bedroom birds

Nature never ceases to amaze. In the thick of our concrete jungle, hemmed in by multistorey eyesores, one stumbles across birds which eke out a living amidst the sparse tree cover. Not just crows and pigeons, but some species which generally are forest dwellers. In a small fringe of trees outside my bedroom window, I spot several species of birds, and some rather serendipitously. I was reviewing my pics shot in February on my digicam, and what I had assumed to be the usual Eurasian Golden Oriole

turned out, on closer scrutiny, to be a Black-naped Oriole, a fairly uncommon find in Mumbai. I have, on occasion,
been misled in my attempts to discover a new species ( which desire resides below the surface in all birdwatchers, truth be told), and my excited mail to BNHS regarding a really unusual spotting of a new lorikeet variety, perhaps Loriculus subramaniamensis, received a rather banal reply: I has spied an African lovebird, a poor escaped caged avian much fancied by misguided bird-'lovers'. I despaired for its survival, what with Mumbai's antipathy towards 'outsiders', but was pleasantly surprised to spot the chap a few weeks later, now calling out in an unmistakable Mumbai accent. This truly is a city of opportunity, and it feels nice to know that once in a while, the initiative is seized, not by man, but by one of the other unsung disenfranch-ised denizens of our city. And in the same spirit, I welcome to my bedroom all those who are interested
( males needn't bother) in learning about the birds, and the bees if you may.
cheers,
Dr.Subramaniam