Bird Race and Awareness event – 3rd Jaipur Bird Race Event highlights details

 

• This is the 3rd Jaipur BirdRace (to be held on 21.1.2018)
• Best chance for bird watchers to enjoy birds … and learn from their ways
• Here’s another chance for a rendezvous with the featherfolk.
• The 3rd Jaipur BirdRace will be held on Sunday, 21st January 2018
• For the current season (December 2017 – March 2018), the event will be held in 16 cities across India

 

JAIPUR/JODHPUR | Updated January 20, 2018: The India BirdRaces were conceptualized by Mumbai-based naturalist-writer Sunjoy Monga. It is a dawn to dusk event where teams of bird-watchers spend the entire day birding in and around each city, covering every birding site across a wide range of habitats. Presently, the India BirdRaces are held in 17 cities across the country between the November to early-March period that also coincides with the peak inward migration of birds over peninsular India. More than 3000 people collectively take part in this exciting event, making it perhaps the greatest birding event in this part of the world, and perhaps anywhere.

 

With the world becoming increasingly urbanized, and with more and more people residing in urban areas, these limited expanses of human-influenced landscapes are in fact turning into one more type of habitat on this planet. The India BirdRaces help look on a continual basis at the avifauna (birdlife) of these urban areas and their surroundings and serve to popularize bird-watching and from thereon a better understanding of other aspects of our biodiversity and immediate environment so that support and awareness for the cause can be increased.

 

This is the third time such an event is being held in Jaipur. More than 300 species of birds have been recorded over the years in and around this great city, that, along with its surrounds, encompasses a broad range of habitats, from Aravallis and landscapes to agricultural tracts, inland wetlands and secondary growth, and of course, human impacted areas.

As of last year, in a marked change from previous years, the India Races have become Non- Competitive, and there will not be any first three winners. It would be still be a Race after all, but to try and spot as many birds as possible. The net result will be that all participants will be winners and the cause of Birds, and the environment, in the urban context, will get that much more support, and awareness.

 

There are no pre-determined routes to the BirdRace – participants can watch birds in multiple locations all within 25 – 30 km radius of the city to try see as many species as can be possible. The participants will try to record as many species of birds as possible; learn about the finer points of bird-watching from the experts & the experienced, and then later in the evening, all teams will meet at a suitable venue over dinner and an interactive tête-à-tête.

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The term Race is not to merely make the event competitive. It has been found over the years (the BirdRace is being conducted for the past ten years across many cities in India) that this exercise encourages participants to look at every bird much more closely and carefully than they would have otherwise. Over the years, the India BirdRaces have recorded nearly 20 additional species or new records of birds for several cities.

 

While there are strict rules, there is a fun element to this exercise, which will help stimulate enormous interest in bird-watching as a highly popular hobby. The event will give us a good idea of the nature of this region’s birdlife and helped build up support for environment and nature conservation. Of course, there is also the team spirit and participation that comes into focus here.

 

The plan is to try see as many species as you can from dawn to dusk before assembling to your chosen site for the evening dinner. It is an event to enjoy and share – each of you can treat it as an opportunity to make one another person get interested in birds and share the joy.

 

At the evening get-together, the participants, from so many children to rank beginners to birdwatching, get an opportunity to interact with some of the finest and most experienced birders in that city, including special invitees.

 

Each Team also gets an opportunity to interact with the others and recount their day’s experiences. All in all, it is a great end to a day well spent with and for the featherfolk, and for nature.

 

The evening event will be organised at Hotel Om Vilas, Bani Park, Jaipur, wherein the teams who spent whole day birding will share their experiences, problems noted by them and a final telly of birds will be made which will be shared with State forest department and State tourism department for promoting conservation and bird tourism in Jaipur.

This initiative has resulted in notification of Chandlai Lake identified as Important Birding Area of the region and the forest department along with local NGOs have taken up this lake as a priority area for conservation now.

 

The Local Organiser of this bird Race in Jaipur is Dr. Amit Kotia, who is Assistant Professor at Botany Department of University of Rajasthan and Dr Sumit Dookia and Dr. Himmat Singh are the Coordinators for Rajasthan BirdRaces.

 

ECOLOGY AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT SOCIETY®

Regional Office: 1-A-43, Kudi Housing Board, Jodhpur

The organizers can be reached on Phone: +91-8860349351; 8860337709, 7976883601 E-mail: erdsrajasthan@gmail.com