Sambar!

I'd not shot so many Sambars together in one as trip as this one in Bandipur. I got to spend some good time with this family in evening light!

Alarm Call!

When the predators are around the first thing that a Deer does is to signal its rest of friends that there's an iminent danger around! Here is that Alarm call that tells everyone to run!

Post cards from Corbett!

It's been a while since I'd the chance to process the images from Corbett. I got a chance over the weekend. Here are some of them.

Fantastic Bandipur!

Kiran Keerthana are in India and we decided to make a trip to Bandipur together and all our MBoyz joined in. What a fun it was! While for the first time, we're making a 1 day trip to Bandipur this happened to be the most productive of all the trips! We got to see a Tigress for over half an hour and for every one of us this was a dream come true! I certainly count this one to be one of the most memorable half-an-hour spent! I wish this luck upon every one who visits forests! Here are some images from the trip!

Magical Corbett

Dhikala grasslands located in Corbett National Park is so beautiful that sometimes it makes you wonder if God created it with a paintbrush in hand. On one side is the Shivalik Himalayan range seen at the horizon of the grass land and Ramganga back waters on the other side. The picturesque grass land is home to hundreds of elephants, spotted and sambar deers and wild boars. The bigger predators like leopards and tigers when they frequent here, would surely be confused seeing the amount of food available! Where-to-start is definitely a problem for them.

Lunar Eclipse

Me and Nanda had an opportunity to take Gargi yesterday to Planetarium on the same day of Eclipse. It was fitting that she enjoyed on this occasion. Here are few images that I shot during the Eclipse.

Lunar Eclipse as seen in Bangalore

Moon chasing another moon?

 I shot the last couple of shots initially at 100mm & then zoomed in to the moon to set the focal length at 400mm. Hence the effect. Hope you like it.

Pea fowls

This time in Bandipur, every Safari drive that we took we encountered a Pea cock dancing & impressing his partner. There's a belief that when Peafowls dance, rain is in the air. And it turned out to be that way as we'd light drizzles on and off.

Post card from Bandipur

Last weekend we made a quick dash to Bandipur hoping to see Gauri & its four cubs. There's always an excitement before you go for any trip and more so in case of visit to any Wildlife sanctuaries. That child-like excitement is what drives many of us into the wild. And this trip didn't disappoint us, as the last safari we got to see a glimpse of a Leopard.For Rakesh/Prema/Praveer and the kids, this was their first sight of Leopard. Though we couldn't get a chance to photograph them, it still lightened up our mood.

Images from Ranganathittu

Thanks to our team outing, we'd a chance to visit Nagarahole & Ranganathittu. I've finally started processing some of them & here are couple to start with.

Old ones from Bharathpur

It's been a while since I processed my older images. Perhaps caught up with too much work and I've not planned it well. Hopefully I'll be more regular now. Here are some of the shots from my visit to the one-n-only Keolodeo National Park at Bharathpur

Eravikulam Sanctuary

This is one sanctuary that I should visit many times over in every season. The colors that it offers is amazing to see. Here is a Nilgiri Thar that just showed up at a distance during the evening.



While returning from Munnar, Nanda spotted this Malabar Giant Squirrel right beside the road. Before the incoming traffic could disturb it, it gave few glimpses of its beauty.

Postcard from God's Own Country

Our visit to Munnar & Thekkady during Dasara was awesome. It was very relaxing & refreshing. See a detailed trip report from Nanda here

It's a heaven for landscapes. Here are some of the images from the trip.

Visit to Bannerghatta NP

Thanks to Dinesh & our own initiative from MindTree foundation, I got a chance to see all the areas (so called "core")of Bannerghatta NP today. We have plans of putting up D/N PTZ Cameras at about 50 watch towers inside the park. And I've got the onus to get the complete system up from the surveillance perspective. Ah, talk about passion & work coming together!! This certainly was an exciting day. Here are couple of shots from the visit. I'll post a detailed report soon.

Patterns

Two black bucks retreated as soon as I was driving into their territory, despite the fact that I was more than 100m away. This gave me an opportunity to look for interesting patterns. Here is one of those

Journey Ahead

Couple of weeks back me, Nanda & Gargi made a quick visit to Maidanahalli. This is an amazing place for Blackbucks & Raptors. In two sessions we saw black bucks sparring, an indian fox stalking for a black buck fawn and short toed snake eagle & montagu harriers. Here is the first from the series

Some more images from last day of 2009

Here are some more images

Last day of birding for 2009

It's been almost a year since I went to Hesaraghatta & I decided to end the year 2009 by making a visit to Hesaraghatta lake. Pandith & Abhijit joined me. It was their first visit to Hesaraghatta & no one returns empty handed from this place! It's just amazing how many variety of birds are around this place. I'm yet to identify this raptor. It looks like a Marsh Harrier to me. Do confirm if you know.

Elephant Behavior

Gopalaswamy Betta presented an incredible opportunity for me to shoot this herd of elephants from the top of the hill. I've never seen such a sight before. Watching elephants from the top as if it's seen from an air balloon was really amazing perspective to get. To add to that I saw very interesting behavior from the mother elephant. If you see closely there are two calves suckling from the same mother. It's very rare for an elephant to have twins! I suspect that the other calf is slightly old (may be 3-6 months) & perhaps has lost its mother. The aunt elephant, which is now the matriarch, is taking care of the orphan calf. This social behavior depicts very clearly the caring nature of elephants.

Do share your thoughts if you've witnessed such a behavior before!

Many moods of Jog Falls

Jog Falls has always been a special place in my heart perhaps due to the fact that we lived close by for over 7 years in Gersoppa. Last weekend I got a chance to recapture some of the moods of it. In next few days/weeks, I'll post some of them. I've called them the moods of Jog primarily due to the changing landscape every time you see it. The mist & the rain create an incredible harmony that makes it very special. Here is the first one to begin with.

Elephant Bathing

We'd a great time watching this matriarch taking bath in BRT WLS. For over 10 minutes, me, Nanda and Gargi enjoyed watching her bath. Elephants are child like when it comes to water & they play with gay abandon.