Bee Eaters | Bird Photography

Do you remember I had mentioned about this beautiful & small jungle-like area in the neighboring colony? I mentioned about this place in the series of posts about Getting close to nature. This is exactly 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 species that had occupied a large tree for themselves. It was awesome to view 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.

Green Bee Eater at Mandrem Beach Goa

Pair of Green Bee Eaters at Mandrem Beach Goa

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.

Chestnut-headed Bee Eater at Sawantwadi, Maharashtra

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.

Green Bee Eaters at Karjat, Maharashtra

And lastly I saw the Green Bee Eater again was 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.