There is this beautiful & small jungle-like area in the neighboring colony where I saw the Green Bee Eater for the first time. It was not just a single bird, there was a whole colony of this bird that had occupied a large tree for themselves. It was an awesome to view and quite entertaining to watch their behavior. Each of them would sit on a branch for some time, fly around and land on the same spot again. They would do it again and again and most of the time, when the land, they would have an insect in their beak.
Smart, fast and very swift in catching the insects which is their primary source of food, they mostly eat ants, bees, wasps, butterflies and every other type of insect. More info about Bee Eaters.
The second time I saw this species of birds was in Goa at Mandrem Beach. This is when we visited the End of the world restaurant again during our trip to North Goa. There was a pair of Green Bee Eaters which stood still on a cable for a long time. I started clicking their photos from far using the 50x Optical Zoom of my Canaon Powershot SX50 HS. However I gradually went closer and closer each time clicking a few more photos. One of the Bee Eater flew away while the other stayed there for some more time.
The only other type of Bee Eater that I have actually seen is the Chestnut-headed Bee Eater. This was from our hotel balcony during our stay at Sawantwadi while on the way to Goa. Again there was this huge tree right in front of our balcony. This tree was a residence for many a species of birds like Common Tailorbirds, Drongos and Sparrows.
I also saw this bird in Karjat-another green paradise near Mumbai. This was during our visit to a family friend. If your remember I had mentioned about this family friend in one of my earlier posts in which I had shared pics of some water lilies.
Lastly, I managed to capture my best shot of this bird at Majhya Mamacha Gaon, Guhagar. This was a bee eater in flight. I noticed the similar behavior of the bird sitting still on a branch flying off and landing back at the same spot. This allowed me to capture a Green Bee Eater in flight mode.
This bird is amazing and I just love watching it. At the next opportunity, I would love to capture the Green Bee Eater tossing it’s prey in the air.
