Nehru Zoological Park
Last Sunday we had a wonderful walk organized by Deccan Birders at Nehru Zoological Park. It was a decent sized gathering with about 50 people including around 10 kids for this bird walk. DB had taken special permissions from the FD to accommodate this walk which started at 6 am.
We entered the Zoo with full energy and enthusiasm and were immediately greeted with few Rose ringed Parakeets, crows and Babblers. The kids were overjoyed and showing each other every bird that they saw. The sun was still very easy on us and we proceeded to walk a little further down the road towards the butterfly park (which was closed as it still was not business time). We saw some egrets, sunbirds & Scaly breasted munias flocking around the flowers and giving some poses for the few photographers in the group. A lot of us were Binocular birdwatchers and less of Twitchers.
By around 7:30 am the sun started shining a little more brightly and we were running around to fill our water bottles with some cold water. Zoo was well prepared for such situations and had drinking water facilities every 100 meters. There were both paid and free drinking water availability which is good. A little further down and we were greeted with a bunch of Spotted deer , emus grazing and running around. We also got to see some kingfishers and black kites in the same area. Eventually after the long walk , we reached the Safari zone. Unfortunately that was still not open and the kids were drained out of energy too. We started our return walk and that is when we noticed a fight between two Barbets. One of them seemed to be injured and eventually settled down on the ground fully exhausted and no longer moving. we were a little skeptical about it, but still approached the bird with caution. We poured some water on it , hoping to cool it down and give it time to recoup. It took about 15 mins and then flew and sat on the fence. We felt happy and it also gave some time and poses for the photographers.
By 8:30 am the Zoo had officially opened for the general public and we saw the crowd size slowly and steadily increasing in the area. It was also getting hot with the soaring sun and kids were drained off their energy as they have been walking since 6 am now. We all started our walk back to the main gate with few good pictures and a lot of memories to take back home.
