23-05-2025
Review of The Search for India's Rarest Birds
Rarity is a magnet,' writes ornithologist Aasheesh Pittie in The Search for India's Rarest Birds, 'for both charlatans and connoisseurs.'
What makes a bird rare? Why do we covet the thing that is rare? These are some of the questions this engaging book tries to unpack as it draws portraits of birds that are rare and possibly extinct (such as the bird on the cover, the Jerdon's courser, and the Pink-headed duck), or are rare but relatively abundant in their habitats (Nicobar scops owl, Mrs. Hume's pheasant).
What makes this book, edited by Shashank Dalvi and Anita Mani, different is that it approaches the subject of rarity and vulnerability not through tedium and doom, but through a sense of wonder and exploration.
The 12 chapters have a selection of birds that have been chosen through different forms of observation: the Pink-headed duck chapter by Pittie talks about how the bird was formally described based on a painting of Indian specimens; art led to science. Ornithologist Pamela Rasmussen studiedtaxidermiedforest owletsin the U.K. and the U.S.;shepursuedthe birdin the forests of Maharashtra; and a strangetaxidermiedmodel led tothe rediscovery ofthe real bird.
End is priceless
'Twitchers [birdwatchers who collect sightings of rare birds] are a possessed soul – we act first and think later,' writes birder Atul Jain. 'Having an understanding partner who gives you a hard time for every single crazy, last-minute trip but always relents in the end is priceless,' he writes. Jain's chapter is like a manual for how to set about a network for birding — how to prepare logistically and mentally for finding a rarity.
'Waiting, sweating'
In his chapter on Nicobar scops owl, wildlife biologist Dalvi introduces the reader to a similar premise – a lot of the work for birding starts before the actual fact. 'For years I had been chatting about my birding plans with one of my close friends James Eaton, because quite simply, that is what birders do.' He adds: one has to do homework, hard work and have a good prediction of habitat and timing.
In another chapter set in the Nicobar islands, journalist Radhika Raj writes evocatively on the Nicobar megapode, an endangered bird that builds huge mounds where it lays eggs.
Found only in India, the megapode has huge feet that check the temperature of the mound. This wasn't an easy bird to see, especially as the group got attacked by sandflies. There was lots of 'waiting, sweating and nothing'. Things changed though, as she saw it on the very last day of a three-week wait. 'The seemingly ordinaryjungli murgi… won us over.'
When I opened this book, I expected to find historical records of white men and their shikar in South Asia. It is enriching to find instead a book that is modern. Most importantly, though the birds are coveted, they are not trophies — each piece wraps fondness and field work for the avian object of affection in a manner that suggests care, not conquest.
This gives hope that we are a long way away from the days of hunting birds so they could be stuffed and laid in drawing rooms. You might come away learning some bird and birder idiosyncrasies in this book; you may even come away fledging from a reader to a birder.
The Search for India's Rarest Birds Edited by Shashank Dalvi, Anita Mani Indian Pitta/Juggernaut ₹499
The reviewer is a conservation biologist and author of Wild and Wilful-Tales of 15 Iconic Indian species
