Migratory birds create riot of colour as they keep tryst with Kashmir wetlands

Srinagar, Dec 7: The evening cackle in the sky as a large flock of migratory birds start descending on the water surface announces the fact that these avian visitors are keeping their annual tryst with Kashmir Valley.

The kaleidoscopic view on the water surface inside the Hokersar bird reserve on the outskirts of Srinagar city proves beyond doubt that nature is the greatest painter of them all.

Teals, Mallards, Coots, Wigeons, shovelers, Brahminy ducks, Pochards, Pintails, Tufted ducks, Shelducks and the Greylag geese are the major species of migratory birds that come to the Valley from Russian Siberia, China, Japan, Eastern Europe and the Philippines.

These visitors come to spend the winter months in the rather sanguine environs of the Kashmir winter to ward off the extreme cold of their summer homes.

Regional wildlife warden, Tawheed Ahmad Deva told IANS that although the migratory bird arrivals are still not very large because of the long dry spell, as the winter season brings rain and snow in the common days, the bird arrivals will improve in the next 10 to 20 days.

“Say for example, if we expected 100 bird species till now, we have around 60 of them in our wetlands at the moment. This is definitely going to improve as rain and snow occurs in the days ahead”, the wildlife warden said.

Last year, official data said the Valley hosted 8 to 12 lakh migratory birds while in 2021-2022, the number was 11 to 12 lakh.

In addition to the migratory birds that make Kashmir’s wetlands their winter home, certain species of migratory birds called ‘birds of passage’ spend some time in early winter and late spring in the Valley before moving to and out of the Indian plains.

These are the Sandhill cranes and Cormorants that spend just a few weeks in the Valley while on their way to and back from the Indian plains.

The first to arrive are the Coots and the Teals while the Greylag geese come towards the first week of December.

The famous migratory bird reserves of Kashmir are Hokersar, Chatlam, Shallabugh and Hygam while a large number of migratory birds also home in the Wular Lake, Dal Lake and other water bodies in the Valley.

Bird poaching has been a major threat that the wildlife protection department faces.

“We have control rooms to supervise these bird reserves and to ensure that poaching is prevented. Migratory birds are not only our guests that impart beauty and majesty to the local environment, but these are also pointers to the health and well-being of our ecology,” said the wildlife warden.

It is a magnificent sight to watch the migratory birds fly high in the sky with the eldest of the flock leading the way. If the eldest of the flock falls sick or dies, it is the next in the hierarchy that takes over.

“Instinct guides these birds to negotiate thousands of miles with arithmetical precision. The flight to winter homes is so tough and challenging that a bird loses more than half of its body weight while flying from the summer home to its winter home,” said another wildlife protection officer.

It is a well-known tradition in Kashmir for elders to tell tales of the migratory birds to their children and grandchildren.

During long winter nights, the children in remote villages of Kashmir gather around parents and grandparents to listen to these ‘Duck tales’.

It is hoped that the legacy of the migratory bird stories continues from generation to generation to create awareness about the health of the local water bodies and its bearing on the lives of humankind.