We participated in the HSBC Bangalore Bird Race about which, hopefully, my article will appear in Citizen Matters….last year’s not-very serious piece is here ) ….

We took along another team with us, because they are even newer to birding than we are. And we taught them the right way to take part in the Bird Race…punctuate visits to birding spots with visits to various eateries to shore up the calorie count regularly! The team is under the impression that much of Bangalore birding takes place in Darshini restaurants, with the finale at the Royal Orchid!

Every team had to report the number of species that they had seen, and had to choose their “Bird Of The Day”. (The one that won it was Blue-Bearded Bee-Eater.) Since almost all our birds were the quite common ones (we are not far away from CKMP birding, that is, Crow-Kite-Mynah-Pigeon id’s) we were wondering what to choose, when, in Bannerghatta National Park area, my eye fell on this bird:

Aha!! How many teams could put down, “Bird of the Day: Bald Eagle–photographic proof available”? We were unique!

I rather think that the honourable judges choked over their coffee and on seeing our entry, and hurriedly thrust it into the discarded pile for fear it would taint other serious birders….

Did we win a prize at the Bangalore Bird Race? Ask Sandeep , whose blogpost I have referred to above. We got a total of 113 entries, of which the 13 part proved quite prophetic! I also have a sinking feeling that the Bald Eagle contributed a lot to our fate….the judges were not particularly “bald” over by our eagle…