How many have you spotted?
Today is 15th edition of the Mumbai Birdrace. From a small beginning on a wintry day back in 2005, the Mumbai event has evolved into the India Birdraces, a pan-india bird spota-thon, with nearly 3,000 people participating across over a dozen cities every year.
Now, if there was to be some genetic upheaval of sorts, and birds were suddenly gifted a voice we could follow, they would most certainly dissent strongly, very strongly, at what we are doing to their landscapes.
Yes, we humans, caught up in budgetary tamasha in election year, ignore the ruin this implies for already-super-burdened natural systems. We seldom care for wilderness and other creatures until there is a selfish interest. Our economic affairs have proven to be irreconcilable with other life forms.
We love numbers. We’re ecstatic when we hear of Mumbai’s burgeoning flamingo populations, or sight greater counts of other large aquatic birds. Why aren’t we equally rapturous over crow and pigeon numbers shooting up as well? Or over larger congregations of certain gulls feasting on discarded junk food?
All numbers are trying to say something. Rising flamingo numbers by our creeks have more to do with pollution than protection. Rising crow and pigeon numbers are a fallout of the garbage we generate. All greater numbers of one kind indicate an inversely proportional fall of another.
The India Birdraces too are about numbers. And are trying to tell us something. Mumbai now has 15 years of findings, generated both on Birdrace day and round the year. The Birdraces are all about inspiring beginners and opening up a new world of nature’s joy to all.
But the figures tell us all that is not well. Every statistic: too many, too few, the last of few of a species, can bring out the human side in us. Not the path and process of ruin, but the watch of death. We care when there is a rarity, a target, a photograph. But we have forgotten countless moments of great experiences, including the Birdraces, that led us along the path.
I wish we had bureaucrats and politicians who really understood ecological design and the gameplan of soil, water, feather, scales and fur. I wish they advocated conservation for its own sake rather than in the wisdom of some economic directions and regulators, or of misguiding development plans and ideas and earmarking pitiful budgets as cure for conservation.
Meanwhile, continue to learn from birds, the swarms of grunting flamingos, the fading cry of our junglefowl and quail, the perpetual screams of our crows. Enjoy the avian rarities in the stinking cesspools of Mumbai. Today we will also put forth a Mumbai Birdrace statement for setting aside several regional sites for our featherfolk.
(Sunjoy Monga is a naturalist, photographer and author of numerous
books on biodiversity)