Kites, Bazas and Osprey

1.Osprey (pandion haliaetus 55-58cm)

This type of birds mainly found in Himalayas and this type of birds are widespread also migrate mainly in winter season. It has long wings, typically angled at carpals and short-tail. It has whitish head with black stripe through eye, white under body, under wing and black carpal patches. It is found in large island water and coastal water.

2. Jerson's (Baza Aviceda jerdons 46cm)
It is mainly found in E.himalayas, hill of India, Bangladesh as well as Sri-Lanka. It has long and erect white tipped crest. It also has long broad wings (pinched in at base) and fairy long tail. Pale rufous head, indistinct gular stripe, rufous barred underparts and underwing coverts and bold barring across primary tips. At rest, closed wings extend well down tail. Juvenile has whitish head and narrower dark barring on tail. It is found in Broadleaved ever green forest.

3. Black Baza (Aviceda leuphotes 33cm)
It is mainly found in Himalayan foot hills, NE and S.India, Bangladesh and Sri-Lanka. It is largely black with long crest and had white breast bund as well as greyish underside to primaries contrasting with black under wing coverts. It is found in Broad leaved ever green forest.

4. Black Shouldered Kite (Elanus caeruleus 31-35cm)
It is widespread resident but it is unrecorded in parts of north west and notheast. It is small in size, it has grey and white with black shoulders. It's flight is buoyant with much hovering. Juvenile has brownish grey upperparts with pale fringes, with less distinct shoulder patch. Grassland with cultivation and open scrub.

5. Red Kite (Milvus milvus 60-66cm)
It is vagrant which found in Nepal and India. It has long and deeply forked rufous-orange tail. It has long wing usually sharply angled. Rufous underparts and under wing coverts whitish head, pale band across upperwing coverts and striking whitish patches at base of primaries on underwing. Recorded in region of Semi-desert.

6. Brahminy Kite (Haliastur indus 48cm)
It is wide spread resident and unrecorded parts of noth west and noth east. It is small in size and kite like flight. It's wings usually angled at carpals. Its tail is rounded. In this type of species, Adult has mainly chestnut with white head, neck and breast. Junvenile mainly brown with pale streaking on head, mantle and breast largely whitish patches at base of primaries and cinnamon-browntail. It is found in land and coastal water.

Short-Toed Snake Eagle, Serpent Eagle and Black Eagle

1. Short-Toed Snake Eagle (circaetus gallicus) 62-67cm
It is resident and mainly found in Pakistan, South Nepal and India. It has long and broad wings, pinched in at base and rather long-tail. It's head is broad and rounded. It soars with wings flat or slightly raised; frequently hovers. It pattern variable, often with dark headed and breast, barred underbody, dark trailing edge to underwing and broad subterminal tail band; can be very pale on underbody and underwing. Mainly found in open dry plains and hill.

2. Crested Serpent Eagle (spilornis cheela) 56-74cm
It is widespread resident. It has broad rounded wings. It soars with wings held forward and in pronounced V. Similarly Adult has broad white bands across wing and tails hooded apperance at rest with yellow cere and lores and white spotting on brown underparts. Juvenile has blackish ear-coverts, yellow cere and lores, whistish head and underparts narrower barring on tail (than Adult) and largely white underwing with fine dark barring and dark trailing edge. S.C davisoni of Andamans and Nicobars is Small with buff underparts and underwing coverts and narrower white banding on wings and tail. It is found in forest and well-wooded country.

3. Small Serpent Eagle (Spilornis minimus; 46-48cm)
This type of birds is resident Nicobars. It is very small in size than other. S.M minimus of central Nicobars has white scaling on black crest, cinnamon-grey underparts with white barring, broad grey central brand across uppertail and broad white central band and some white at base on undertail. Juvenile minimus has buff tips to crown; crest and upperparts and full second pale band across uppertail. S.m Klossi of Great Nicobar has cinnamon scaling in black crest, blackish gular stripe, plain cinnamon underparts and narrow black banding on white undertail. It is found in forest near rivers.

4. Black Eagle (lctinaetus malayensis 69-81cm)
It is resident and found in Himalayas, hill of India, Bangladesh and Sri-Lanka. Distinctive wing shaped and long tail. It flies with wing rasi.

Bird Identifications Characterstics

In the world we can find many species of birds. We can also identify them by lookout their characterstics, either physical or behavioral, colour etc.

1. Identification by size

Size is the most noticeable feature of any life form, and especially birds. A good look at the bird at once helps you place it in a certain bracket. It is important that identification by size is related to certain yardsticks.

It is easy to discribe what we saw, but any description of size can often be subjective and what is big for you may not be so big for some one else, therefore it can be of great help to have something familiar to measure and relate the size of year bird with.

Familiarize yourself with the size of some common birds such as the house sparrow, house crow or the common kite. This way you can confidently say that the bird you saw was smaller than the house sparrow or approxmately the size of a house crow and so on.

2. Identifications by colour

Like size, colour is yet another very obvious feature for identifying birds of same or similar colours do not mecessarily belongs to the same group or family. However, colours is yet another way to short list the bird's identify.

3.Identifications by size

Often it is possible recognise a bird in dim light even against the light, merely by its silhouette appearance. All birds have distinctive shapes. Shape is a combination of physical attributes like posture, build, head, wings, legs and tail. Posture pertains to birds actual carriage, to its stance of "gist" for instance. Some birds swim to fly with their neck curved in a graceful S-shape. Yet other woth their neck stretched up or out front; nocturnal birds such as owls settle erect and across, of perpendicular to a branch, whilst nightjars settle flat and along a branch length.

A bird's build implies wheather a species is slim and shapely or robusf and thick set, long-bodied or shortish. Is the head roundish as in owls or crested as in many bulbuls. The break comes in a vast array of design, either book-tipped as in most birds of prey and shrikes long and dagger-like in kingfisher or short and stout as in seed-eaters.

As the wings pointed like in swifts, longish and broad as in herons or rounded as in warblers? Legs and tail also show variations in size and structure will experience, the shape and form of a bird will help in identifying a bird.

4. Looking for other field-Marks

Since so many species have complicated colour arranged, certain distinctive marking come in very handy. Often these field-marks can help distinguish between species and even between sexes of certain species. These field marks can either further, explicit modificaton of colour and / or in the form of streaks and barring on upper and /or under-bodies, eye stripes, crown stripes, wing bars, tail bands, neck stripes, white or pale rumps, or actual physical modifications, like facial wattles of some peculiar deelopment of certain feathers perhaps in the tail or of the chest.

5. Identification by behaviour

Just like every individual has a personality and temperament, so dies every bird. This is yet another attributes which, with just a bit of observation and experience, begins to assist in bird watching. A wood-pecker can be recognised by its shape and preference for moving on stems and branches, a flycatcher by its habit of making frequent short sallies after winged insects and returning to its perch, a sparrow by its hopping movement whilst larks and pipits by their walk, swifts and swallows by their almost constant flying. But again the swallows can perch on wires and thin branches whilst swift cannot.

6. Flight as an identification clue

Flight is what birds are best known and instantly recognised for. All birds, groups have their distinctive flight which help in ther identification wood-pecker have an undulating flight, while Parakeets fly fast, mostly straight, the Falcon dashes fast and steadily. The Hawks with their roundish wings make a few rapid wings-beats followed by short glide is heron/egret steadily flys with slow wing beats and its head/neck pulled back into its shoulders; whilst cranes and storks fly with the neck sketched out. During ducks, such as pochards trip along and patter along the water surface before taking flight; while the surface-feeders such as pintails and teals directly spring up from the water.

7. Habitat perference and seasons

All birds belongs to a certain habitat and as far as possible most birds perfer to remain in familiar sorroundings. After a few visit you will realise that you see certain birds more or less always in the same area. In a forest you can always exjpect to see different birds in the various layers of tree growth. On the upper leafy branches are purely arboreal birds such as barbets, dronfos, minivets and orioles; the stems and branches are home to the wood-peckers, the upper-middle storeys hold various drongos, bulbuls, babbles, thrushes, the lower bush and scrub have yet other kinds of babblers, bulbuls, warblers and doves.

Free as a bird might seem the fact is that the majority of our feathered friends live in nature seemingly indistinct yet highly organised "cages". It would be pointless to look for a lark in deep forest or woodpeckers in a grass land. How ever there are a variety of micro-habitats inside forest.

8. Calls in field identification.

Just like birds are celebrated for their flight so too are they for their melodious voices most birds have an individuality when it comes to voice. In fact expert bird watchers often rely on their ears as much as their eyes to recognise birds. Birdcalls are not just pleasure they augment your enjoyment of the natural world. Birdcalls are a huge assistancein instantly discovering which bird is present at particular miment in a locality. No matter how well field guides and bird watcher. Friends describe of particular call, ultimately the best jungle will be yourself. Sound difficult but its worth every whistle and scream. "so happy birding".