January Birding and Annual Waterbird Counts

Over the past few years, participating in annual bird counts organized by warblers and warders has been a regular January routine for me. This year was also no different; I participated in two of the events organized by the team. Apart from that, I also did a solo session.
The locations that I covered with the organization were Polachira wetlands in Kollam district and Kadinamkulam in Trivandrum. The Polachira count included: Lesser whistling ducks (1200+) and Cotton pygmy goose (250+).Kadiankulam offered us a visual treat during the event’s conclusion: a continuous flying of nearly 400 cormorants right during the concluding session.
The group sessions were quite engaging with good participation and, as usual, wrapped up with a lot of shared knowledge and experiences.
The one I did personally was at Periyalkulam, Tamil Nadu, on a fine evening in the last week of January. It was good birding; I was able to watch nearly 40 birds there. And a few interesting sightings for me were the Baya weavers nesting and the brown-headed barbet, which is usually common there.

Overall, January’s birding was good and quite rewarding. Returning to familiar locations again highlighted how much value there is in repeated visits and steady attention, rather than one-off experiences.