There are many birds found in
cities. They range from seed eaters to fruit eaters, insect eaters to bird
eaters, rodent eaters to fish eaters. But the most common and my personal
favorite for observations is a small bird called the Shikra.
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| glum looking shikra |
The Shikra (Accipiter badius)
is a small raptor (or bird of prey if you prefer) present in the concrete
jungles of the human world. It preys on a variety of animals and birds. Some of
the favorite preys are small birds like bulbuls, barbets, animals like
squirrels, and a large variety of insects ranging from flying termites to large
sized grasshoppers. An occasional young and inexperienced snake and an unlucky
gecko also add to the menu. It makes its nest is tall well shaded trees. Well,
enough of describing the bird, I have a story to tell about its life.
I love to see the day to day
behavior of these birds, for they never cease to amaze me! One might think of
them as just “birds” or “bird brains” and something of lesser intelligence to
us humans. But some of the things birds are capable of, just leaves you
dumbfounded when you are a witness to the incident.
There is one incident that sits
vivid in my mind. I was on my terrace one beautiful morning, photographing
flowers from an African tulip tree (Spathodea campanulata) when a pair
of shikras’ came and sat quite close by. They seemed to be in an argument, for
they did not stop calling and screaming for the next ten minutes. Soon after
the male, very typically, left the place and flew far away. The female shikra I
guess was in a foul mood and she sat on the branch like a feather ball with a glum
look on the face. Little did the shikra
and I know that the branch she was sitting on was the top part of a White
cheeked Barbet’s (Megalaima viridis) nest.
Barbets (Megalaima spps)
make their nests in dead branches of trees. Some face the entrance facing the
ground, some prefer it vertical. The White cheeked Barbet usually makes the
nest vertical. They excavate by removing parts of the dead branch with their
beaks and creating a hollow inside. The reason they choose the dead branch is
that the wood is soft and can be easily removed by scraping it off with the
beak. Their beaks, by the way, are not hard like the woodpecker’s to chisel, so
they choose softer wood and “chew” through.
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| Shikra sitting right above the nest |
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| Barbet peeking out of the nest |
Well, here is where the actual
story begins. The shikra is sitting on the top and the barbet nest entrance is
below. A barbet peeps out to see whether the noisy couple has dispersed. The
shikra sees this and with wings open just parachutes down on the barbet’s neck.
Just as it lands on the neck, the barbet pulls in, into the hole. Now imagine
this situation, the nest is on a dead branch which is vertical, the shikra has
caught the barbet and is not willing to let go, but, it has no foot hold! The
barbet on the other hand, has the talons digging into its neck, in the very
comfort of its own nest! Awkward situation, where the predator and the prey
both are equally at advantage and disadvantage AND both not willing to let go
as there the stakes are high! For one- its life and home, for the other – first
meal of the day ready on a platter but not able to get it out.
So… here I was standing and
watching from the terrace, a spellbinding spectacle, the barbet pulling in and
the shikra with one leg in the hole pulling out. This drama was, however, cut
short. Before the natural fate of the struggle could be seen or predicted, it
came to an end with a bunch of keys hitting the already surprised shikra on the
neck. The next moment saw the shikra on a nearby branch and the barbet on the
cemented sidewalk, both shaken a little after the incident, one looking down
and the other looking up, wondering what in the world had just happened!!
The shikra, gaining its senses
back quickly dove at the barbet (which was now a sitting duck). This time it
went for the kill like there was no tomorrow, just to be hit again in the face
by a bunch of keys. This time completely bewildered and mightily pissed at the
invisible assaulter it decided to cut the chase a bit short and flew away. The barbet’s
side of the story however came to realize soon after. This barbet was a young
one! Though it had all the feathers and had grown well without any physical
defects, it had not yet mastered the art of flight.
By the time this drama was cut
short by my trigger happy uncle throwing a bunch of keys in the air to
discourage the shikra (or that’s what he “meant” to do) I was down on the
ground floor. At first he thought the barbet was injured due to the fall and
thus could not fly. But after checking for injuries, (while giving an
explanation to uncle as to how he had disrupted the natural order of hunter and
the hunted) I came to the conclusion that it was a fully fledged, yet young,
Barbet who did not know how to fly.
The poor barbet was put into a
box and a couple of friends who work with the animal rescue team came and
assessed the situation. All of us wanted the barbet to go back in the nest, but
the branch was dead, which means it could snap and fall with a little extra
push by a human. Thus, it was decided with a little disappointment that the
barbet be sent to the rescue centre.
Thus ended the shikra and barbet
drama.
Oh! By the way, my uncle’s reason
to distract the shikra and not actually hit it was he wanted to save the poor
barbet from being killed. I’m sure the shikra cursed my uncle at that point of
time (first the husband and now a human – one majorly pissed off female shikra!!)
because the keys he was throwing in the air got caught in a small branch. So, a
second rescue attempt was launched to retrieve the keys. After everything had
settled down, he must have said sorry to the barbet and I a thousand times over
and quietly slunk away.
Thus ended the uncle drama. He never
tried to “help” anymore without asking first.
Now the shikra has got chicks of
its own and so have the barbets. But neither came back to the same tree ever
again. They are around though… see them on a daily basis ! and thats another story !
