Woodpeckers And Waterhens

Three Black-rumped Flameback Woodpeckers,Dinopium benghalense, gave me quite a run around the neighborhood a  couple of days ago. I barely managed to make this crappy video showing two of them.




 Remember the Waterhen family I showed you last week? The chicks are apparently doing well. I saw them at the same spot today and took a couple of photos and made a short video. The parents are a  little less protective of the chicks now, allowing them to wonder on their own a little. 

 

That's about all the birds I've got about this week, as I had to compromise birding to have my family life intact!

A post for World Bird Wednesday.

Birding On The Go.......

Ahh, time for World Bird Wednesday! What kind of striking birds have you got this week, folks? Well, I've got a few! The highlight of this week is a family of White-breasted Waterhen  that I came across and videoed at a small pool near a paddy field on the way to work.  There were two adults looking after three chicks, so I assume both parents of this species take care of their offspring. The chicks are coal black so you need to look carefully to make them out in the video. I took two snaps of the adults too.

                                            White-breasted Waterhen, Amaurornis phoenicurus

The freshly planted paddy fields these days are hosting quite a large number of birds, and  I bagged Red-wattled Lapwing, and Indian Pond Heron.
                                                                 Red-wattled Lapwing, Vanellus indicus

 

Indian Pond Heron,Ardeola grayii

I photographed  a Common Kingfisher at the same spot where the Waterhens were, and another on a bank of the canal.
                                                           Common Kingfisher, Alcedo atthis

This  Cormorant( whetherLittle, Indian or Great I don't know) was by the canal too.

                                                       ? Cormorant

I saw quite a large, mixed, flock of Scaly-breasted and White-rumped Munias today near the canal too, but I only managed to capture  one Scaly-breasted Munia. 

                                       Scaly-breasted Munia, Lonchura punctulata

There was a couple of Rose-ringed Parakeets on a tree this morning by the road I use to reach our hospital, and one was very obliging.

Finally, a Purple-rumped Sunbird that I captured in a neighbor's garden. 

                                               Purple-rumped Sunbird ,Leptocoma zeylonica

A post for World Bird Wednesday.

A Shikra And Some Other Birds.........

Do you remember the bird I show you on last WBW, the one I said a Crested Serpent Eagle? Well, my identification was wrong, it was infact a Shikra. I was able to photograph another one this week. It makes two Shikras in two consecutive weeks!


                                                                                     Shikra, Accipiter badius

This White-breasted Drongo was right in front of our house.


                                                  White-breasted Drongo,Dicrurus caerulescens

Perched on the same wire was this very sympathetic White-throated Kingfisher.

                                                  White-throated Kingfisher, Halcyon smyrnensis

 

Time for another ID correction. What I showed you as an Ashy Prinia last week was really a Plain Prinia. Below is another photo of one. I'll show you an Ashy Prinia soon, both Ashy and Plain Prinia can be observed near paddy fields around here. Come back for more birds on next Wednesday.

                                                          Plain Prinia, Prinia inornata

The last bird I'm showing you this week is   this  White-breasted Waterhen hiding among paddy in a freshly planted field.

A post for World Bird Wednesday.

White-breasted Waterhen

This video is the result of weeks of waiting and observing one single spot near a paddy field in Kurunegala. On the route I've chosen to walk between my workplace and home is a big shallow hole close to a rice field that gets filled by the rain in the rainy season. That's where I saw an opportunity to have a go at a  White-breasted Waterhen(Amaurornis phoenicurus), locally known as Korawakka . But it was no easy task. These birds will remain in the open as long as I leave them alone, but dash in to hiding if I so much as  just look at them. But today in the morning I got lucky with one. Having made a couple of videos, I moved on for work. Although it was pretty hot and humid when m,y work was over, I decided to walk home with out taking a bus, hoping I'd be lucky again. And this time there were two of them. I couldn't get the two together in the video though. Like some scientific information of this bird?