A team of birders from the Coastal Karnataka Bird Watchers’ Group sighted 87 species of birds during the bird census conducted by them at the Durga Reserve Forest, about four kilometers from Karkala, on Sunday.
The team of birders was divided into five groups each containing five members. They started the census around 6.30 a.m. and concluded it at around 1 p.m. Birders from Mysore, Manipal, Udupi, Mangalore, Kudremukh and Sringeri participated in the exercise. The members of the group conducted the bird census in the periphery of the Durga Reserve Forest.
“Our group also sighted Sri Lankan Frogmouth and Malabar Trogon, which are rarely seen,” said a beaming M. Shivashankar, coordinator of the group. The members of the group had been individually birding in the Durga Reserve Forest for the last eight to 10 years.
“But this is the first time we entered the forest in five groups in five different locations. Since different groups were covering the periphery of the Durga forest, we got a view of all the birds found in a given time-frame. Many of the endemic birds of the Western Ghats can be seen in a good number in Durga Reserve Forest,” Mr. Shivashankar said. The group has plans to conduct bird census every two months.
