For wildlife photographers in Mumbai, the flamingo season has always meant one thing: Thane Creek at first light, a long lens, and the patience to wait for the pink tide to arrange itself into something worth pressing the shutter for.
This year, that equation is being rewritten.
With flamingo numbers at Thane Creek noticeably thinner — a consequence, most believe, of El Niño-driven changes to the ecosystem — a growing number of photographers have begun following the trail of informal sightings to less familiar ground. The reports coming back are interesting.
Mulund Hills, not typically on any wildlife photographer’s Mumbai itinerary, has been mentioned repeatedly in birdwatching groups and photography communities over recent weeks. The sightings are not enormous in scale — not the vast Thane Creek panoramas that have filled calendars and Instagram grids for years — but they are striking in a different way. More intimate. More unexpected. The backdrop is hills instead of industrial horizon. The light, at golden hour, catches differently.
For photographers, there is something quietly exciting about documenting a moment of ecological transition — being present when a bird that has always been there suddenly appears here.
“It’s the kind of shot you can’t plan for,” says one Mumbai-based wildlife photographer who made the trip last weekend. “You go, you don’t know what you’ll find, and then suddenly you’re photographing flamingos with the Sanjay Gandhi National Park tree line behind them. That doesn’t exist in any archive anywhere.”
Whether the Mulund sightings become a reliable photographic destination or remain a one-season curiosity will depend on what happens next. But for now, the photographers chasing the story are finding that the flamingos, as always, have led them somewhere worth going.
Point your cameras north.
