When I arrived in Goa in November I couldn’t take more than ten or so steps at a time before I had to stop to release the pressure on my sciatic nerve due to the agonising pain forward motion caused me. Nevertheless, rather than being shut up in my flat all day, I ventured out onto the nearby dunes every morning around 7:15am (my gait resembling one of the many many leg injured dogs here). As a keen birder, I took my camera with me for company and during the long and frequent pauses, started to snap the birds around me.
I am no stranger to Goa and Arambol/Mandrem, having spent many winters here, and am well aware of the amazing bird and wildlife it has to offer. It’s one of the many attractions that keep us coming back year after year. What was a surprise was how quickly, under a year after the closure of many of the beach shacks on the dunes between Food Planet and Arambol beach, the wildlife and particularly the birdlife has started burgeoning back on the dunes. Whilst it’s clear that these closures brought misery for many of the shack owners, seasonal workers and businesses there, the re-wilding of the dunes has been a boon for birds.
The whys and wherefores of the project are purely circumstantial. Before my injury, my perfect day would start early at around 6:30am with a long beach walk from Girkarwada to the end of Mandrem beach where it hit the creek at Ashvem. I’d love taking in all of the sea and shore birds en route and would take my camera out once in a while and snap the Plovers, Sea Eagles and my favourite Western Reef Heron. I’d often stop on the dunes near ‘Elsewhere’ (where the Ridley Turtles Nest) and meditate for a while before slowly walking back home, often taking in a yoga class or simply having a dip and doing a bit of body surfing.
We would go birding once a week on the hill behind ‘Riva' along with spotting birds in and around our small garden in Kepkarwada and monthly bird walks with the Goa Bird Conservation Network. Birding was always present but never as consistent as it turned out to be when it was literally the only activity I could manage.
Whilst my life appeared to have shrunk beyond all recognition, my awareness to my surroundings, like most things in the tropics, grew quickly. The slow pace of my hobbling and frequent pauses led me to see and hear more birds than ever before. Day after day, traversing the same small patch of ground for a couple of hours, my seemingly diminished existence actually revealed itself to be inhabiting a much vaster space than I’ve ever previously experienced. Less breadth, more depth you might say.
The boundaries for the observations had really been set for me. With beach walking no longer an option I stuck to the flatter more even area on and above the dunes. I soon started to know where to find my favourites, recognise more and more calls and the number of species I’d click started racking up very quickly.
People often come over to see what I am up to with my tripod and camera plonked into the sand staring intently down my lens. Fishermen who pass through the dunes every day were amazed to see some of the birds up close for the first time, such as Indian Rollers, Purple Sunbirds and a pair of White-bellied Sea-Eagles with young eaglet high up in their nest in a Casuarina tree. The Spotted owlets always delight people especially as they have been hiding in plain sight just off to one side of a commonly used path in the trunk of an old coconut palm, almost invisible in their incredible camouflage.
I had been sending weekly photos to a group of friends and family using WhatsApp and getting some encouraging feedback. I too, was constantly amazed by the volume of beautiful birds I was seeing. After a few requests from people here in Arambol for a link to an Insta feed or Facebook page, I decided to make a website.
I’m hopeful that the more people get to know and appreciate what’s here, the dunes could continue to thrive become a real nature hotspot. I am not trying to paint a picture of a pristine environment, there’s a lot of rubbish around. While you are here, one way to help might be to enquire at your hotel or confirm with your landlord that yours and their rubbish is being disposed of responsibly (there is a regular daily collection service here but not everyone currently uses or is aware of it).
Enjoy the photos and whether you are already staying here or planning a trip, consider a visit to the dunes with a fresh pair of eyes (and binoculars if you can). This is an underrated, yet surprisingly rich nature area. Perhaps if more people knew what incredible birdlife and nature was here there’s more of a chance that all the birds you see here will continue to make it their home.
So, that’s it. I guess you could call it a very ‘happy happenstance’. As I write this, I am birding most mornings, slowly recovering and currently enjoying a bounty of Sunbirds on the grass bank in front of Giroba temple in the cool of the early mornings.
Happy birding
Ali Reeves