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| Indian Grey Hornbill Ocyceros birostris
- Adult male |
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| Photographer : | © Vishwajeet Naik |
| Location : | Pune, Maharashtra, india |
| Date : |
16 April 2009 |
| English synonyms: | Grey Hornbill, Common Grey Hornbill, Indian Gray-Hornbill, Common Gray-Hornbill, Gray Hornbill |
| Bird Family : | Bucerotidae - Hornbills |
| Bird Group : | BUCEROTIFORMES |
| Red Data Status : | Least Concern |
| Remarks : | Possibly the first record of an Indian Grey Hornbill using a metal box for nesting.
Vishwajeet Naik, an artist and bird photographer, put up about 150 boxes made of wood, plastic 5 litre oil cans, and tin boxes on the trees in his garden, so that the birds could make use of these boxes as their homes to stay and breed in them.
The birds using boxes for nesting were Maynas, especially Common Maynas, Jungle Maynas, Brahmany Maynas, Pair of Owlets, Magpie Robins, Parrots, Common Pigeons. These birds have been regularly breeding in the artificial nest boxes provided to them.
One day Vishwajeet while photographing saw a Grey Horn Bill getting down in to the garden collecting a lump of mud in its beak. The Bird flew to one of the boxes, put up on the Peempal tree. He observed that the bird gave the mud to a bird which was within the box. The female Horn Bill in the box beating its beak kept plastering the opening of the box to keep a small slit like open.
This activity started in first week of April. The male Horn Bill use to bring Mud, Green leaves, Tree Barks and also Fruit Berries and place it down the slit of the box, to its mate.
Vishwajeet was sure that the Horn Bill had made a nest in the box. On reading Salim Alli’s book it was confirmed that the female gets entrapped in the nest and the male does feeding activity. On 10th of May in the morning the mud lining of the box was open, Vishwajeet thought that due to some danger like snakes, cats the female Horn Bill must have left the nest. The next day to Vishwajeet’s surprise he saw that both the parents were bringing food and he could see that they were feeding the chicks which were inside. Every 15 to 20 minutes the parents came to feed the chicks and one could hear the squeaking of the chicks.
Why did the Horn Bill a Wild bird choose to nest in an artificial metal box? The reason behind this is that Horn Bills require old Tall trees, old tree have hollows in them in which the Horn Bill build their nests.
Due to urbanization, and development of express ways all the ancient 100 years old trees have been chopped away, to name some areas, Solapur Road, Sinhagad Road, Ferguson College Road etc. This has caused a great loss of the natural nesting sites. Hence the Grey Horn Bill chooses to use the metal box as its nest for breeding. - VN |
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