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Brainfever
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| Photo Information |
Copyright: Kedar Kulkarni (kedarkulkarni)
![Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Note Writer [C: 141 W: 0 N: 174]](http://i1.treknature.com/misc/g-n-g.gif) (765) |
| Genre: Animals |
| Medium: Color |
| Date Taken: 2009-06-07 |
| Categories: Birds |
| Exposure: f/5.7, 1/1002 seconds |
| Photo Version: Original Version |
| Date Submitted: 2009-06-11 23:52 |
| Viewed: 405 |
| Points: 6 |
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| [Note Guidelines] Photographer's Note |
Posting one of the rare photoes on TN
The bird commonly called as Paoshya in Maharashtra. In Marathi the word "Paos" means rains. And when you hear the voice of this bird its understood that Monsoon is on its way and there would be showers pretty soon.
In earlier days farmers love to hear its call and start the preparation for the monsoon.
These days we do hear its call for last 10-15 days but the rains are still awaited. We were lucky enough to get few glimpse of this beautiful bird. Thanks for Viewing!
Info from Wikipedia -->
The Common Hawk-cuckoo Cuculus varius also popularly called the Brainfever bird, due to its call, is a medium sized cuckoo resident in South Asia. The resemblance to a Shikra hawk give it the name of hawk-cuckoo and like many other cuckoos is a brood parasite, laying its eggs in nests of babblers and laughing-thrushes.
The Common Hawk-cuckoo is a medium to large sized cuckoo, about the size of a pigeon (ca. 34cm). The plumage is ashy grey above; whitish below, cross-barred with brown. The tail is broadly barred. The sexes are alike. They have a distinctive yellow eye ring. At first glance they can be mistaken for a hawk. When flying they use a flap and glide style that resembles that of sparrowhawks (especially the Shikra) and flying upwards and landing on a perch they shake their tails from side to side. Many small and birds and squirrels raise alarm just as they would in the presence of a hawk.
They can be confused with the Large Hawk-cuckoo but that species has dark streaks on the throat and breast. Young birds have a pale chin while young Large Hawk-cuckoos have a black chin
During summer months, prior to the Monsoons, the bird is easily detected by its repeated calls but can be difficult to spot. The call is a loud, screaming three note call, repeated 5 or 6 times, rising in crescendo and ending abruptly. This call has been popularly transcribed as brain-fever in English or pee kahan (in Hindi, "where's my love") or chokh gelo (in Bengali, "my eyes are gone") and paos ala (Marathi, "the rains are coming"). The call may be heard all through the day, starting early before dawn and frequently during moonlit nights. Common Hawk-cuckoos feed mainly on insects and are specialised feeders that can handle hairy caterpillars. Caterpillar guts often contain toxins and like many cuckoos they remove the guts by pressing the caterpillar and rubbing it on a branch prior to ingestion. The hairy caterpillars are swallowed and the hairs are separated in the stomach and regurgitated as a pellet. |
marius-secan, amanengone has marked this note useful
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- foozi
(8757)
- [2009-06-13 21:42]
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Hi Kedar,
nice shot with nice angle. the eyes is beautiful and sharp. Well exploited light.
regards,
Foozi
Hello Kedar.
Congratulation for that interesting nice picture of the small bird. The composition of the picture is lovely, in diagonal ascending, giving movement to the shot. Colors, saturation, contrast are good.
The sharpness is not so good ; but I know how difficult is it to have such a picture. I have tried to improve the sharpness with the software from Olympus, with, I think, a quite convincing result. If you are interested, I can post you the modified picture.
Thank you also for your interesting notice.
Hope to see you another time on treknature.
Have a nice day.
Philippe.
Hi Kedar
These are difficult birds to take pictures of! Well captured here in excellent light and with great details.
TFS
Ravi
![Gold Star Critiquer/Silver Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 106 W: 22 N: 182]](http://i1.treknature.com/misc/g-s-g.gif)
(796)