There is a pigeon currently under arrest in Pathankot, accused of spying for Pakistan. Great time for a quiz on our feathered friends and foes.

1. Japanese fisherman call it Ukai. This particular style of fishing is also common in parts of China, Greece and Macedonia where a bird is used to hunt fish with a snare tied around its neck so it cannot swallow the larger fish. Which bird is used in this traditional form of fishing?

2. The bar headed goose breeds near lakes in Central Asia and then holidays in winter in the Indian subcontinent. Why is it of great interest to ornithologists?

3. Glasgow born, he took a position as a cabin boy to reach the United States and made his fortune at Klonkdike when he found a rock the sixe of a goose’s egg. He has figured regularly on the Forbes list of fictional billionaires. Just identify this avian entrepreneur?

4. Still on fiction. Whose first student was a bird named Fletcher Lynd?

5. Which novella was adapted for the 1978 film Junoon, starring Shashi Kapoor, Jennifer Kendall and a young Nafisa Ali?

6. Fill in the blanks with the name of a bird, and for good measure identify the person being quoted “For my own part I wish the ____ _____ had not been chosen the Representative of our Country. He is a Bird of bad moral Character. He does not get his Living honestly.”

7. Which bird shares a mutually beneficially relationship with giant tortoises, where the tortoise actually raise their torsos so that the birds can clean their skin of parasites. This species is reasonably well known in the history of science?

8. What connects Rossini’s La Gazza Ladra, Tintin comics, Swedish and Russian folklore and an album by Marillion?

9. After which bird is the special forces unit of the Indian Air Force named. They are currently deployed in peace keeping operations in the Congo?

10. Which variety of flightless birds are regarded as the only avians who hunt primarily by smell as they have poor eyesight but nostrils towards the end of their beaks? It also lays the largest egg in proportion to its body size.

Answers

1. The Cormorant

2. It is the highest flying migratory bird. While many breeds cross the Himalayas, few fly over the higher peaks. Bar headed geese have been seen over Makalu and other 8000 metre peaks and unconfirmed sightings have them flying over Mount Everest.

3. Scrooge McDuck, who was just supposed to be a one time character in a Donald Duck comic but instead inspired a whole line of new comics

4. Jonathan Livingstone Seagull, the eponymous character of the best selling book by Richard Bach. If you are wondering what the fuss is about, just ask anyone who grew up in the seventies.

5 . A Flight Of pigeons, by Ruskin Bond inspired by incidents during partition

6. Bald Eagle, Benjamin Franklin who apparently preferred the turkey as America’s national bird

7. The Galapagos or Darwin Finches, first observed and captured during his expedition to the islands on HMS Beagle

8. The Magpie, known for its love of bright and shiny items, the opera and album was named after them – and they were the actual villains in the Castifiore Emerald

9. Garuda, the mount or Vahan of Lord Vishnu

10. The Kiwi

Joy Bhattacharjyais a quizmaster and Project Director, FIFA U-17 World Cup

Follow Joy on Twitter @joybhattacharj

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