Isabelline wheatear spotted at Adyar Estuary

Around this clip of year, birders Senthilnathan S and Srivathsan Nagarajan are habitues of the Adyar Estuary, the Broken Bridge broadside of it. Any birder successful Chennai worthy his brackish would be. The Adyar Estuary is known to propulsion up surprises, the unexpected, blessed bundle of feathers sometimes being ‘delivered’ connected the peripheries.

On October 2, 2025, the astonishment arrived aft these 2 had turned their backs connected the Estuary, the Broken Bridge. They recovered it erstwhile they were astir astatine the sportfishing hamlet, Urur Olcott Kuppam. It was an Isabelline wheatear.

“We spotted the vertebrate aft our regular birding league successful Broken bridge. At archetypal it was foraging successful the mud roads. By seeing its colour we were definite it was not a regular bird. By the clip we got down from our conveyance it flew and sat connected the formation sands which made it precise hard to spot due to the fact that of its blending colour. After a hold of 15 - 20 minutes we spotted it again connected a tiny works and past connected a heap of debris,” says Senthilnathan.

The sighting is said to beryllium the archetypal not conscionable lone for Adyar Estuary, but Chennai. A sighting of this quality spreads faster than wildfire, and the spot was besieged by telephoto lens of assorted brands. And by the extremity of the day, the Isabelline wheatear was contemplating a vocation successful modelling.

Not each birder that turned up was lucky.

Says Senthilnathan: “On October 2, till the extremity of the day, it was seen; and a mates of birders got lucky, documenting the vertebrate with photographs. We returned to the spot connected October 3, 4 and 5, lone to realise that our luck had tally out.”