Galibore

Just after the announcement of this year’s Oscars, I had an argument with a friend over which was a better movie Avatar or The Hurt Locker(watch it if you haven’t!!).  At  some point, my friend puts forth, “Actually, it is surprising that a person like you who is so interested in biology(I left bio in 10th grade :P) didn’t get impressed by Avatar’s imaginative flora and fauna. “. I was not impressed;  we tend to ignore things which are grander,more spectacular and beautiful in real life than reel life. My stand was strengthened by the spectacle I saw last Saturday(15.05.2010) – migration of butterflies( tigers, crows and the egg-flies). Here I present to you my attempt at capturing this mind blowing event.

With Galibore being the first trip out of my canon 50mm lens, I ended up capturing more of birders in various moods than birds.

Shreeram trying to click a Crimson Tip

Mamta engrossed with Tigers and Eggflies

Doddamakali – The good, the bad and the ugly

Doddamakali is JLR’s nature and fishing camp situated on the bank of Cauvery. I and Shreeram reached the camp at around 2 o’clock in the afternoon. The resort staff gave us surprised looks on reaching Doddamakali, it turned out that the Bangalore office had not informed them about our booking, no matter what the service we got over the next two days was superb.

Doddamakali has a grassland and dry scrubs kind of habitat, just that the grass is present on hills instead of flat open land. It is a nice place to observe birds like quails and francolins(partridges), prior to this my associations with quails had only been the scare they give when they fly off with drrrrrrrr sound.

Grassy hill slope

Since this is was my first trip with my new camera the only bad thing about the trip was my photography. Lots of shots which were out of focus, overexposed sky in most of the landscape shots and what not.I am posting some of the relatively better pics .

Rock Agama

One the 2nd evening something really disturbing happened. We spotted a Grey-headed Fish eagle sitting on a bare rock cliff with a big fish. We started approaching the eagle cautiously. The moment Shreeram was going to click the eagle there was a blast BOOM!!. The eagle dropped the fish and flew off. After this  there were two more blasts which drew my attention to some people on the opposite bank. Some fishermen were catching fish by throwing explosive in the river.

After returning to the dining area the JLR staff told us that they had tried to catch of the poachers, but the poachers escaped. They crossed the river in one of the coracle and tried to get hold of the poachers from an elevation. This was so because the last time when the JLR guys tried to follow the poachers from below they were targeted with stones and the explosives which the poachers had for catching fish. All these details were rather depressing.

I will add the complete list of birds and butterflies seen on the trip soon.

Mammals:

1. Grey Mongoose
2. Wild boar
3. Spotted deer