Chennai's Dr. Dolittle

He has been bitten by mice, butted by goats and pecked at by birds but, despite it all, 80-year-old Annachi loves his menagerie

July 29, 2014 05:44 pm | Updated 05:44 pm IST - chennai

Annachi and his animals

Annachi and his animals

Everyone knows Annachi on this busy Padi road of nuts-and-bolts units. “Oh, the birdman,” smiles a mechanic pointing to a three-storeyed building. Past the machines and men buzzing on the ground floor, I climb flights of narrow stairs, and call. “Annachi!” A kind face appears. “Come up to the mottai maadi !” A few steps and I step into an incredible sight. It's a farmyard-on-the-roof — around me are thousands of fluttering birds in cages, scampering guinea pigs, large dogs, smug-looking goats, tiny fish in a tank, bees in hives: and 80-year-old Annachi, Chennai's Dr. Dolittle, sweeps the scene with a benign look. “I know each one of them by name,” he grins.

Yes, he always wanted to breed them — “the biggest and the smallest of all farm animals. I had a cow here, but had to give it up.” As a kid in Tuticorin, he kept bees and filled jars with honey, slept with a pet goat and drank its milk raw every morning. Once out of school, he ran a betel-leaf farm and bought a coconut grove. “Father owned several businesses. He died when I was 18, his wholesale timber store burned down, and we left the village for a better life.” He worked in brick industries owned by relatives, launched a cement works business, married, raised a brood of children; and through that hard life, always came home to his menagerie of pigeons, rabbits, cattle and goats. Good times and bad times, he shared his life with them.

Annachi, son Rajkumar (ph: 98843 91099) and son-in-law Vasanth (ph: 90804 71166), take me on a jaw-dropping tour of the terrace. I watch fan-tailed pigeons ( atta-pura ) strut, their purity certified by long feather-shoes, hood, continuous fantails; majestic king pigeons; white-eyed tumblers; a short-nosed, hooded, black Jack-Russian owl-pigeon with a spiral chest and shoe feathers. “Must have escaped from a breeder,” says Vasanth candidly.

Annachi picks up a homer and points to the rings around its leg. “These carrier pigeons are naturally GPS-enabled with magnetic-pole sensor,” says Rajkumar. Their ringed yellow-red eyes are studied by breeders for shrewdness in direction and flight distance.” Flying pigeons are star competitors and addiction to pigeon-flying is known to have ruined families. “Many believe pigeon-breeding is a bad omen,” Annachi states. No, he won't dream of racing his. He keeps his fancy birds and animals in well-defined enclosures, “to preserve the beauty of the breed.”

The ones that blow me over aren't the fan-tailed movie stars you saw in Mughal-e-Azam . I stand and stare at Sierra (a longish pigeon with a beautifully tanned body and a white streak running from throat to underbelly — its white-feather shoes are a fashion statement!), Muski that dances with its head thrown back and shivers like a diva, Lottan which whirls like a dervish when you shake its head, the large-bodied Badangar with red lids around its eyes, the small diamond-dove, Pouters ( oodhu-pura ) that stand upright on tall legs and puff up regally, the short-faced Satinette, Jacobeans whose feathers grow in reverse direction giving them a full look (“they have an awesome mating dance-and-song routine beating their wings”), Yakooth that calls “yakoo!”, Chandrakala (can be bred for its pretty brown-and-white striped body), seeni/sevella/konda pura...who knew pigeons came in so many colours, sizes, and had such fascinating characteristics? Finally, we reach the everyday pigeons and hey, I can identify them!

Royalty graces the chicken/duck coops too. I am introduced to the ball-shaped Silkey chicken that has black blood and meat, and feathers softer than human hair, the thick-necked, ferocious-looking Aseel-sandai kozhi of dagger-like-nail fame, trained to bring laurels to the owner, and Manila ducks with beautiful red rings round their eyes (the females can fly far). Annachi is proud of his fecund red-eyed white rats/mice that can polish off the barn, the white/black/brown guinea pigs without tails, love-birds of unimagined colours (“you can watch their love behaviour all day!”), milk-yielding Chennai goats (“Dad hasn't forgotten them”). The small sapota tree laden with hundreds of fruits completes the Land-of-Oz picture.

He has been bitten by mice, butted by goats, and pecked at by birds, but for Annachi they are “children's antics.” “My pets keep me happy. The factory downstairs gives me enough to take care of them.” He can be persuaded to sell one of a large brood. And if he takes a liking to you, he might gift you a pigeon/guinea pig/fish/white mouse. It's worth a try.

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