Altitudinal Migrants Hit Trail 5


Sunrise on Saturday 13 October 2012 saw us on Trail 5 of the Margalla Hills looking for altitudinal migrants from the Himalayas. The trail was busy with hikers and the spring was quiet from a birding perspective. During the walk up to the spring a Barking Dear bounded across the trail in front of us and provided incredibly close views. There were large groups of ORIENTAL WHITE-EYE and most had GREY-HOODED WARBLER associated with them. Amongst one of these feeding waves we had good views of a BLACK-CHINNED BABBLER; normally a furtive species. We saw several raucous GREY TREEPIE and a few BLACK BULBUL flew noisily overhead. Rustling leaves, once again, gave away the presence of a RUSTY-CHEEKED SCIMITAR BABBLER.

The highlights of the morning were two stunning male RUFOUS-BELLIED NILTAVA; an exciting discovery as we had only once previously seen this species as we descended Mukshpuri. The males displayed their brilliant blue crowns, black throats, blue upperparts and orange underparts.

Another superb bird was a female ULTRAMARINE FLYCATCHER that provided extremely close views and we could easily see the bluish upper-tail and primaries. The bird was possibly a first-winter male but some females also show the distinctive blue/black colour in the wings. We sat for about 30 minutes watching this fabulous bird that spends the summer months at much higher altitudes.

A GREY WAGTAIL patrolled the stream near to the visitor’s centre and overhead we enjoyed great views of a LONG-LEGGED BUZZARD.

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