Submitted date: 25 July 2012 Accepted date: 19 November 2013 Published date: 25 December 2013 Pp. 156.
First sighting of Long-tailed duck from West Bengal
A. Raha & D. Gupta* *Corresponding author. E-mail: debanta_gupta@yahoo.com
Long-tailed duck, Clangula hyemalis is vulnerable and one of the rare vagrants in Indian subcontinent. This species was first sighted in Arunachal Pradesh in 1935, subsequently, in Kashmir, Uttarakhand, and Punjab in 2001. On 21 February 2013, Shantanu Prasad sighted a single female long-tailed duck at Gajoldoba, West Bengal. This is the first record of this bird from Eastern India observed on 28 February 2013.
Submitted date: 22 November 2012 Accepted date: 26 August 2013 Published date: 25 December 2013 Pp. 154–155.
On usage of perches by the Spotted Owlet
A.M.S. Ali* & R. Santhanakrishnan *Corresponding author. E-mail: amsamsoor@yahoo.co.in
The Spotted Owlet Athene brama (Temminck, 1821), although a common, native species in India, is poorly studied. The present study examines the use of various perch substrates and perching heights by Spotted Owlets between 2007 and 2009 in Madurai District (9°30’N, 77°28’E), Southern India. Four habitats; rural, urban, riverbanks, and agricultural lands (transects of 4500m length and 50m width were used for each habitat) were selected and surveyed between 18:00 and 22:00 h for usage of perches. In each survey, perching substrate and perching height used (height on which Spotted Owlet perched) while foraging were recorded following Bell & Ford (1990). The perching heights were grouped into various class intervals: 0–2m, >2–4m, >4–6m, >6–8m, >8–10m, >10m. The chi-square test was applied for testing percent usage of perch substrates and perching heights between habitats.
Hemidactylus frenatus Duméril & Bibron, 1836 usually occur in pairs, is commonly found in human settlements and is thus known as a ‘house gecko’. It only rarely inhabits undisturbed forests in the wet zone though it is comparatively common in dry, intermediate and semi-arid forests in Sri Lanka. This nocturnal species spends daytime in crevices but feeding during daytime has been observed. Although it is not highly territorial, most individuals seem to occupy the same place for an extended period. Group behavior can also be observed, especially within human habitations in the dry zone. This species can commonly be seen on lampposts where it waits for insect prey to be attracted to the light. In addition to the expected assortment of insect prey it also commonly feeds on rice, bread and other household food and hence has become a ‘pest’ in most houses. Habitual cannibalism is shown by some adults as they feed on juveniles. Eggs as a part of a gecko’s diet, whether of their own species or those of another species, are recorded in captivity. In this paper we describe the egg-feeding behavior of H. frenatus in the wild.
Wolf spiders (Arachneae: Lycosidae) are one of the successful hunters which extend their range through various habitats such as wetlands, springs, and sandy coasts, though less information is available on their feeding and predatory behaviour. During the course of regular field visits for an ecological study of benthic fauna on the Mahi estuarine mouth at Gulf of Khambhat, on the western coast of India (22°12’59.13”N, 72°36’55.47”E), interesting observations about the prey-predation relationship between the wolf spider (Lycos sp.) and two crab species Uca lactea annulipes and Cardisoma carnifex were recorded.
Based on the collections from Travancore, India (Chemunji hills, Muthukuzhivayal Bourdillon s.n.), Bourdillon (1904) described and illustrated Eugenia rama-varma Bourd. (Myrtaceae, as “Rama Varma”, “named after H.H. [Mulam Thirunal Rama Varma] the Maharaja of Travancore”, with a comment: “a very handsome evergreen tree found at high elevation above 4000 ft”. Gamble (1919) transferred it to Jambosa, as J. rama-varma (Bourd.) Gamble. Later Chithra in Nair & Henry (1983) transferred it to Syzygium and made the combination S. rama-varma (Bourd.) Chithra (as “rama-varmae”).