The Deskbound Birder: Indian Roller

Thursday, 18 February 2016

Desert National Park and Little Rann of Kutch, India - 10th February (Day 3) - Part 2

We headed back to the entrance gate where we had our packed lunch before slowing driving out of the park birding en-route and stopping for some of the species we had sped past earlier to get to the park. Just outside the park gate a chat perched on top of a fence turned out to be a cracking male Stoliczka’s Bush-chat which was giving a subdued sub-song and performed a slightly shifty side to side shoulder wiggle display. Isabelline Shrike, Asian Little Bee-eater and Indian Roller perched on the fencelines. A short walk a little further along produced good views of Isabelline Wheatear and an Asian Desert Warbler closing following a fine male Desert Wheatear, I was amazed at how the warbler could disappear into the smallest of bushes and not be seen. It was nice to see this species again, the last that I had seen was the Isle of Wight bird way back in October 1991. The drive also produced good views of Black-bellied Sandgrouse, Southern Grey Shrike and was notable for the large numbers of the threatened Spiny-tailed Lizard. This is a rather odd looking snub nosed lizard which is threatened through collecting for their tails which are thought to have aphrodisiac qualities.