The stone-eater

[Samrat Sarkar]

Eating stone is a common behaviour for Chestnut-headed Bee-eater. Here this bird is eating stone from a riverbed in Manas National Park. They eat stones for calcium which increase the egg shell thickness. They eat stones to grind the harder parts of insects in their gizzard.

Canon EOS 7D + Canon 500mm f4 + Monopod
ISO 200, 1/400, f4, -0.3step EC, cropped

[Prashant Gandhi]

Perfect timing, Samrat! The bird is also beautiful! Thank you so much for sharing information and also a pic! :001_smile:

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Samrat,
Nice action. Colours look nice. Glad that you got this behaviour. I remember how astonished I was when I had first sighted that behaviour while filming in naguvanahalli on the outskirts of mysore.

Manas is in my radar this year. Hopefully I will be able to.

Cheers,
Sabyasachi

[Murugan Anantharaman]

Very interesting behavior captured, Samrat. The details have come out well, Thanks for sharing.

[Mrudul Godbole]

Perfect timing. Loved the low angle and the colours. Its good that the eye is not blocked by the vegetation. Nicely captured. Thanks for sharing.

[Samrat Sarkar]

Thanks a lot Prashant ji, Murugan ji.
Sabyasachi da, do visit Manas... sightings are good this year... specially tigers, black leopard... and obviously birds.... I still remember that film... "Bee-eaters of Naguvanahalli is crying for help..." your voice...

Mrudul ji, It was late afternoon, and we are waiting for a RBT near his kill at this river bed in Goruchhara area of eastern part.. lots of bee-eater were there... and I captured this action..

Samrat

[Sandipan Ghosh]

brilliant shot and good documentation

[Shyamala Kumar]

Rare behavior beautifully documented . Thanks for sharing .