Diario de sriharsha444

So, on a weekend, (sunday), 12 February i decided to visit a lake in northeast Bangalore. While i planned to visit a single lake, i went to another nearby lake. Both shared fishermen... Which is the subject of this journal... as u can guess by the title.
So the first lake is Maragondanahalli it is situated Huvinane. It had quite the bumpy roads along the way. And it seemed that the lake was in construction and that they were trying to fill more water and clean it. And so i noticed a white looking detergent like chemical they were pouring out that supposedly kills these invasive plants, as to control the overgrowth of these.
the lake was fully covered in invasive water plants, expect for a few puddles along the banks.
At first sight, i saw egrets around cattle which were feeding on the grass found in the walkways. They were hard to photograph. The species is "Cattle Egret", Bubulcus ibis, it goes along with cattle and removes ticks from them. Its a very common bird seen in Bangalore. Especially lakes like these and they are very hardy.

And then i was travelling with my car inside the lake, A fishermen was going with his newly caught fish and we waved at him. He held a big fishing net, which was just a mosquito net with a few logs attached to it. I was surprised, i didnt know that people catch fish in lakes like these.
He then showed his bag of fish, and i definitely knew that it was tilapia beforehand. He caught mostly small ones, but then we saw more of his group catching fish. Specifically it was Oreochromis niloticus, "Nile Tilapia" its a invasive species from Africa introduced to a lot of lakes in Bangalore and pretty much all over India. But this is the first time ive seen someone catch for consuming in Bangalore, from a lake too.

I saw many catch the fish. Even kids, who removed the rocks to make sure the fish dont hide in them. Their only source of food is just these fish.. They are not from Bangalore too. Actually not even from India...

Annnnyways... we left and we then decided to go to another lake, Doddagubbi. And this lake was situated along small villages, with even some lassi! And this lake was absolutely beautiful. It was quite big, with only garbage along the edges. Just entering the lake, we saw another fisherman! Only one though, he had a rod made out of simple sticks, he used earthworm as bait.. But before approaching him, we decided to first look around the lake, and then come back to the fisherman. As we went, the first thing that caught my eye was a flower, a "Morning Glory", Ipomoea i am not sure about the species as i am not so into plants.. But by the looks of it.. It seems to be what i think. Plants usually dont catch my eye, as they are most of the time they are invasive.. But this one is naturalised..

I kept walking around the edges to see if i could spot a Chequered Keelback, Fowlea piscator. A type of snake which inhabits lakes. But then i saw dragonflies around some wood. Initially i saw only one until another one joined it.

Then going towards the lake, i saw a lot of egrets, which were probably not cattle egrets. As the species found before.. I also saw a heron, only a single one though. Upon looking on the sky, i found an cormorant, or sometimes called as an "Shag". I tried my best to spot a Brahminy Kite, Haliastur indus. But for the life of me, i couldn't spot a single one.

Next, on the way i saw a water strider, these are quite easy to come by for this is the first time i've seen one in an lake. They are unique as they are the few insects which spend most of their time on water. And.. walk on water. I wont attach the image to this journal, but i have uploaded it as an observation as with all of these images u see on this post. Excluding the above image with the egrets. So check out the observation here.

Anyways... Do you remember that fisherman we saw at the beginning when we visited this Doddagubbi lake? Yeah we decided to go check up on him. On the way at one of the trees, i heard a rustling.. I saw a bird with beautiful orange feathers! Za! It was a Greater coucal, Centropus sinensis! It was extremely close to me! Probably the closest i've been near a bird.. expect that one kite that tried to kill me.. Unfortunately i couldn't grab any pictures, my phone was not able to catch such a fast moment. Anyways, we went to the fishing guy and guess what! Another tilapia!. However those tilapias were accompanied by a snakehead... Well i guess i didnt find the snake.. but rather the head! He told me that he had waited for an hour just for a few fish, and that they were a lot of different species of fishes in the lake. The snakehead was bitten by another fish, and so, it was easy to catch. However the tilapia cant be ignored! It seemed that it is not the Nile Tilapia that we saw at the Maragondanahalli lake, but rather another species. He called it Jalebi Meen, (Literal Translation:Jalebi Fish) its the local name for the fish. Jalebi is an sweet, very popular in India. Its made using all purpose flour (maida) and its served in a circular and pretzel like shape. See, "Jalebi Meen" seems to refer to the Oreochromis mossambicus, species (Mozambique tilapia). And if u closely observe u will see a sort circular shapes which kind of resemble the sweet. And i think the blue individual that u see on the left in the below picture is that very species. As some observations of the species have that blue color which is not present in the Nile Tilapia.
Again, i am not conforming the species here. I am leaving my notes if anyone wants to try ID it. I have left the Observation as just the genus right now.

Next the snakehead.. Again it was indeed deceased.. I wonder what fish would have caused the damage. Oh and there were 2 individuals i held the big one.

Anyways... Thats about it... I saw some small temples in the lake buts that it...
Please dont judge by just these pics, check the observations, there are more clear photos.
If u have anything to say, Please comment! I would love to see them! 🙏
Thank you all. Keep posting observations, As my first journal, i would like if u guys can provide any feedback..! 🙏
Jalahalli
Bengaluru