Just came back from a two week trip to India. Though it was primarily a social visit I did find some time to do birding around three locations where we stayed with our relatives. India occupy about 4% of world's landmass yet one finds about 16% of worlds bird population there. No wonder wherever you find a green space you will find a variety of birds. A square kilometer of walk around my ancestral village produced 22 different species of birds without making too much of any effort. At the end I found and photographed altogether 76 different kinds of birds - below is a small subset. Though I spent my first 25 years of life there I could only recognize perhaps 10 or so birds. The rest were all lifers to me. The province of West Bengal, where we went, extends from the foothill of the Himalayas to the mangrove forests of Sundarbans near the mouth of Bay of Bengal. Because of its diversity the province alone boasts about 900 species of birds. I didn't visit any well-known birding hotspots - that is left for another visit in the future. Enjoy. More can be found from the following album link :
https://www.flickr.com/photos/60250038@N02/sets/72157649832742599/1. Red-vented Bulbul
2. Blue-throated Barbet
3. Black Drongo getting a free ride
4.Rufous Treepie
5.White-throated Kingfisher
6.A green bee eater
7. Asian Koel (Female). Male is all black.
8. Purple-rumped Sunbird. There's no humming bird in India - these guys get all the nectar.
9. A jungle owlet
10. A River Lapwing
