The photographic journey of a Nature Lover: Wildlife

Showing posts with label Wildlife. Show all posts

Sunday, January 27, 2013

A Day with the Blackbucks


A charming Green Bee-eater

The beauty and charm of being in Bangalore apart from the climate, malls, pubs, liquor marts and pretty gals :P ;) is the proximity of the national parks, conservation reserves and many lakes in and around the Garden City.

Jayamangali Bluckbuck Conservation Reserve located around 130 km from Bangalore, is one such off beat wildlife zone. A beautiful grassland typical to the Deccan Plateau, its a beautiful place for photography and observing wildlife.

Known to have the 2nd largest population of Blackbucks in Karnataka, the reserve is a treat when it comes to Blackbucks. One can watch herds of them grazing merrily.

A Blackbuck Herd

Jayamangali is also a birders paradise. Harriers, shrikes, bee-eater, pipits, bulbuls and many others can be easily spotted.

A Montagu's Harrier

An ideal day would be reaching the spot before sunrise, spending the whole day there till sunset.This being my first trip and being an overnight plan, i couldnt spend much time there.

Even though being a protected area, basic amenities are yet to be provided, including forest guards and staffs. The protected area being just 3.23 kmsq, suffers from lots of pressure due to over grazing by local cattle herds, farming and industrialization.

Being a dry grassland with rolling rising and falling landscape, the place is a beauty and one of its kind, that needs to be preserved.

Saturday, October 27, 2012

A trip to Avalanche Lake

The charm of an off beat tourist destination is just different. Stunning vistas, charming people, road less traveled and if you are lucky, an interesting wildlife encounter, but the Best of all is the less tourist crowd!

A view of Avalanche Lake

Avalanche Lake is one such place, the lake being named after a huge land slide "Avalanche". 28 kms away from Ooty, in route to Upper Bhavani passing through one of the most beautiful landscape in the Nilgiris, the final destination the lake itself is a sight to behold!

Starting from Ooty, passing through lush green Horticulture fields, one reaches the Forest Check post at Avalanche, nearby which there is a one of the few Trout Fish breeding centers in India.

The rolling green hills and blue sky are just picture perfect

From the check post the road to Avalanche Lake passes through Mountane type forest full of mosses, ferns, flowering plants, orchids and beautiful waterfalls all of which makes up a part of the Nilgiris Biosphere Reserve.

Merrily cascading water falls and blooming flowers are a sight to behold

Being a protected area, tourist vehicles beyond the check post are not permitted, but a local community initiative by the charming people of the Toda tribes is available, through which one can hire a jeep and a guide for the entire trip up to the lake and back to check post.

Beautiful grasslands and Sholas

All along the way the guide provides wonderful facts about the plants and ecology of the region and insights on Toda tradition and customs.

Also one comes across flowering variants of the famous Kurinji Flower or Neela Kurinji ( Strobilanthes kunthiana ) which is know for flowering once in every 12 years, causing a mass blooming of flowers during the monsoons creating a look of velvet carpet across the higher hills of the Western Ghats.

The annually flowering family members of the famous Kurinji Flowers

The flowering bushes, water gently cascading down the stream makes the place picture perfect.

Another beautiful vista

The Bhavani Temple located half way through the route is one of the most beautiful places i have ever been. The humble little temple along the stream surrounded by the rolling green hills gives the ultimate touch of spirituality to serene and tranquil location.

Tranquility at its best

The lake with its emerald blue waters and the lush green hills is a wonderful sight. If lucky one can spot wildlife along the lake and also in route.

A curious Jackal looks on

The avalanche lake tourism is modeled in a effective sustainable method by employing the local communities and also restricting the number of tourist flow per day to around 10 trips approximately some 100 to 150 persons a day. Its one of the best example for conservation based Eco tourism and can act as an example for tourism in other ecologically sensitive area. As long as such an initiative works, conservation and tourism can go side by side ensuring preservation of the fascinating life among us.

Monday, June 4, 2012

Ducks,Moorhens,Pelicans and a Sea Eagle

Black Headed Ibis

A plan hatched overnite, heading without directions and with absolute zero expectation! This was how I set myself to Pallikarnai early morning two Saturdays back, for my first birding trip in chennai.

Purple Moorhen

In the end it turned out to be pretty good day for birding.. especially Pallikarnai marsh.. the density and variety of birds out there was just stunning.

Fulvous Whistling Duck

The marsh was full of purple moorhens,fulvous whistling ducks,cormorants, black headed ibis, glossy ibis,spot billed ducks, common coot and a lot many, here are some pics i managed to click with my 18-135 mm lens.

Spot Billed Duck

Pallikarnai seemed to be perfect wetland habitat.. but what troubled me the most was the presence of this land fill sight.. that's fast degrading this awesome and beautiful wetland that's home to so many species of birds.

The landfill sight on the back ground

Common Coot

A happy family of whistling ducks

Before we started towards ECR.. a pelican flew by.. proudly gliding with his massive wings.

Spot Billed Pelican

In ECR it was again a search for pelicans and a casual visit to the good old croc bank.

White throated Kingfisher

The pelicans gliding happily.

The search for pelicans turned out to be pretty rewarding.. with a group of nearly some 30 to 40 odd spot billed pelican and my first ever sighting of a white bellied sea eagle.

The flock of pelicans

White Bellied Sea Eagle

It was indeed a day for the pelicans..as again in ECR too another one flew past us..with those Majestic Wings!

White Bellied Pelican

Monday, March 5, 2012

Life in Croc Bank

Being a part of the Docent program at Madras Crocodile Bank Trust aka Croc Bank..is just an awesome experience!!! A wonderful place to getaway during the weekends from the horrors of a metropolitan city... and getting to stay over night at Croc Bank makes it more fun and interesting!!!

Nothing can beat the night walks at Croc Bank, the beach and the Sunrise on the Bay of Bengal!!! Now for those who dont know much about Croc Bank.. well in a jiffy.. here it is MCBT in short is a reptile zoo and a herpetology Research station, which was intially started as a captive breeding center for reviving the three indian croc species. It was founded by the world famous herpetologist Romulus Whitaker . Ever since then Croc Bank has been into conservation and captive breeding of endangered Herps!!

Currently housing 14 species of crocodilans and the only zoo in India to have a pair of the critically endangered tomistoma schlegelii.

Other exotic crocs that have found a home at croc bank include the spectacled caiman, yaccare caiman, the drawf caiman

Another major attraction is the beautiful first underwater gharial exhibit. Being one of its kind in India, it provides a glance into the amazing underwater life of the gharials.