The Allure of Little Birds
Birders may go through many phases in their birding life.
4 February 2022, 18:00 PM
Book Hounds
We are a perpetually curious group. Like members of secret societies of the Middle Ages, we quickly recognize each other.
7 January 2022, 18:00 PM
The Enigmatic Thick-knee
Whenever I hear “Thick-knee” I think of Majeda Haq, birder, conservationist and friend who left this world too soon in 2019.
31 December 2021, 18:00 PM
Good-looking Birds
We all have our notion of “good-looking” when it comes to people. This idea extends to other creatures.
24 December 2021, 18:00 PM
The Dining Room
One of my most memorable jobs was being waiter. My cousins in Chicago had invited me to spend the summer after college freshman year. Looking for summer work there, I responded to a newspaper advertisement and was hired after an interview. My title was Waiter at the restaurant of Metropolitan Club on the 67th floor of Chicago’s Sears (now Willis) Tower.
17 December 2021, 18:00 PM
Predators of Muhuri
Screaming loudly and wildly flapping their wings, the ducks abruptly took off from the water about two hundred feet from our boat.
10 December 2021, 18:00 PM
Red Munia
The Red Munia entered my childhood through a story about the Creator painting birds after creating them. However, one fidgety bird has flown off before being painted and returns just when He finishes. There are a few drops of paint remaining with which He splatters this bird. And so this exquisite bird was created with spots of white sprinkled on red.
3 December 2021, 18:00 PM
Primates of Bangladesh
On a summer morning several years ago I climbed up the watchtower in Satchori National Park looking for birds. In two hours I saw little.
26 November 2021, 18:00 PM
Rhino
Last week I wrote about the book African Silences by Peter Matthiessen recounting a series of trips he made in Africa in search of birds and wildlife. Along with other animals, the book taught me about the White Rhino.
17 April 2020, 18:00 PM
Re-Visiting Africa
Recently I started re-reading a book I first read three decades ago. African Silences chronicles writer/naturalist Peter Mathiessen’s travels through Africa during the 1970s and 1980s looking for rare birds and wildlife.
10 April 2020, 18:00 PM
Tree Shrew
It was a bright, sunny morning in early March. Reaching Satchori National Park, I discovered my guide Rahim had not arrived.
3 April 2020, 18:00 PM
Tangents: Red Junglefowl
The chicken is the most ubiquitous bird in the world. There are over 23 billion chickens in the world, providing nutrition to humanity. How did it come to be? It was domesticated from a wild bird, the Red Junglefowl, over five thousand years ago.
29 March 2020, 18:00 PM
Woodpeckers
Woodpeckers are specialized birds. They have unusual features and capabilities that work together to achieve one goal: to find insects that are hidden inside the bark of trees or other covered areas such as termite or ant hills.
20 March 2020, 18:00 PM
Egoless Photography
I vividly remember when I discovered photography. I was a third-year undergraduate engineering student in the United States when I
13 March 2020, 18:00 PM
At the Pond
In our age of multitasking, it is difficult – perhaps inconceivable to some - to sit still and silent for long. It goes against our notion of the times we live in. Yet, once in a while, we may find ourselves in a position of doing just that. How is that experience?
6 March 2020, 18:00 PM
Drongo
I was watching a flock of Cattle Egrets trailing behind cows grazing in the Haor’s swampy land. One of them – a juvenile lacking confidence – had caught a small fish in its beak.
28 February 2020, 18:00 PM
Bathing Beauties
Watching bathing birds is an unexpected but sublime delight. Depending on the bird, you can see them frolic in abandon, splash water around, puff up their chest before dipping, dive and pop out in a stream of water, create sprays of water by shaking their wings and make all kinds of faces while doing it.
21 February 2020, 18:00 PM
Secrets of Trees
Recently I started reading The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben, a German forester who spent several decades managing old trees in European forests. The book has many startling observations and claims: for example, trees communicate with each other, they raise alarms and work cooperatively, and they single out certain weak trees for special attention and care.
14 February 2020, 18:00 PM
Saving the Kalem
It happened just after we emerged from the bushes to face a small crescent-shaped lagoon. A thin layer of winter fog covered the shallow water.
7 February 2020, 18:00 PM
Nuthatch
In my eyes the Velvet-fronted Nuthatch is one of the prettiest birds of Bangladesh.
31 January 2020, 18:00 PM
Roosevelt in Brazil
During my 2018 trip to the Pantanal in Brazil I learned that Teddy Roosevelt had travelled there a century earlier. This piqued my curiosity and I decided to learn more about that trip.
17 January 2020, 18:00 PM
Dismal Days
I often write about rare or interesting birds (or wildlife) I have encountered. If you read my column you might think I find them on every trip or outing.
10 January 2020, 18:00 PM
Travelling Light
Recently I had a pleasant surprise when checking in for a flight at Dhaka airport. After I placed my suitcase on the weight scale, the ticketing agent looked at me, puzzled. “Sir, your luggage is so light that it is showing a negative weight.”
27 December 2019, 18:00 PM
Cats
The Felidae family, commonly known as cats, consists of 38 species of carnivorous mammals.
20 December 2019, 18:00 PM
Peregrine Falcon
I had been out since early morning cruising the Padma river and was returning to Rajshahi town. After turning a bend, I noticed an airborne black silhouette against the white sand of a char to my left.
13 December 2019, 18:00 PM
Cancun Once Again
In 1519 the Spaniard Hernan Cortes landed in Mexico. His band of adventurers defeated the Aztec king Montezuma, thus starting 300 years of Spanish rule. Before that, for hundreds of years, several native civilizations rose and fell in Mexico, and the nation proudly boasts that heritage wherever one looks.
6 December 2019, 18:00 PM
Owls
Owls occupy a special place among birds. Nocturnal creatures, they look distinctive because of their large heads and upright stance.
29 November 2019, 18:00 PM
Territorial Behaviour
During my trip to Brazil last year, I travelled on a boat that traversed the massive Paraguay river - in the wetland called Pantanal - looking for Jaguars.
22 November 2019, 18:00 PM