A rare sighting of the small, attractive Daurian Starling was recorded in the city on Saturday near the Adyar Estuary. A.M. Aravind, a brand consultant and birder from Chennai , said that he was delighted at having spotted the bird, with its distinctive shiny green-edged wings.
“The Daurian Starling falls in the vagrant category since the bird generally doesn’t reside in India nor does it migrate to the country. When I initially spotted the bird, I thought that it could be a Rosy Starling but after leafing through the guidebook for most of us birders — Birds Of The Indian Subcontinent, I chanced upon the bird in the ‘vagrants’ section in the appendix of the book,” said Mr. Aravind, who has been an avid birder for nearly a decade now.
Waiting to spot birds near the back entrance of the Theosophical society, he had caught sight of the Daurian Starling. “Migrant shore birds generally come to the Adyar Estuary and a number of these birds can be found in that area now. I had gone there hoping to spot these birds but was thrilled as I chanced upon the Starling,” he added.
The breeding range of the bird is generally around East Mongolia, South East Russia, North East and Central China as well as North Korea. “During winter, it migrates to South East Asia and can be spotted in Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and parts of Indonesia,” Mr. Aravind said.
Stating that the sighting of the bird in Chennai is an extremely rare one, he said that the last known sightings of the bird in the Indian mainland were in recorded in Kerala in 2015 and in Valparai in 2008. “However, there have been sightings of the bird recorded previously, in the Andamans,” he explained.
He claims he registered the sighting with e-bird, an online tool, and checked, and confirmed with the moderators of the portal that it indeed was a rare occurrence.
