Birdwatching Saturday....



Sun in my fist..



Out of all the ways that I have planned my weekends , I never ever thought I will spend it like this. This Saturday for close to 4 hours from late afternoon to late evening, was spent watching birds from the balcony of my flat.

Although it also involved futile efforts to capture them on camera but at the end of it I could only manage some handful images.

The plot in front of my flat is empty and recent rains has created an artificial pond in it. So one fine morning I got up and started clicking it. Soon I went to get ready for office but then my dad called me saying look at the beautiful white birds that have come to that pond . Unfortunately I couldn't come as I was taking bath but yes I noticed there were many . So ever since I thought I will shoot them (with camera :) ) someday, hoping that the pond will remain for at least few weeks as monsoons have arrived but to our hard luck it has not rained yet here after that one heavy downpour.

So yesterday since it started getting little cloudy I sat at the balcony with cameras intact but neither it rained nor I could capture any. And it even became hotter at times with sun blazing in full glory.

But one thing I noticed which may or may not be because of that pond, my locality has variety of birds. I could spot birds of different size and color. In fact I did spot a white stoke like bird which even flew in front of my balcony and I did click my Analog SLR when it flew past but I will know the results only when I will develop the roll.

It was so much fun to see them glide, take of , perch and flutter their wings so rapidly while landing.

It was so difficult to click them when they glide or fly past you as they are so fast. I really need to learn how to do that as it really looks quite beautiful.

Sharing the few I could click. Incidentally these are of the birds who came and sat on my balcony rather the one which flew past which I intended to click.

The first up is crow which perched on the tree in front of my house. It sat there so lazily that it made me wish I was crow :) . He even noticed that I was clicking him but with full attitude he lazily ignored.






This Sparrow came and sat on my balcony. According to facts about sparrows, Male sparrows have reddish back and black bib while female sparrows have brown back with eye stripes. So since it had brown back so it must be female.





Next came a Mynah which had a leave caught in her beaks. Common Myna or Mynah is an insect eating bird which was introduced into Australia, New Zealand etc from its native place India for controlling the pests which were destroying the crops over there.

As the evening set, the sun became less bright and hence a beautiful subject for photography.

As it was little cloudy so the sun was playing hide n seek and thus presented various different situations for capturing.

The topmost pick "Sun in my fist" was a silhouette , i.e. a picture where the bright background darkens the subject in front.

When the sun went behind the clouds , the rays presented a beautiful background illuminations for the clouds.

One interesting thing about capturing sun which I experimented with is that you have to underexpose the picture otherwise the sun is so bright that all you will get is big bright patch of yellow and the circular outline of sun will never be captured. 



Another interesting thing that happened this Saturday was after a long time I slept at 10:30 in the night. Ever since college , Saturday always used to be staying up till late night and dozing off only when you felt like sleeping but this Saturday I just felt sleepy while reading and just fell asleep.