Some birds that can be seen in Chennai now

The Purple Sunbird - This iridescent male bird has this amazing colour during the mating season, other times it is not so colourful and has a plainer yellowish body. The female apparently does not undergo this transformation. You can spot this bird by its long and slightly curved-towards-the-edge beak, and it is usually flitting about in shrubby flowering plants. It is closely related to the Humming Bird.




This is the Pied Crested Cuckoo - Herald of the monsoons. Salim Ali remarked that this bird comes with the monsoon and goes with the monsoon. In that sense it has been called the rainbird, as it travels along the Indian subcontinent along with the monsoon rains. Lovely bird with a typical call, it can be seen in Chennai around November or so. Can be seen resting on the limbs of medium sized trees, almost hidden among the branches.

The Kuil, Koel, Indian Cuckoo - The famous, much loved and omnipresent songbird of India. This is the male of the species. The female is a lighter shade of black, with white patches all over the body and does not have the sweet tone that the male is so famous for. The female is also much more shy and difficult to spot. These birds fly higher and amongthe taller trees and many times into the open. They have many cries and can be identified also by the red eye. it is smaller than the crow and has a longer and thinner tail.