K. Ravindran, an avid bird watcher and president of Nature Society of Tirupur, and Gaja Mohan Raj, an independent birder, have spotted Whimbrel, a migratory bird species, at an agriculture field during birding trips carried out in Tirupur and Coimbatore districts on Sunday and Monday.
“Being primarily a coastal bird wading in shallow waters, it is for the first time on record that the said species was spotted in the entire western region of Tamil Nadu.
Whimbrel, which usually breeds in Northern America and Europe, travels to Australia, New Zealand, South America and Africa once the winter starts in North America and Europe”, K. Ravindran told The Hindu .
Waterbodies
Mr. Ravindran, along with other birders in Nature Society of Tirupur who were recording the arrivals of various migratory bird species around water bodies in Tirupur and its hinterland for the past many years, was of the opinion that the solitary Whimbrel spotted could have stopped on a transit en route to coastal sides of South Asian and Australian belts.
The Society members with help of experts plan to monitor the western regions of Tamil Nadu for the next few weeks to see whether more numbers of Whimbrel would be congregating in flocks here to feed and rejuvenate before heading to their destinations in Australian side.
“All these data on the migration journey of Whimbrel are going to be fed into the data base which the Society has developed”, said Mr. Ravindran.
