The mango trees in our neighbourhood had put out new growth in winter, and I took a couple of shots of this tree last month. The tender new leaves have the most lovely shades of orange, maroon and pink and they have a clean fragrant smell. By now, they have turned a light green and the tree would probably start flowering in a month or two.
On Diwali day, I was out admiring the early morning view, when I spotted these birds feeding on the ground searching for insects etc. I hurried to get my camera and snapped them from far as I didn’t want to scare them off. Pretty bad shots in the light of the dawn but with some cropping and adjusting the contrast in Picassa, I got enough of details of the birds to enable me to paint them. I found out that they are called Orange headed thrushes and are secretive birds feeding mostly at dawn or dusk and prefer building their nests in mango trees.
Here is the composition I made out of the mango tree and the birds:
Watercolor Journal 