Wings on water , see the sea birds

It’s time to spot the winged beauties along Karnataka’s coast. The three-day bird festival, starting in Mangaluru on February 9, will give birders an opportunity to capture the rare avian species in b
M Shivshankar with his team during a sea bird watching session off Mangaluru coast
M Shivshankar with his team during a sea bird watching session off Mangaluru coast

MANGALURU: Come dance with the cranes and sing with the song birds. This could well be the slogan of Hakki Habba, beginning on Friday. The activity of birding in Karnataka has a history that dates back to a century. But sea birding is still to catch up even in Mangaluru, Udupi and Karwar despite a coastline of 300 km.

It was less than a decade ago that some bird watchers in the region ventured into the Arabian Sea off Mangaluru coast for the first time for birding. Since then, they have been doing it for at least thrice a year. But still, they feel that the activity can be well organised or carried out in a more scientific manner like in developed countries. In this backdrop, they are waiting in the wings to land in the Arabian Sea for the fourth edition of Hakki Habba scheduled in Mangaluru from February 9-11.

The bird watchers hope that the state event, besides popularising sea birding, will help birders expand their subject knowledge through interactions with experts and scientists in the field which ultimately help carry out sea birding in an organised manner. Due to lack of access to experts in the field to guide them, presently the enthusiasts mostly depend on materials available on the internet for directions and other aspects of sea birding.

M Shivshankar, Harish R Bhat, Vineet Kumar K and Karthik Bhat P, who carried out a study of pelagic birds along the Arabian Sea of Udupi and Mangaluru coasts in January 2016, said there is huge scope for birding in the pelagic zone of Karnataka Coast as records state the existence of over 28 species of birds in the region.

The survey carried out by them sighted 11 species of which 8 were pelagic birds like Brown headed gulls, Black headed gulls, Heuglins’s gull, Whiskered tern, Greater crested tern, Swinhoe’s storm petrels, Gul- billed tern, Arctic Skua and non-pelagic birds like Black kite, Brahminy kite, Western reef egret.
A pelagic bird spends a significant portion of its life on the open ocean, rarely venturing to land except to breed.

Shivshankar says pelagic birds are found 10-15 nautical miles deep into the sea and very rarely come to land. They are found on land during cyclones and heavy rains and not during normal situation. So, sea birding is really a great and rare experience. Shivshankar and some like-minded people who are professionals working in Dakshina Kananda, Udupi, Karwar and Bengaluru and others have formed a group called Coastal Karnataka Bird Watchers Network which regularly organises bird watching. During this Hakki Habba, the group members are expecting sighting of species like Arctic Skua, Pomarine Skua, Storm Petrel, Swinhoe’s storm petrel, Braggard tern and Mask Googy that are usually found during this season.

Prashant Krishna, the group member and an employee in a chemical industry at Suratkal, hopes that the Hakki Habba will help improve the knowledge of bird watchers. He said identifying some birds like Arctic Skua, Long Tailed Skua and Pomarine Skua is very difficult as they have minute differences in body and structure. Also, the bird watchers are eager to sight birds like Frigate that have never been sighted here in the recent times but sighted in Kasargod coast two years ago and Red Billed Tropic Bird that was sighted in Mangaluru Coast for the first time last year.

Unlike bird watching in forest, sea birding requires a lot of patience. But there are times when one gets to sight them in flocks of hundreds. During their last journey into the sea, Prashanth Krishna and his friends saw Bridled tern, a migratory specie. “Sighting of birds at one place indicates the availability of their rich food below,” says Prashanth Krishna.

HAKKI HABBA

 Inaugural function of Hakki Habba will be held at
Town Hall in Mangaluru at 11 am on February 9
 Forest and Environment Minister B Ramanath Rai will inaugurate the bird festival
45 persons who have enrolled for the event will go birding in the wetlands near Netravathi river, Mangalore University campus and Sasihitlu in three different groups on February 9 and 10, according to DCF K Karikalan.
On February 11, bird enthusiasts will go for pelagic birding in the sea from 6 am to 1 pm

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