The kid who identified Golden Oriole

Golden Oriole is a spectacular looking bird, bright yellow with a jet black wing and tail, and a blood red beak. Add to it a flute like musical note. Makes it a must watch bird. It is a migratory bird found mostly in Europe and west Asia migrating to Indian subcontinent during winter. To spot this bird is a rare occasion; also consider that it is a shy and secretive in its habit keeping itself quite busy in high canopies, making it very difficult to locate. It was for this very reason that I was pleasantly surprised when a 7 year old kid was not only able to spot but identify this bird for the group of birdwatchers-some of them quite seasoned veterans. It was an amazing experience.

It happened last month when this blogger was with group of birdwatchers at Lal bagh, they meet once a month in here. I had spent some time with this group last year too around this time. It is a motley collection of forty odd people ranging from tremendously excited kids (some even toddlers) to elderly. They gather at about 7:30am at the glass house and venture around for six to seven hours, in the meantime new people join, some form subgroups and so on. It is when someone spot a rare bird that the group recongregate with flurry of action pointing their binoculars and camera, while others try to guide still confused to the exact location “no no not there..you see that branch…no no the one on the left ten o clock angle..see that. Can you?” and so on. Some end up really frustrated not able to locate, in the meantime the bird has flown to another branch!!. It is at this particular juncture a veteran would elucidate his knowledge about the bird to anyone ready to listen with anecdotes (most avid birdwatchers I have found to be compulsive conversationists when meeting their kind). There was a commotion when this kid started running around yelling “oriole, golden oriole”. People rushed around trying locate the elusive bird. Having spent sometime with the bird (some even calling it ‘watch of the year’) their attention turn to the boy, he became cynosure few try to pull his cheeks which he dealt quite deftly. I found myself talking to his father who claimed to be completely ignorant about birds and comes to these walks only because of his son and then he said “offcourse his grandfather is interested in birds and has many books”. Aha so that explains it. In the meantime the kid had vanished and the harassed father spend next precious minutes trying to locate him.

At that kid’s age my intentions towards birds were diabolical to say the least. We kids had gulel (catapult) to bring down birds or beehives. I took up bird watching more than a decade back when I had escaped to Bharatpur bird sanctuary from Diwali noise and pollution of Delhi. Here I met some foreigners and found myself listening about birds and more birds, they invited me to their hotel and over drinks discussed more about birds. They were Europeans who traveled around the world cataloguing birds. They had some sophisticated cameras too. It was spectacular world for me, and henceforth I too got hooked to birds, next 6-7 years I was regular at bird sanctuaries. Woodcock’s Birds of India is best way to start. Now off course there is so much in the Net. Bird watching needs lots of patience. And yes groups are big no to bird sanctuary, respect the birds be silent, you are only a guest. No plastics. No littering.

Post script: oriole name comes from Latin aureolus meaning golden. In Hindi it is referred to as peelak (from peela-yellow). I have posted the photo I took, it has not come all that well, I need a long distance lens…will take sometime to buy and start a new blog on birds. In the meantime I have taken the photo from the net.