42 - Sparky’s ‘On Course’ World

 Hello, Sparky here.

 

A shower has calmed the season’s run.

Though it feels like winter now,

the summer is not undone.

Patiently biding his time, is Sun.

The glorious summer might be back next week,

or we could have a thunderstorm overrun.

If we didn’t know much of it is due to climate change,

It would all still be fun.

 

That’s the kind of week we have had. A bit of everything, really. The customary fireworks were missing from the pre-monsoon shower and hence the showers themselves were quite subdued but at least we know that matters are ‘on course’.

After the shower that brought down the temperature, the mangoes have started ripening and we have all started making a beeline to the mango tree every day. The mangoes aren’t fully ripe yet so it isn’t yet as sweet as we like it to be but we are getting there so no one is really complaining.

This is the time of the year when the winter visitors begin to depart for their summer homes in far-away lands with their little ones in tow. This year one particularly stubborn Painted Stork put his foot down, or to be precise he put his wings down and refused to fall in line with his parent’s plan of moving for the season.

His argument was rather simple, ‘If I was born here, why cannot I live here?’

Every argument that his parents put forth fell on deaf ears. Finally, the parents consulted Mrs. Ulukah and Mr. Goldback and sort of handed the baby over to their care.

Well, I cannot say I understand all these ‘migrating birds’. I wouldn’t risk making an arduous journey across landscape that wouldn’t even be the same as last year because humans would have in the last 1 year alone made innumerable changes to it. Built roads and bridges where there were forests and lakes. Filled up lakes to build hotels and apartments and then built swimming pools in them. Burnt large swaths of forest to farm the land. Put up power lines and wind turbines where there were rolling hills and grasslands. The list is endless. It feels like madness to launch into a journey when the map you have is outdated. For all we know they have done something to alter the magnetic poles as well. I am with that baby and will be keeping an eye on him. In a way, all of us will do our bit for this bold one, he will be the Banyan Island baby.

The Koels have started their singing, the call of a male koel is like a peppy cool breeze on a hot summer’s day, you don’t know where it came from but when it touches you, it sooths you and excites you all at once. Adding to the chorus this year along with the Barbets is our ‘stranger from across’, our marooned peacock. That’s the beauty of nature there is space for everyone within her gigantic canvas but what Mother Nature hasn’t taken into account is we all have just a pair of ears and a brain apiece to process all that. Sometimes it gets so cacophonous, thinking becomes difficult.

With the male Koels setting up their orchestra many birds on the island got a bit jittery. Just a bit jittery, not more because they are all neck-deep in work this time of the year - building nests, wooing partners, feeding and keeping cool. If you recollect what happened last year, you will recall that Mrs. Koel, a brood parasite, meaning a bird who bypasses all parental responsibility by simply laying her eggs in other birds’ nest did just that last year in Mr. & Mrs. Drongo’s nest and when caught had promised to help feed the chicks once they hatched only to disappear.

So, with the male koels calling out to the to-be-mothers, many birds like drongos, jungle crows whose nests the female koel prefers to lay her eggs in, went up to Mrs. Ulukah to complain. Well, Mrs. Ulukah advised them to be vigilant. What else could she have done? What is one to do about a crime that hasn’t taken place yet, although we fully know exactly how matters will unfold? For that matter how does one even enforce their will and assert their right on another species? For the crime that humans have committed and are yet to commit, have we been and will we ever be able to hold them accountable in any way?

See you all next week. In the meanwhile, if you would like to write to me, email me at Sparkyatbanyan@gmail.com