K B Srinivas: Birding at TG Halli Reservoir

Another weekend and another new destination planned for Birding. This time I wanted to go to some new place which was good for. watching Waders. So I decided to visit TG halli reservoir. I had heard it has good number of birds.

I did not know the route. Thanks to a fellow INW member who helped me with the route. Take a left at Magadi Road and and have to reach Naganalli. Its a water catchment area for the reservoir. I reached the place around 6AM. Its a beautiful lake which can be visited by a family for a picnic.

When I reached the place I could already see people fishing in the lake. There were few fishermen around. Apart from them no one in the vicinity. Lot of birds were flying around. Lot of storks, Openbills, ducks and Sandpipers.

After lot of crawling I could get some good shots of sandpipers and little ringed plovers. After sometime fishermen came to the shore with their catch. One Brahminy Kite was intelligent enough to wait for the right time to steal a fish. I got some good shots of the brahminy kite which was enjoying its steal:-)

After sometime I spotted another raptor and this time it was a "kestrel". My first sighting of this guy. Had to run around this who was giving me tough time for photographing. At the end I did manage to get some good shots of this guy. Then it was time for my first sighting of a Grey Bellied Drongo. I have seen Black Drongo and Ashy Drongo earlier. This fellow was good enough to give me couple of poses. But because of light constraint I could not get a good photo.

After taking some paces I saw some wagtails in the area. On closer inspection they turned out to be Yellow Wagtails(Corrected by bng_birds group member). The winter visiors for Bangalore. There were around 6 of them. While taking photographs of this a Oriental Skylark(Again corrected by bng_birds group member) was checking me out. I turned my attention to him and this guy gave me first good shot of a lark.

I saw a White Eyed Buzzard close by. This guy was very shy but I somehow managed to get a photo which could be used to ID the bird.

It was already 9AM and I was wondering how I haven't heard or seen a single lapwing. This is one bird which I see in every outing. And suddenly I heard a call. And by the time it was 10:30AM I could see atleast 20 Red wattled Lapwings in the area.

When I was photographing Sandpipers I saw another guy who was wagging is tail a lot. On closer inspection I Id'ed him as White wagtail. Another new sighting for me. I was very happy to see this guy. You can see White Browed Wagtail everywhere but seeing Yellow and White Wagtail on the same day was amazing result for a single day.

Hope to visit this place again sometime in Novemeber/December.

List of bird's found during the trip.

1. Black Ibis
2. Black Headed Ibis
3. Painted Stork
4. Asian Openbill Stork
5. Eurasian Spoonbil
6. Pond Heron
7. Grey Heron
8. White Browed Wagtail
9. Yellow Wagtail
10. White Wagtail(Amur Wagtail)
11. Rivern Tern
12. Black Kite
13. Brahminy Kite
14. Little Egret
15. Cattle Egret
16. Large Egret
17. Little Cormorant
18. Grey Bellied Drongo
19. Bushchat
20. Indian Robin
21. Green Bea Eater
22. Wire Tailed Swift
23. House Swift
24. Common Crow
25. Jungle Crow
26. Spot Billed Duck
27. Red Wattled Lapwing
28. Pippit
29. Oriental skylark
30. Common Myna
31. Common Sandpiper
32. Indian Roller
33. Zitting Cisticola
34. Lesser Whistling Duck
35. Common Kestrel
36. Little Ringed Plover
37. Red Rumped Swallow
38. Rufous Tailed Lark
39. White Eyed Buzzard
40. Green Sandpiper
41. Little Stint
42. Indian Spotted Eagle

Co-Ordinates to the place : 12.975453,77.347784