Wildbuzz | A merriment in the mulberries

March and April toss up a feast of flowers and fruits for creatures. The mulberry or ‘Shahtoot’ tree attracts birds for a fleeting period. Watching a tree speckled in raspberry red and dark purple mulberries is a delightful pastime as the winged gourmets nibble away in abandon and squabble for shares.

The resident rose-ringed parakeet is quite silent when gobbling mulberries. The flexible ‘tota’ effects various caterpillar-like manoeuvres in the leafy branches to get to an alluring mulberry. Birds in passage migration to the higher reaches for summer breeding also afford a glimpse. A lucky bird-watcher can chance upon the merriment of flocks of passing spot-winged starlings as it is not a very common bird of the cities.

The starling is one that nature has blessed with an elfin charm. The male in breeding plumage is endowed with a reddish-chestnut throat and a pale rusty-orange chest. The female more subdued in colouration, though both possess white to lemon-yellow irises, which are captivating. Their curving bills suggest an equipment for reaching nectar in flowers of convoluted shapes and tubular stores.

While feeding on mulberries, the starling can joyously hang from a tender branch swaying in the wind and pick at fruit, a vignette that evokes comparison to children enjoying a ‘jhoola’ strung from a tree while feeding on candy. Starlings make most of the mulberry bounty because soon enough they will get down to the arduous and selfless tasks of nesting and parenting in the vistas of sylvan mountains.

However, for all its magnetism to the human eye, the starling is quite a bully while feeding, adopting “dog-in-the-manger” tactics to keep off other birds even when itself is satiated. And some more to the starling enigma, as Dr Salim Ali put it: a flock is prone to suddenly plunge off a tree and whirl around it at lightning speed as if an invisible devil were in pursuit, before alighting and feeding complacently as if nothing at all had happened!

An owl in the fire of flowers

The Flame of the Forest or Palash tree is currently ablaze and attracts birds seeking nectar. Langurs are known to feed on its petals while lesser-seen creatures in the guise of ants and insects crawl all over the crooked trunks and branches. Another set of creatures, --- the birds of prey --- utilise the tree as a vantage point. The avian hunters seek not Palash petals but the small birds attracted to them.

Kestrels, buzzards, eagles and other raptors perch on Palash trees. But of all these, the enigmatic spectacle is of a powerful Indian eagle owl on a Palash tree in broad daylight. The colour of this owl’s irises are a bright orange-yellow or a reddish orange and they harmonise with the raging petals. The owl sports two erect, blackish horns or ear-tufts that enhance its imposing aura.

The other bird whose body parts match the petals is the rose-ringed parakeet. The coral-red, ‘swollenish’ beak of the ‘tota’ imitates the Palash petal’s curvature and it works deftly among the flowers. The ‘tota’ is depicted as the ‘vahana’ (carrier) in mythology of Kamadeva, the god of love, and his consort, Rati Devi.

This large owl is not a strictly nocturnal hunter. It is sometimes seen sitting on the ground during daytime or perched on a cliffside or rocky outcrop before sunset and after dawn. The coloured eyes suggest this trait of the owl unlike other owl species, whose eyes are dark and they sally forth for hunts only in the night.

The owl is associated in culture with omens, superstitions and folklore. Subject to persecution by holders of such irrational beliefs, owls are captured, cut up and sacrificed during Laxmi puja rituals. The irony is that the owl feeds on rodents and renders a silent, unsung service to humanity.

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