilderness

Celebrating 1st Birthday of BT WILD ART 

Lovely readers today is a very special day for me because it is the 1^st birthday of BT Wild Art, your support and appreciation helped your favorite blog to grow a year older. The first step towards the wilderness started exactly the same day last year with a holy thought to spread wilderness awareness and information of unique aspects of Mother Nature and see where we have reached.

During the year received tremendous love and support from all of you that helped me to deliver the uniqueness with every single blog. I am thankful to each one of you for taking active participation in following the blog spot. With your support, I am sure we will achieve many more milestones in the years to come. Let’s continue the relationship for an unlimited period to explore and conserve our lovely land.

The Flashback 

A year back there was no plan to write a blog; I was following my passion for photography, which helped me realize the importance of Mother Nature and conservation but still no thoughts on exploring writing anything but at the same time  One of my friends Ramulu was the first person who came up with idea of opting blog so as I can reach more people to spread awareness. I was not very sure that people will like such topic hence I was unable to decide but it was Ramulu’s confidence that bugged my mind to have serious thoughts. After Ramulu it was Shalaka who suggested blog space and insisted to go for it.

After this the role of another friend Timir Sir who saw my clicks and offered me the opportunity to write one-pager on conservation for Me and My Earth magazine. He convinced me to attempt at least once and hence with his guidance I managed a writeup for a magazine which later on was published. This gave me the confidence to shoot a blog, the same content I tried and since then it's unstoppable

The response was overwhelming which motivated me to plan a few more but to continue you need to improve and offer different topics but when you have such lovely people around you then nothing is impossible.  I was first timer so there was a lot to learn and improve, the same of taken care by few of my close friends Saurabh, Jogi, Vishnu, Padmini, Manoj, Deepa, appreciation from Kranti Mam, Anantha Sir and lovely words from each one of you is the reason for the success of BT Wild Art. Keep motivating, keep blessing and keep advising me so as we can achieve many more milestones. 

The Recap

As we started the journey with Conservation of wildlife after one year we should recap the learning so as we give some importance to the wilderness from our busy schedule. 

Clean and pollution free world is only possible if we conserve our Mother Nature 

Save our wetlands from unwanted exploitation from industries

The important thing is that we need to understand how to make a balance between development and conservation. Both are equally important but due to commercial thought process we avoid rather ignore the importance of conservation and destroying it continuously, the impact of which is visible and it is high time that we realize and put strong efforts towards conserving and developing fruitful locations

I hope you will take every step to save our lovely land so as our next generation can stay in a pollution free environment. With this thought ending the blog and leaving you with some of the best clicks of BT Wild Art 

A Message of the Day 

After they disappear, will you then shed a tear? Save wildlife. Save life 

Author:

BT Wild Art
Life is Safari. Enjoy it.

The Photo Safari

Beautiful Bee-Eaters

Friends hope you are following your passion on weekend and enjoying the same to the fullest, if not trust me you are missing something. We have passion in our soul but we are not realizing and even if we know because of the busy life we are unable to optimize it. Take out one day, run away from city life and try to follow your passion, it may be tracking, music, nature, photography, wildlife, singing or blogging anything, just spent a day with it and see the difference in you. Best of luck for the trail, I am sure you will feel refreshing.

So now let me come back to the topic for the day, from past few weeks we have been reading trip reports that offered me the best opportunities for photography as well as topics for my readers. Therefore, from these trips let me pull out a beautiful bird, which is none other than Bee Eaters. A lovely little bird with superb color combinations, so let us meet Green Bee-Eater here in the next section.

The Go Green Bird

Part of Bee-eater family also known as little green bee-eater is mainly insect eater bird majorly found in grassland, thin scrub and forest often quite far from water. Like other bee-eaters, this species is a richly colored, slender bird. It is about 9 inches (16–18 cm) long with about 2 inches made up by the elongated central tail-feathers. The color and pattern make this bird beautiful and photogenic, let me help you with a description so as you will get the idea. The entire plumage is bright green and tinged with blue especially on the chin and throat. The crown and upper back are tinged with golden rufous. The flight feathers are rufous washed with green and tipped with blackish, plus as a final touch a fine black line runs in front of and behind the eye gives the complete look and attractive for the frames.

Along with color pattern, the nature of the bird is such that all photographers get attracted towards it to make memorable frames. I have seen award-winning pictures of Bee-Eater on social media. Even I have experienced such a unique behavior of the bird in the wilderness. The habit is such that it will never sit at one place for a long time and will keep jumping here and there to catch insects or honeybee. While doing this activity if you are lucky and you have control over your gadgets well, you will turn truly a winner in this. So next time when you are on a trip ensure you get some lovely moments with you with this bird. Now, let us see some interesting facts of little champ.

The facts file 

This elegant bird usually hunts low to the ground, making short swoops before returning to their perch. They sometimes perch on the backs of cattle or grazing antelope and make sallies into vegetation close to the ground to catch insects

Green bee-eaters "disarm" dangerous prey by removing the stinger and eliminating the venom by means of hitting and rubbing a bee against a branch

Green bee-eaters are insectivorous; they eat bees, Hymenoptera, bugs, beetles, termites, moths, and many flies. They also eat butterflies, crickets, dragonflies, caterpillars, and spiders

The Green bee-eater has a distinguishing predator-avoidance behavior, in that, if a potential predator looks at the bird’s nest, the Green bee-eater will not enter it until the predator looks away. This remarkable behavior shows that the bird is aware of what the predator is looking at, but also suggests an awareness of a predator’s mental state. This ‘theory of mind’ awareness is typically only part of human behavior and several other primate species

There are 8 subspecies of green bee-eater that can be found in Africa and Asia. Green bee-eater inhabits arid woodlands, thicket, plantations, lakesides and open grasslands

Green bee-eater is a natural-born killer of bees. Even juvenile birds that have never encountered bees in their life know how to perform this procedure

Bee-eaters may be killed by raptors; rodents and snakes raid their nests, and they can carry various parasites

Isn’t it interesting that such a little bird is having unique qualities that can very well help you to create frames? Even it is pleasant for sighting the way it catches bees, I hope you enjoyed the blog so now visit the DSLR to complete the journey for this week

A Message of the Day 

After they disappear, will you then shed a tear? Save wildlife. Save life 

Author:

BT Wild Art

Life is Safari. Enjoy it.

Deadly DSLR