• The recent reports of Indian grey hornbill sightings from Chennai — by Geetha Jaikumar at Theosophical Society and AM Aravind at Akkarai — have an identical sub-text running through them, one marked by persistent and belligerent “caws”. It reveals the prospects for the Indian grey hornbill in urban spaces that are both hugely arboreal and heavily populated.
  • In the 20 minutes that Aravind lingered at Akkarai and watched an Indian grey hornbill, which was largely perched on coconut trees, he noted how ferociously the greynecked ( corvus splendens ) — the honourable house crow — guarded its territory by heckling the hapless Indian grey hornbill. “The crows were constantly mobbing the Indian grey hornbill, some of them even dive-bombing the bird. Unable to take it, the hornbill flew further south, beyond Akkarai,” remarks Aravind, adding that the bird only returned within a few quick minutes, as it was driven by another set of unhappy house crows.
  • In the tail-end of the video that Geetha took of the pair of Indian grey hornbills, one notices the birds’ bonding session on a broken coconut tree at Theosophical Society being brought to rude end by a murder of crows.
  • Being man’s commensal, crows would be found in plentiful numbers in places marked by dense human populations. A bird species that is trying to expand its range into urban settings is likely to be up against the uproar of the Indian grey neck.
  • With a heavy concentration of tall trees, many of them fruit-bearing, and less-disturbed in many parts, the Theosophical Society gardens may just be the right space for the Indian grey hornbill to start building its numbers within the metro.
  • (‘Uncommon Resident’ discusses birds found in Chennai and surrouding districts as residents but are not commonly seen)