Taj Mahal: Through The Eyes of Ornithologist Virat Jolli: Taj Mahal a wonder on earth is India’s finest monument. Considering its historical, cultural and unique architectural design, UNESCO has enlisted it as a World Heritage Site in 1983. It was built by 5 th Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan in the year 1632 A.D in memory of his beloved wife Mumtaz Mahal. This monument is built on the banks of River Yamuna. The monument is a marbled mausoleum and has well managed gardens planted with variety of fruit bearing and medicinal trees. Taj Mahal is known for its unique Mughal architecture but current article aims to highlight much less talked about natural aspect i.e. birdlife. Taj Mahal The Yamuna River, a majour tributary of River Ganga originates from Himalayas descend down at Poanta Sahib, Himachal Pradesh and enters plains of Northern India. This is one of the most important River of India as 70% of water requirement of Delhi NCT is fulfilled by it. River Yamuna falls wi
Revisiting Wetlands of Hoshiarpur, Punjab #Wetlands #Birds #Ecosystem #Landuse Virat Jolli: Last year in the month of November, 2017, we visited a specialised wetland ecosystem in North Eastern part of Punjab in Hoshiarpur District. These wetlands are locally known as chos (seasonal nallahs). During our past visit, we documented some important rare and large sized waterbirds in these wetlands and surrounding areas along with other terrestrial birds and animals. This has fascinated us and raised our curiosity to further explore the region and know more about this relatively little and unexplored region. Chos of Punjab Keeping this in mind, this year in the month of October, 2018, we planned to revisit the site and document its biological wealth. It was a sunny day, I along with a local villager named Gurpreet explored chos of this region. These chos received water from Himalayan rivulets which recharge them and flooded them during monsoon season. Gurpreet, told me tha