Birds en route and at Bharaptur

anybody who has followed our previous trips knows that Rae loves to photograph birds that he sees along the way - indeed, we've already posted some from the first two days.

Wednesday was a wonderful day with the wildlife reserve less than 500 metres from the hotel. The reserve is quite large, something like 10 or 15 km long, so it was a good thing they allow bicycles in the reserve - we logged another 13 km in the four hours we were there.

The first two photos below were along the two-lane road after leaving Agra. I was amazed at the number of kingfishers we saw and how close they let me get. And the owlet was just sitting on the branch of a tree over the road in broad daylight. 

White-breasted Kingfisher

Spotted Owlet

The rest were all seen in the reserve.

Spotted Owlet watching a lizard on his tree

Grey Heron

Purple Heron

Grey Heron

Common Kingfisher

Sarus Cranes - male, then female, followed by juvenile

Swamp Heron

Indian Eagle Owl tending two owlets in its nest