Openbill Storks at Uppalapadu Bird Sanctuary near Guntur City, India

[Dr Ajay Kumar Singh]

Openbill Storks at Uppalapadu Bird Sanctuary near Guntur City, India. About Uppalapadu bird sanctuary Anand Madabhushi has already described it very nicely in wilderness thread ". Thanks Anand

http://www.indiawilds.com/forums/showthread.php?t=11766

EOS 40D, 280mm, F/8, 1/125, ISO 100, Manual, cropped a little from left

[Saktipada Panigrahi]

A paradise on earth revealed. A great reminiscense for me.

Those were the days when we had to go by launch and return within a few hours after observing similar congregation of nesting and breeding birds (other species, too) in August/September during late 1970's in the Sajnekhali Bird Sanctuary (part of the buffer area of the Sundarbans) from a watch tower.
In a devastating cyclone during 1980's all the tall trees were uprooted and the sanctuary was lost for ever. The present tourist lodge has come up much later near the same place.

Good news that the new bird sanctuary has come up. Thanks for sharing.SaktiWild

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Good to see this bunch of open billed storks. What all birds did you sight there? I will copy this to the post by Anandji. You can also post your impressions of the place giving your date of visit so that it serves as a record.

Is that an electric pole in the background?

Cheers,
Sabyasachi

[Roopak Gangadharan]

Nice to see so many Open bills. this place brings back a lot of fond memories.

Patra sab, those poles are the work of an FD officer sometime ago.As i heard he felt the trees around the waterbody were not enough to support the huge numbers of nesting waterbirds, so called artificial trees were erected in form of poles supporting 2-3 circular platforms on which the birds can nest / rest.
The fact that the tree cover around the bund at that time was not great is true and I dont know if it worked at all. In the long term ofcourse this image clearly reflects the utility of the idea.

TFS
Roopak

[Dr Ajay Kumar Singh]

I visited Uppalapadu bird sanctuary on August 03, 2012. Unfortunately due to some other commitments I was at this place for very short time but I managed to see birds like

Open bill stork
Black head Ibis
Purple swamp Hen
Spot Billed/ Grey Pelican
Common Coot

Although some more birds are reported from this sanctuary, in the entrance you can see some big boards that display the short description and names of the bird.

Little Cormorant
Glossy Ibis
Darter /snake bird
Painted stork
Spot Bill Duck

I have attached a google image that will give you the correct orientation as well idea of the area. There are several ponds with small mounds in between with kikir/ babul tree mainly where the birds nest /rest. Few towers they have raised that was occupied by pelicans. The area flocked by birds (marked by red) are very small ~ 30000 sq m (0.03 sq km) probably due to lack of kikir/babul trees in the nearby ponds. I dont know much about how this sanctuary can be developed, probably growing more babul/kikir tree in the surrounding ponds will attract more birds.

[Dr Ajay Kumar Singh]

This photgraph will give you the idea of mounds with kikir/babul tree. Sorry for the somewhat washed out backlit photo.

[Mrudul Godbole]

Nice to get an update about the bird sanctuary. Good to know there is a huge number of open bills visiting the place. Thanks for sharing the details information.