india

Updated: May 05, 2019 08:15 IST

Bird song is often the sweetest alarm for early risers. On Sunday you could listen to bird songs playing from 30 different locations on the globe, lush forests of eastern Poland, the Himalayas in India; an urban wildlife sanctuary in Kenya, a disappearing lake in Slovenia to the coastal wetlands of Wales. From 4.30 am to 11 am All India Radio World Service English will broadcast the Dawn Chorus 2019.

A team of broadcasters and birders from India will contribute to the programme by recording bird song from Sattal in Uttarakhand. Live recording from Sattal will be relayed first on the programme. “Sattal has over 500 species of birds. We are camping near the forest so that we can go early in the morning to record. There are birders and a local bird guide also with us,” said Monica Gulati, who is reporting the event for AIR.

“I have seen the flyers of the Dawn Chorus. Sattal is a great birding place, entire lower Himalayas are fantastic for bird watching...,” said Nikhil Devasar, Delhi-based birder and author.

Bikram Grewal, also an ornithologist and author said “There is a difference between bird call and bird song, there can be an alarm call when a predator is chasing them. Increasingly birders are recording calls and playing it back in order to bring birds out of hiding. I think its very bad for conservation because the birds are often alarmed...Summer is the best time for bird song because they sing looking for a mate,” he said adding that the team may be able to hear a Blue whistling thrush, Orange-headed ground thrush, the Magpie robin which sings beautifully. You can tune in to airworldservice.org-english and FM rainbow 102.6 MHz.

In 2018, India relayed bird song from Chapramari forest in north Bengal, and in 2017 from Soor Sarovar Bird Sanctuary in Agra.