GBBC 2026: Watching Birds Where the City Hesitates

We believe birdwatching is a festival. Not because it is rare for us (we watch birds throughout the year) but because every act of attentive looking feels celebratory. This is the second year, we have tried to approach the Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC) more intentionally, treating it not just as participation in a global citizen-science event, but as a moment of collective reflection on urban nature.

GBBC is a four-day global bird monitoring programme where participants record bird sightings and contribute data to international biodiversity databases. Last year, we chose mainstream and well-known sites: Okhla Bird Sanctuary and Lodhi Garden. These spaces are accessible, biodiverse, and loved.

But this year, we asked ourselves a different question: What about the birds that live where we hesitate to go?

Trails followed in Yamuna and Sahibi confluence (left) and sewage drain (right) in the vicinity of the Dheerpur wetland (Screenshot credit: eBird)

Seeking the Unmanicured City

We intentionally chose unmanicured, difficult, and often avoided urban spaces, areas that many would call unpleasant because of strong stench, sewage, or neglect. Yet these are perhaps the most honest forms of our urban ecosystems.

We visited: Dwarka Forest; The confluence of the Yamuna River and Sahibi River; The sewage drain around Dheerpur Wetland; and Jahapanah City Forest. Seven beautiful people joined us this year. For some, it was their first time exploring such spaces with binoculars instead of judgement.

At the Yamuna–Sahibi confluence, the biodiversity was overwhelming. Aryan, who joined us for the first time, stood quietly after spotting multiple species within minutes. He later said he had never imagined such richness could exist at the edge of what many call a “dirty river.”

There, amid the shifting colours of the water, we discussed something fundamental: how the river’s changing shade is not an accident but a reflection of our consumption patterns. The colour of the river is a direct consequence of the most basic necessities of urban life: detergents, drains, industrial discharge, domestic waste. To watch birds here is to confront our own ecological footprint.

Moments That Stay

We met a few young boys near the confluence who were curious about what we were doing. One of them looked through binoculars for the first time and saw a Painted Stork. The look on his face, astonishment mixed with disbelief was unforgettable. For a moment, the river was not a site of waste but a site of wonder.

An inquisitive young boy was amused to spot a painted stork (bottom) with binoculars (Image credit: Nirjesh Gautam)

Around the sewage drain near Dheerpur, we experienced what many would consider unlikely joy. On a muck island beside the drain, we observed stilts, swamphens, glossy ibis, and sandpipers feeding. The contrast was striking: polluted water flowing slowly, and life thriving at its margins. It reminded us that urban biodiversity does not wait for restoration. It negotiates, adapts, persists.

At Jahapanah City Forest, we recorded 17 bird species within a short span. At one point, we went off trail, following the calls of a francolin into denser thickets. That act, listening and following, felt symbolic of what GBBC means to us this year: moving beyond convenience and toward ecological honesty.

Some bird sightings from the visit (Image credit: Nirjesh Gautam)

Beyond Counting

In total, we recorded a rich diversity of species across these sites. But numbers, though important, are not the only outcome. GBBC 2026 for Urban Nature Matters was about:

• Expanding the geography of attention

• Acknowledging uncomfortable landscapes

• Connecting biodiversity with consumption

• Creating first experiences of wonder

• Reclaiming neglected spaces as ecological spaces

If birdwatching is a festival, then it must not be restricted to curated venues. It must include sewage drains, confluences, contested forests, and margins. Because that is where the city reveals its ecological truth and wilderness.

For us counting birds in such places is not merely participation in a global programme. It is a quiet political act of recognition.

And perhaps that is what makes it a festival.