Saturday, March 2, 2013

Birding at Bangalore Infosys Campus

We have been having regular nature walks in our Bangalore campus to list out the birds. As this was a winter we took time out of our regular work and went for walks. And we also kept an eye if there was any interesting sighting during other times. My other colleagues who are actively involved are

1. Ajit A
2. N Nagaraj
3. Srinivas Dhulipala
4. Raghavendra S N
5. Prashant M

Thanks to everyones(including few others from Infosys) effort we have identified around 52 bird species in our campus till now. Even today I found couple of new birds(Grey Bellied Cuckoo and Verditer Flycatcher) which were never reported till now.

We have huge roosting of Jungle Mynas and Common Mynas. Loud noises could be heard in the evenings everywhere. Even Rosy Starlings and Grey Headed Starlings roost in our campus during winters. They can be seen in 100's. There is a small roosting group of Night Herons, its a group of 5. Another roosting bird species is Red Whiskered Bulbuls. We rarely see Red Vented Bulbul in our campus.

With the onset of winter we can hear Warblers everywhere. We still haven't identified all the warbler species in our campus. We ourselves are still trying to learn.

The other common species of birds are White Browed Wagtails, Common Tailor Birds, White Cheeked Barbets, Prinias, Flowerpeckers, Black Kites, Rock Pigeons and Asian Koels. Most of these birds nest inside our campus and recently we have seen White Browed Wagtail getting their young ones and feeding them on the green lawns across the campus.

Today(Saturday) morning I went to campus since it would be comparitively less crowded. The idea was to photograph the common species birds for which we did not have good photographs but ended up spending time with birds which I were seen for the first time in our campus. The Blue-Capped Rock Thrush was identified by Ajit quite sometime back. I along with Srini and Raghu made lot of effort to see this fellow again but in vain. Only once we spotted him but it was too dark to identify any of its features.

Today the other new species which I spotted were Verditer Flycatcher and Grey-Bellied Cuckoo. I was looking at the Thrush and from no where the Verditer flycatcher flew acroos the thrush. I was very lucky to see him. I was lucky to spot Cuckoo too. It was hiding in big trees and when I was trying to spot Bulbuls I came across the Cuckoo. It was beautiful.


It's amazing to take a walk in the campus either in mornings or evenings and hear all these beautiful sounds.

We still believe there are many more bird species in our campus which needs to looked upon and document the same.

The amount of effort put in by the Infosys organisation to create such a great environment for employees to work is worth noting. The same can be said about other Infosys campus across India. Amazing commitment.

List of Birds seen in campus till now.

1. Purple Sunbird
2. Purple Rumped Sunbird
3. Loten's Sunbird
4. Common Myna
5. Jungle Myna
6. Common Crow
7. Jungle Crow
8. Rosy Starling
9. Grey Headed Starling
10. Rose Ringed Parakeet
11. Indian Robin
12. Pied Bushchat
13. Tickell's Flowerpecker
14. White Browed Wagtail
15. Grey Wagtail
16. Ashy Prinia
17. Common Tailorbird
18. Spotted Owl
19. Red Whiskered Bulbul
20. Red Vented Bulbul
21. Black Drongo
22. Ashy Drongo
23. Little Egret
24. White Breasted Waterhen
25. Indian Cormorant
26. Indian Roller
27. Asian Koel
28. Greater Coucal
29. Scaly Breasted Munia
30. Oriental White Eye
31. White Cheeked Barbet
32. Coppersmith Barbet
33. Golden Oriole
34. Great Tit
35. Rock Pigeon
36. Spotted Dove
37. Black Kite
38. Brahminy Kite
39. Shikra
40. Kestrel
41. Blyth's Reed Warbler
42. Greenish Leaf warbler
43. Scop's Owl
44. Indian Nightjar
45. Indian Pitta
46. Blue-Capped Rock Thrush
47. Verditer Flycatcher
48. Grey-Bellied Cuckoo
49. Barn Swallow
50. White Throated Kingfisher
51. Small Blue Kingfisher
52. Pond Heron
53. Night Heron
54. Tickell's Leaf Warbler
55. Cattle Egret

Grey Bellied Cuckoo

Id Please?

Purple Rumped Sunbird

Cormorant


Black Kite


Blue Capped Rock Thrush

Little Egret

Common Tailorbird

Loten's Sunbird


White Cheeked Barbet


Rose Ringed Parakeet


Verditer Flycatcher

Grey Drongo

ID Please?


White Browed Wagtail(Juvenile)




Tickell's Leaf Warbler

Red Whiskered Bulbul

Grey-Bellied Cuckoo

Rock Pigeon



3 comments:

  1. Good birding guys! I work out of the same campus and have seen many of these birds myself! I think it's time for me to reconsider a trip to the campus on a holiday for birding. Great shots, by the way!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I was just looking at this post and discovered the Blue Capped Rock Thrush... can't believe you saw it on the campus (and I had to go all the way to Devarayana Durga hills to find it!) Wish I could spot it too :)

    ReplyDelete