Garganey return to Kavdi Pat, right on schedule

September 14, 2026Narmada Valley dry deciduous forests

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Garganey are back on the Mula-Mutha at Kavdi Pat, the stretch of river about fifteen kilometers downstream of Pune where the road from Hadapsar ends in paddy fields at the water.¹ Five were counted there on September 8.¹ They are the first of the wintering ducks to reach this reach of river, and they are on schedule; (Spatula querquedula) are among the earliest ducks to arrive in India each autumn and among the last to leave, with some staying on peninsular wetlands into May.²

Anyone going to look for them should not expect the bird on the field guide plate. The drake's white stripe curving from the eye down the back of the head and his pale grey flanks belong to breeding plumage, and he is not wearing it now. After nesting the males moult into a drab eclipse plumage and keep it well into the winter. In September the whole flock reads as streaky brown ducks. The drake keeps a slightly stronger head pattern and a whitish chin, and when he stretches or flies he shows a pale blue-grey forewing.

That forewing is the mark. Common Teal, the other small brown duck on this water in autumn, flies on a dark forewing with a green speculum. On the water the Garganey is a little larger than a teal and carries a heavier, all-grey bill. Its head is more strongly striped: a pale eyebrow over a dark eye-stripe, a pale patch at the base of the bill, and a clean whitish throat with no streaking. Indian Spot-billed Ducks share this river all year and are easy to separate, roughly twice the bulk, with a black bill tipped yellow and a red spot at its base.¹

Garganey are dabblers. They feed swimming with the head under, picking from the surface, or upending in water a few inches deep, and they take seeds, pondweed, roots and shoots along with worms, snails, crustaceans and insect larvae. They often feed at night and rest through the day, so a daytime count can miss birds tucked into the reeds.

The birds reaching Pune have migrated in from breeding grounds well to the north, arriving early as Garganey typically do. What they find at Kavdi Pat is a low-gradient stretch of river where the channel spreads into shallow pools, sandbars, mudflats and reed beds as the monsoon flow drops. As the river recedes through October and November, the shallows fill with algae, sedge, small fish and insects, and the ducks and waders gather in numbers. Five Garganey in the second week of September is the beginning of that season.¹

1. eBird
2. iNaturalist

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