N. Gopal Raj Concern over the possibility that wild birds might transport the bird flu virus known as H5N1 has led to greater interest in studying bird migration. A flock of flamingoes over the Pulicat Lake in Andhra Pradesh. One day in December last year, Niranjan M., a 29-year-old engineer and avid bird-watcher living in Bangalore, drove some 125 km to a lake near Somnathpur in Karnataka. The lake was awash with a couple of hundred migratory birds, mostly bar-headed geese and, in the warm glow of the evening sun, he took over two dozen photographs.