Asian Koel Pictures

Asian Koels drive people mad with their insistent early morning calls that actually sound like their namesake "Koel". The Asian Koel (Eudynamys scolopacea) become common sight in Singapore only during the last decade as they gradually migrated down the Malay peninsular from Thailand with the crows.

As a member of the cuckoo family of cuculidae, they lay their eggs in the nest of other birds and let the surrogate parents raise their young. Asian Koels tend to predate the nest of crows. When a male Koel finds a suitable crow's nest minus the presence of the crows, it calls out very loudly "Koel" to attract any female Koel in the vicinity to come lay her egg in the nest.

Competition can occur between male Koels over mating rights. I always wonder what the crows make of it when they raise their very strange looking chick. Koels have distinctive red eyes and the male Koel is dark iridescent blue black while the female has a brown chestnut plumage.

My good friend Shei called me one morning to say that there was this hawk like bird sitting injured on the ground while being mobbed by crows. This happen on the grounds of a church so the scene was almost metaphorical like the story in the gospels of the adulterous women caught in the act by any angry mob of Pharisees or in this case crows.

Now perhaps with the biblical phrase "Let he who has not sin cast the first stone", my gallant friend shooed the angry crows away and rescued what turn out to be an injured female Koel. Could it be that the female Koel was fleeing the scene in haste after laying her egg and banged right into the church building?

Shei wrapped up the injured bird and placed it in a box. He drove the "patient" to the Jurong Bird Park and signed it over to the resident vet who would have the expertise to nurse the injured bird back to health. He should have added "Go and sin no more" but that's another sermon.

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