Recent Records of Yellow eyed Pigeon Columba Eversmanni in Rajasthan

2007·1.2 MB·

by  Harkirat Singh Sangha

MISCELLANEOUS NOTES
BlackbuckSanctuary overaperiod ofone century, andalso ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
its impacton different wild animals. Regularmonitoring of
the bird in a large spatial area is required, and also the WethanktheChiefWildlifeWardenandtheofficialsof
monitoringofthehabitat,toknowmoreaboutthepopulation theKarnatakaForestDepartmentforpermissiontocarryout
trend. this study and for assistance in the field.
REFERENCES
Au,S.&A.R.Rahmani(1983):Studyofecologyofcertainendangered Neginhal, S.G. (1980): Status and distribution of the Great Indian
speciesofwildlifeandtheirhabitats:TheGreatIndianBustard. Bustard in Karnataka. Pp. 76-80. In: (Eds: Goriup. P.D. and
Annual report 1981-1982, Bombay Natural History Society, H. Vardhan)Bustards in decline. Tourism andWildlife Society
Mumbai. ofIndia,Jaipur.
Bhat, H..G.K. Karthik, R. Hasbhavi&A.K. Varma (2005): Statusof Neginhal, S.G. (1997):ABustardsnestatRanibennur.Newslettersfor
Great Indian Bustard (Ardeotis nigriceps) at Ranibennur Birdwatchers37: 2.
Blackbuck Sanctuary. Pp. 12-14. In: (Eds: Verghese, A., Neginhal, S.G. (2005): Rehabilitating the Great Indian Bustard at the
S. Sridhar, A.K. Chakravarthy, H. Bhat and P. Karanth) Ranibennur Sanctuary. Pp. 12-14. In: (Eds: Verghese, A.,
New Initiatives for Bird Conservation. Navbharath Press, S. Sridhar, A.K. Chakravarthy. H. Bhat and P. Karanth) New
Bangalore. initiatives forbird conservation. Navbharath Press, Bangalore.
Ghorpade,D.B.(1996):BustardsinHagedal.NewsletterforBirdwatchers Rahmani, A.R. & R. Manakadan (1990): The past and present
36(5): 96. distribution of the Great Indian Bustard Ardeotis nigriceps
Karanth, K.U. & M. Singh (1990): Dry-zone afforestation and its (Vigors) in India. J. BombayNat. Hist. Soc. 87: 175-194.
impacton blackbuck population.J. BombayNat. Hist. Soc. 87: Samad,A.(2006):GreatIndianBustardrediscoveredinBellarydistrict.
565-570. Mistnet 17(3): 15-16.
RECENT RECORDS OF YELLOW-EYED PIGEON COLUMBA EVERSMANNI
12.
IN RAJASTHAN1
HarkiratSingh Sangha2 and Shantanu Kumar3
'Accepted July 21, 2005
-B-27, Gautam Marg, Hanuman Nagar, Jaipur 302 021, Rajasthan, India. Email: [email protected]
'Firdaus Farm, Kalwar Road, Bye-pass Zone-C, Jaipur 302 012, Rajasthan, India.
TheYellow-eyedPigeonColumbaeversmanniisarare Farm,Jor-Bir,Bikaner(28°04'N,73°23'E)inthecoldmorning
winter/passagemigrantin the Indiansubcontinent. It breeds fromtwo-threeSalvadorapersicatrees.Thebirdswerequite
in Central Asia from the southern Aral sea south to north- concealedinthecanopy ofthetreesthattheyalmostmissed
eastIranandTien ShanMountainsandnorthernAfghanistan seeing them. The pigeons burst out of the trees when they
easttoLake Balkhashandfarwestern China, and winters in unknowingly drove theirjeep too close to them. Although
southern parts of its breeding range south to Pakistan and the pigeons rapidly flew away there was no mistaking their
north-westIndia(Gibbsetcil. 2001 ). diagnostic white rumps. After Hying about for one or two
The species is classified as vulnerable because it has minutes they settled on about fourSalvadorapersica trees.
declined rapidly in the past as a result of changing Again at Jor-Bir c. 100 birds were observed foraging
agricultural practices and hunting in its wintering grounds, onthegroundonDecember 18,2001.Theflockwasextremely
and possibly habitat loss in its breeding grounds (BirdLife waryandafterflyingawaysettledonthreeorfourSalvadora
International2000). persica trees. Once settled they were lost in the canopy of
HSS was fascinated by the species after reading an the trees; only those birds which perched on the tree tops
article in the Hornbill (Singh 1980). However, it was only werevisible.
after his visit to Harike in Punjab with Per Undeland (PU) Incidentally, R.G. Sonia, aseniorofficerofthe Forest
that he really started looking for the species in Rajasthan. DepartmentofRajasthan, presented asetofphotographs of
Incidentally, PU highlighted the presence oflarge flocks at thespeciestoHSS.WhilepostedatBikaner,hephotographed
Harike by writing about the species (Undeland 1997) and amixedflockofaboutten RockPigeonsColumbalivia and
,
reporting to the Oriental Bird Club (Crosby 1995; Robson fifteen Yellow-eyed Pigeons C. eversmanni at Jor-Bir on
1996, 1997). November 11, 1995 whentheycametodrinkwateratapool.
OnFebruary 17, 2001 while censusing vultures, HSS As an aside, this open area with scattered Salvadora
and Rishad Naoroji flushed c.70 birds at Camel Breeding persica, Prosopis cineraria and Zizyphus mauritiana has
212 J. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc., 104 (2), May-Aug 2007
MISCELLANEOUS NOTES
beenattractingvulturesinlargenumberssince 1998.Thearea 1999 and then during the first week of March. Most ofthe
is used by the municipality of Bikaner city for dumping timethey wereseenonaKadambaAnthocephaluscadamba
carcasses (mostly cattle). (Vibhu Prakash in litt. 2000). Incidentally, there is only one
SK met with the species nearRupawas, Pali in the first oldrecordofthespeciesfromBharatpur.Abdulali(1970)during
weekofFebruary, 1998.About 60 birdswereforagingon the athreedayvisittoBharatpurinOctober 1951 sawthespecies
groundandwhendisturbedtheyflewuponthetrees“not like “in pairs andpartiesof 15/20 inopen”
our pigeons (Columbo livia) but like buntings.” After the While posted atTonk, HSS was informed byAziz-ul-
disturbance was overthey came down again tothe ground to Haq ofthe erstwhile Tonk family that up to 1970s the birds
feed. weresporadicallyshotduringwintermonthsinTonkdistrict.
On April 23, 1998 between 1 100-1500 hours, at the The species was so well recognized that it also had a local
borderoutpostofKheruwala,Ganganagar, SKcountedc. 100 name. The local shikaris used to call itpitkula.
birds on the “border lighting posts ofthe fence” spreadover
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
an areaofseveral kilometres in groups offourorfive.
There are two more recent records from Rajasthan. A
local shikari saw “c. 60 salara” (Colombo eversmanni) in In response to request from HSS the following were
January2003ontheGangCanalnearSriGanganagar(Gurdip helpful. S. Subramanya supplied the published references.
Singhpers.comm.).Threebirdswereseen inthe KadamKunj R.G. Soni, Vibhu Prakash, Gurdip Singh and Aziz-ul-Haq
areaofKeoladeoNational Park, BharatpurfirstonJanuary4, supplied their unpublished data.
REFERENCES
Abdulali, H. (1970): Notes on Indian birds 12. Extension 23: 50, 24: 60.
of the southern limits of the eastern stock dove (Columba Robson,C. (1997): Fromthe field: India. OrientalBirdClubBull. 25:
eversmanni Bonaparte). ./. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc. 67(2): 63-64.
331. Gibbs,D.,E. Barnes&J. Cox(2001): PigeonsandDoves: AGuideto
BirdLife International (2000): Threatened Birds of the World. the Pigeons and Doves of the World. Pica Press, Mountfield,
Barcelona and Cambridge, U.K.: Lynx Editions and BirdLife U.K. pp. 184-185.
International. Pp. 205. Singh, M. (1980): The mystery of the Salara pigeon. Hornbill (3):
Crosby, M. (1995): From the field: India. Oriental Bird Club Bull. 14-18.
21: 70. Undeland, P. (1997): Yellow-eyed stock Doves at Harike, India.
Robson, C. (1996): From the field: India. Oriental Bird Club Bull. Birding World 10: 260.
ON THE SIGHTING OF THE LESSER COUCAL CENTROPUS BENGALENSIS
13.
IN THE ANDAMAN & NICOBAR ISLANDS'
Manish Chandi-
'Accepted April 26, 2005
:Centre for Herpetology, Madras Crocodile Bank Trust, Post Bag 4, Mamallapuram 603 104, Tamil Nadu, India.
Email: [email protected]. [email protected]
DuringarecentbirdwatchingprogramintheAndaman not possible within the short span of observation and also
IslandsaCoucalthatfittedthedescriptionoftheLesserCoucal due to the heavybrushoftheroadside where ithadperched.
Centropus bengalensis a previously unrecorded species in TheonlyspeciesofCentropusthathavebeenrecorded
,
the Islands, was observed on April 5, 2004 close to No. 6 at from the Andaman & Nicobar Islands include the endemic
Havelock Island. The bird was subsequently re-sighted the Andaman Coucal Centropusandamanensis(Grimmett etal.
next day very briefly early in the morning. The bird that we 1999), and sightings of a coucal species on Great Nicobar
sighted was smaller than the common Andaman Coucal Island(Sivakumar2000),whichwaspossiblytheLesserCoucal
Centropusandamanensis, andtheGreaterCoucal Centropus (R.Sankaranpers.comm.).OnasubsequentfieldvisitinMay
sinensisfoundcommonlyacrossIndia. Itwasblackexceptfor 2004toLittleAndamanIsland,abirdthesizeoftheAndaman
deeprustybrown/chestnutwings,withaburstofflight,typical Coucal, but of the coloration of the mainland coucal, was
of coucals observed as it crossed the road. It allowed us to spotted in the beach forest of South Bay (Totibue), Little
stop and confirm our sighting, however, a photograph was AndamanIsland.
J. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc., 104 (2), May-Aug 2007 213