White-tailed flycatcher. Picture by Rofiqul Islam

Guwahati, Oct. 23: A field trip with friends at Jeypore reserve forest accorded a an opportunity to Rofiqul Islam to capture a rare sight — the white-tailed flycatcher (Cyornis concretus).

The 776th bird that Islam had seen in his life was also the first photographic record of the white-tailed flycatcher in the country.

The sighting happened during a butterfly meet at the reserve forest in Dibrugarh district on October 18-19 when Islam and his friends had gone to Khonsa road for birding.

“The time was 6.30am when I heard a different bird call. I took out my binocular, could identify the bird through its call and immediately captured it on camera. It was a great experience and later showed it to my colleagues also,” Islam, a birding tour leader with allindiabirdingtours.com since 2007, told The Telegraph.

The 10,876 square km Jeypore reserve forest is in Dibrugarh district, adjoining Arunachal Pradesh. It falls under the Jeypore-Dehing landscape of Assam Valley semi-evergreen rainforest and is one of the last remaining large tracts of lowland tropical forests left in Upper Assam.

According to Birdlife, the bird has been classified under the category of “least concern”.

Naturalist Anwaruddin Choudhury said besides the increased awareness on bird watching, good camera equipment has also helped to take pictures from a distance.

“There are birdwatchers now whose tribe has increased, but we need serious ones too,” he said.

Around 38 people from Sikkim, Assam, Bengal, Manipur, Odisha and Mumbai participated in the meet, which was organised by Butterflies of NE India group, co-ordinated by Monsoon Jyoti Gogoi.

The event was also supported by www.flutters.org, a website on Indian butterflies and wildlife NGO Aaranyak.

“The aim of the meet was to bring the amateurs and experts of this region together. The event will happen annually in different places of the Northeast in the coming years. Although the region is very rich in butterflies with around 1,000 species, there is lack of information from most of sites. Hence, there is a need of network to share and promote butterfly research in this region,” said Jyoti Gogoi, a butterfly expert.

There were talks by experts like Isaac Kehimar, Gogoi, Rajib Rudra Tariang, Sumon Sinha, Atanu Bose and also included field trips.