Quick Links >> Dr. Joseph George Memorial Talk Speakers Schedule
Come join us for this year’s Bird Day at the Venkatappa Art Gallery on September 30th, 2017.
Bengaluru Bird Day is a full-day with walks, talks and workshops on birds and birdwatching. This informal event is put together by the birdwatching community in Bangalore to commemorate the birthday of Dr. Joseph George, who started the group birdwatching effort in Bangalore. The event is completely free of cost and open to all.
The day long event will culminate in the Dr. Joseph George Memorial Talk titled ‘Themes and Trends in Indian Environmentalism’ by Dr. Ramachandra Guha, followed by recognition of people who have contributed over the years in promoting group birdwatching in Bengaluru.
Note:
- Free registration is needed at the venue.
- Limited seats available on a first come, first served basis.
- Preference will be given to those who will stay throughout the day.
- If you wish to attend only specific talk/s, please have a friend substitute you for the rest of the day.
Event Details
Venkatappa Art Gallery, Bengaluru
September 30th, 2017
7 AM to 8 PM
Free Entry
Dr. Joseph George Memorial Talk 2017
‘Themes and Trends in Indian Environmentalism’
by Dr. Ramachandra Guha
Starts at 6:00 PM
Coffee will be served at 5:30 PM
Speakers
Schedule
7:00 AM to 9:00 AM - Birdwatching
Bird Walk for School Children
Meet at the Queen’s Statue, opposite the KSCA Cricket Stadium. Grown-ups are welcome as well.
9:15 AM to 10:15 AM - Talk by Seshadri K. S.
Birds, bird-watching and nature conservation: experiences of a tropical biologist in South and Southeast Asia — Talk by Sheshadri K. S.
Bird-watching in a city like Bangalore or other parts of India is fairly easy in comparison to the rapidly vanishing tropical rainforests. Having worked in evergreen forests in India, I had hoped that my bird watching forays into parts of Southeast Asian forests would be easy. I could not have been more wrong. Pervasive forces of globalization have opened up access to vast landscapes. Reaching far flung islands such as the Indonesian Island of Komodo or Malaysian Borneo is relatively easy. The challenges however lay in attempting to find the birds in the forests. My bird watching forays have taken me to some of the last remaining rainforests in Peninsular Malaysia, Malaysian Borneo, Cambodia, Thailand and Indonesia. Biodiversity conservation has taken a back seat in much of SE Asia. If one is lucky to get past the Oil Palm plantations which span like an endless ocean, one enters a timber logging road and unfortunately, such roads are the best places to watch birds. These areas also attract numerous photographers having an impact of their own as well. In this lecture, I will touch upon some of the birds I’ve watched, narrate some stories behind how those sightings happened. I will then highlight how the conversion of forests for oil palm, timber logging, song bird trade and rapid urbanization has decimated birds with a hope that we can learn from it.
10:15 AM to 11:15 AM - Talk by Praveen J.
Kerala Bird Atlas — Talk by Praveen J.
Kerala Bird Atlas is a citizen science project that attempts to systematically map the distribution and abundance of birds for the entire state of Kerala. Being a first of its kind in the country, it is envisaged as a five year activity that started in 2015 and expected to wind-up in 2020. An atlas is expected to give better insights into the abundance of our common birds, and by repeating the process after a decade, it would enable a rigorous assessment of the changes in our bird community over a period of time. This has significant implications for nature conservation as birds are excellent indicators of the changes happening around us.
11:15 AM to 11:30 AM - Coffee / Tea Break
Take a break, stretch your legs, and have a cup of coffee or tea.
11:30 AM to 12:30 PM - Talk by Suhel Quader
Exploring the wonders of bird behaviour — Talk by Suhel Quader
One of the fascinating things about birds is the diverse behaviour they show. As a young birdwatcher my interest in birds turned towards a curiosity about the strange and wonderful things they do. In this talk, I’d like to share with you some of my explorations of this subject, including the social behaviour of Cinereous Tits, the breeding behaviour of Baya Weavers and the brood-parasitic behaviour of Koels. I’ll end with a few thoughts about how all of us with an interest in birds can hone our observation and understanding of avian behaviour.
12:30 PM to 2:00 PM - Lunch & Networking
Join us for a simple networking lunch.
2:00 PM to 4:15 PM - Introduction to Bird Sketching Workshop by Prasad Natarajan
Introduction to Bird Sketching Workshop by Prasad Natarajan
Note: Participants should bring their own pencils and sketchbooks to participate in this workshop.
Introduction to bird anatomy, which helps us identify various species. Introduction to various categories of birds (For Example: Waders, Woodpeckers, Ground Dwellers, Raptors etc). We’ll be working on simple ways to sketch birds using basic geometric shapes. Later moving to their proportions, angles and fast gestures. We’ll also cover sketching of birds using negative shapes. And hope this session will inspire you to sketch birds outdoors while birdwatching!
4:15 PM to 4:30 PM - Coffee / Tea Break
4:30 PM to 5:30 PM - Talk by Mahesh Iyer
Bird management at airports today — Talk by Mahesh Iyer
Bird hazard studies were first conducted in India by BNHS back in 1982-88 and covered about 22 airports. One of the recommendations included removal of vegetation from airports that seemed to attract birds. Post this era, in 1990s, Indian Air Force (IAF) got permission from Ministry of Environment to selectively eliminate birds that came too close to the runway. Both these have become the bane of our airports for the survival of birds in the recent years. These models have also miserably failed in enhancing the flight safety of airports. Today, most of the airports provide graphical services on enhanced flight safety, while the situation on ground remains contrary. New techniques were developed during 2007-2010 by Ornithology Cell of IAF to study birds at Indian airports and was proven that birds at airports could be managed without killing them or cutting trees. Two case studies on management of Rose-ringed Parakeets in Gwalior airport, and Greater Short-toed Larks in Bidar airport (both IAF bases) proves that this model has potential for co-existence of birds and planes.
5:30 PM to 6:00 PM - Coffee / Tea Break & Networking
Take a break, stretch your legs, and have a cup of coffee or tea.
6:00 PM to 7:45 PM - Dr. Joseph George Memorial Talk
Dr. Joseph George Memorial Talk — Themes and Trends in Indian Environmentalism by Dr. Ramachandra Guha
7:45 PM to 8:00 PM - Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving and Recognitions
Recognition of birdwatchers who have contributed to the cause of group birdwatching in Bangalore.
About Seshadri K. S.
Seshadri grew up in Bangalore and started to watch birds at a young age. An avid naturalist with interests across many taxa, he has chosen to study natural history, ecology and conservation biology as a career.
Over the last decade, his research has taken him to remote and often inhospitable environments where he has spent extensive periods of time. His research spans a swath of biology ranging from orchids in the tall forests of the Western Ghats to discovering new species and new behavior among Amphibians. He led a team to study amphibians in the forest canopy for which he was honored with the “Future Conservationist” award by the Conservation Leadership Program in 2010.
He is currently awaiting a doctoral degree from the National University of Singapore which bestowed him the prestigious (late) Prof. Navjot S. Sodhi Conservation Biology Scholarship in 2013. He has traveled extensively to some of the last remaining strongholds of biodiversity in the rapidly vanishing forests of Southeast Asia wows to find solutions to effectively conserve nature. He enjoys photographing natural landscapes and biodiversity and often teaches ecology, evolutionary biology and research methods to students and nature enthusiasts.
About Praveen J.
Praveen J is a computer engineer by profession and a hobbyist bird-watcher. He involves in citizen science initiatives that monitor and report aspects of bird distribution by bridging amateur bird-watcher networks with ecologists and wildlife biologists. Though a resident of Bangalore for the past 15 years, most of his initiatives are based out of his home state, Kerala. He is presently an associate editor of Indian BIRDS journal.
About Prasad Natarajan
Prasad Natarajan is Bangalore based wildlife artist and founder of Artist for Wildlife and Nature(AWN). Self taught artist, his studio is out there in the outdoors!
He travels to various destinations of the world to capture wildlife through his camera and does field sketches. These become finished artworks at his little studio later. He has been working on wildlife art from 2005.
About Dr. Ramachandra Guha
Ramachandra Guha is a historian and biographer based in Bangalore. He has taught at the universities of Yale and Stanford, held the Arné Naess Chair at the University of Oslo, and been the Indo-American Community Visiting Professor at the University of California at Berkeley. In the academic year 2011-2 he served as the Philippe Roman Professor of History and International Affairs at the London School of Economics.
Guha’s books include a pioneering environmental history, The Unquiet Woods (University of California Press, 1989), and an award-winning social history of cricket, A Corner of a Foreign Field (Picador, 2002). India after Gandhi (Macmillan/Ecco Press, 2007) was chosen as a book of the year by the Economist, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, the San Francisco Chronicle, Time Out, and Outlook, and as a book of the decade in the Times of India, the Times of London, and The Hindu. His most recent book is Gandhi Before India (Knopf, 2014), which was chosen as a notable book of the year by the New York Times. Apart from his books, Guha also writes a syndicated column, that appears in six languages in newspapers with a combined readership of some twenty mllion. Guha’s books and essays have been translated into more than twenty languages. The New York Times has referred to him as ‘perhaps the best among India’s non fiction writers’, Time Magazine has called him ‘Indian democracy’s pre-eminent chronicler’.
Ramachandra Guha’s awards include the Leopold-Hidy Prize of the American Society of Environmental History, the Daily Telegraph/Cricket Society prize, the Malcolm Adideshiah Award for excellence in social science research, the Ramnath Goenka Prize for excellence in journalism, the Sahitya Akademi Award, and the R. K. Narayan Prize. In 2009, he was awarded the Padma Bhushan, the Republic of India’s third highest civilian honour. In 2008, and again in 2013, Prospect magazine nominated Guha as one of the world’s most influential intellectuals. In 2014, he was awarded a honorary doctorate in the humanities by Yale University.
In 2015 he was awarded the Fukuoka Prize.
About Sangeetha Kadur
Driven by a deep appreciation for the natural world and the arts, Sangeetha explored her way into the realm of wildlife art. She aspires to capture the wilderness, her inspired world on paper and canvas and dreams of travelling to diverse landscapes. Through her art, she hopes to draw people closer to the wonders of the wild world and contribute to conservation causes. Sangeetha has several commissioned projects to her credit and has illustrated for various publications and wildlife organizations. Her most recent publication on ‘Hummingbirds‘, a large format coffee-table book, in collaboration with Gorgas Science Foundation, Texas and Felis Creations, Bangalore, has added a feather to her cap. With ‘Greenscraps’, the Nature Journaling Workshops, she shares her passion for creating art from natural history and hopes to inspire new generation of nature and wildlife artists.
About Mahesh Iyer
SS Mahesh is a retired Indian Air Force Officer, served in J&K sector for two and half years. He has studied MSc Entomology at IARI, New Delhi and left his Ph.D program at IARI to join IAF.
He served in the branch of Air Traffic Control for eight years.
He established Ornithology Cell at Air HQ to study bird strikes at IAF, and studied 22 airports. He was commended for bringing down bird strikes by 27%. He then pursued his management studies from IIM Ahmedabad, and founded a research firm, Grus Ecosciences, at Bengaluru.
At Grus, he has been engaged in studying the language of birds and animals – bioacoustics. He employs this technique to convey message to target species that the treated area is dangerous. Bioacoustics is now widely used in Indian airports for preventing bird strikes, and in agriculture for preventing crop loss. Central govt has recently announced subsidy for agriculture product.
He is a member of National Bird Control Committee under DGCA to oversee how bird management programs in Indian airports are conducted. He studies airports for bird strike prevention and is currently engaged by many airports.
About Suhel Quader
Suhel has been fascinated by birds since his early teens, and was fortunate enough to have been able to spend a substantial part of his subsequent years studying them in the field and learning more about them.
He works at the Nature Conservation Foundation, where he spends his time on a mix of things: bird outreach and education, participatory projects to generate information on nature, and teaching research methods.