The rufous treepie belongs to the crow family and is a smart looking noisy bird that is commonly seen and heard on campus. To the right is a magizham or a bullet wood tree, which produces small white flowers with a strong and lasting fragrance.
The rufous treepie (Dendrocitta vagabunda) belongs to the family Corvidae along with crows and magpies, and is found in the Indian subcontinent, with a distribution extending up to Cambodia. It is a handsome bird with a sooty black head and neck, an orangish-brown body, and a graduated long white tail dipped in black. It is a rather noisy bird with a wide range of calls, including “ko-tree” or “krowwiiii kroo”, and short repetitive screeches. It is found singly, in pairs or small groups in scrub, gardens, human habitation, and wooded areas. It is an omnivore that forages at different heights in a tree stand, feeding on fruits, seeds, nectar, insects, small reptiles, which is also known to scavenge and remove ectoparasites from deer. It is often seen in mixed-species flocks, which are parties of different kinds of birds that move together and forage. It is among the four species of treepies found in India, all belonging to the genus Dendrocitta. The grey treepie replaces the rufous treepie at higher elevations, the white-bellied treepie is found in the forests of the Western Ghats, and the Andaman treepie is endemic (only found there and nowhere else) to the Andaman islands. On campus, the rufous treepie is often heard and seen among the trees surrounding Ramanujan auditorium and the library.
Magizham, bakul, or maulsari (Mimusops elengi) is a smallish leafy evergreen tree native to the Indo-Malaya and Australia, which is commonly planted in gardens and avenues. It has small white star-shaped flowers with many petals, with a strong sweet fragrance that lasts long after the flowers fall to the ground. It has glossy green oval leaves with wavy margins and pointed ends, and berries which are reddish orange when ripe. It is a host plant for the caterpillars of Common Red Flash and Common Crow, while the Dark Cerulean feeds on its nectar. There are many magizham trees on campus - on the path leading to the substation from the main building, outside the hostels, and lining the road left of the main gate.
