The Keoladeo National Park, Bharatpur, India

Located strategically along the Central Asian migratory flyway, the Keoladeo National Park is an important wintering ground for many Eurasian raptors, being especially good for eagles. Together with local Indian birds it is a kind of Eagles Eldorado, since it is quite easy to watch and photograph large numbers of raptors in a rather small area. Due to the large individual variation of many eagles staying here, it works as a kind of live laboratory for studying different moults of many Eurasian species, learning more about age variation as well as flight behavior. For example, the rare ‘fulvescens’ type of the Greater Spotted Eagle was seen here. But many other raptors were also found here. In addition to the 17 species pictured below, the following 16 species of raptors were observed during this period: Osprey (common), Himalayan Griffon (very rare), Indian Black Eagle (rare), Booted Eagle (common), Western Marsh-harrier (common), Pale Harrier (common), Shikra (common), Eurasian Sparrow-hawk (uncommon), White-tailed Eagle (rare), White-eyed Buzzard (common),  Eurasian Buzzard (uncommon), Long-legged Buzzard (uncommon), Common Kestrel, Laggar Falcon (uncommon), Saker Falcon (rare), and Peregrine Falcon (uncommon). See also the page India on this website for more photos of other birds than raptors as well as mammals in the Keoladeo National Park.

The biggest difference between today and that period is the large decline in the number of vultures, especially the White-rumped vulture, which was very common in those days. So the large groups of vultures on the photos below are no more.

The age of a raptor is assessed based on mainly Gensböl. G., 2006, Rovfåglar i Europa (Raptors in Europe). To know more about the characteristics of the races found in India, other literature was consulted, mainly Ferguson-Lees, J. & Christie, D., 2007, Raptors of the World, and the Illustrated Checklist of the Birds of the World, 2014, Volume 1, by HBW and Birdlife International. For example, based on this literature and the photos below, the juveniles of the light morph of the local race of the Tawny Eagle (Aquila rapax vindhiana) have a less bright underbody and wing-coverts than the other two races, especially ssp belisarius, being more greyish than creamy white. This morph and the reddish-brown/brown morph were more common than the tawny morph in those days.