Will birds come to oil palm plantations?
Frontier Despatch carries this article in its 1 st April, 2016 issue. Some of the participants were handling binoculars for the first time and I needed to go slow. We began with the basics. I shared of how beautiful the birds appear when seen with binoculars as compared to that with the naked eye. Then moved on to using them; wearing them over neck and adjusting their width, observing objects with either of and both the eyes, selecting objects to view – far and otherwise, and putting focus to use. We deliberated on the need to keep them away from moisture ( especially in a place like Mizoram ) and, as is the case with binoculars, how not to ‘clean’ them. As we walked more we learnt how to make better use of the bird-book as also discussed body-parts of birds, local names and specific species – bulbul ( for example ) became Black Bulbul or the Red-vented Bulbul. One participant also brought a Mizo book on wildlife to look up local names – it surely helped. I observed that some o...
