Green Bee-eater - Seven notes of pictorial music
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| f/8, 1/160 iso-800 |
This winter we got the chance to
observe social behaviour of Green Bee-eaters. They roost in our campus. Green Bee-eaters
usually seen in small groups and often roost in Neem tree communally in large
numbers (200-300). The birds move excitedly at the roost site and call loudly,
often explosively dispersing before settling back to the roost tree. At early winter mornings, they huddled next to
one another to get warmness from each other.
We saw many groups. It’s like their daily routine is to emerge from the roosting
branches soon after dawn set altogether in such small groups of 6-14, preen and
sun themselves for at least an hour,
then disperse to feed. They used to produce loud chirping sounds and invited others
to sit nearby. They only prefer closeness of known bird, if some unwanted bird
came near to their group they try to drive them away.
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| f/8, 1/500,iso-800 |
Green Bee-eaters are mainly
insect eaters and they are found in grassland, thin scrub and forest often
quite far from water. Several regional plumage variations are known and several
subspecies have been named. Bee-eaters predominantly eat insects, especially
bees, wasps and ants, which are caught in the air by sorties from an open
perch. Before swallowing prey, a bee-eater removes stings and breaks the
exoskeleton of the prey by repeatedly thrashing it on the perch.
7 November 2015
GMERS Medical College, Dharpur, Patan, Gujarat, India
Nikon D7100
AF-S Nikkor
300mm F/4D IF-ED + AF-S Teleconverter TC-14E
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