Life has come a full…nest!

So, this takes me back to August 2018 (not that long ago also). I shot one of my first bird nests then. I was not into birding or bird photography. Little did I predict, that two years later, I’d be closely following a story related to the same species – Purple-rumped Sunbird.

It is fascinating (how many times have I used this word in this blog) to watch the female sunbird build its nest.

Among many things, it also uses the spider web as a binding agent. We have a lot of webs in our courtyard, hence getting these shots were easy.

Unlike the Baya-weavers (and many other species), the female does all the work. Male, the good-looking bloke, comes once in a while for inspection.

Another thing I really wanted to do, was to shoot them in flight. I had to try multiple settings to get these.

Also, ended up getting these where she’s about to take off.

And, if stills aren’t enough, here are a couple of videos to view how they do this. The second one is handheld, so ignore the bumpy result.

Will be updating this one too, if there are any other significant developments I am able to capture.

Update: 26th June.

Unfortunately, this story has a sad ending. After having followed this nest for days, we spotted an angry crow just destroy it. Thankfully, there were no eggs inside. Not sure what promoted this Ghazni type of behavior. The Sunbirds seemed confused for a while after they came to see the nest destroyed and have moved on.