Birding in the cold (brrrr.......!!!)

I honestly can't believe that I was able to get up and get out that early today in all that cold to go birding, but I guess I had to. Atleast this beautiful Buzzard was waiting for me. Thanks man for making my day.

Take at the Kralingse Lake in Rotterdam using my friend Chintan's equipment.

Kralingse Lake @ Rotterdam

After a month of not birding I was about to kill someone when I finally got to get out my Binoculars and head for the lake close to my school here in Rotterdam. And boy it was a great birding outing!!!

If my memory serves me right I had seen this beautiful bird near Dibrugarh in Assam in the might Brahmaputra more than a year back.

These beautiful Geese are seen all most everywhere here - in the small canal and streams that criss-cross this country.

Though all most all the birds seen here are also found in some part of India - they were mostly lifers for me and I'm sure they wouldn't have allowed me to approach them so easily back in India.

The woods around the lake revealed a few intersting birds including -
Wood Pigeon, Eurasian Collared-Dove, Winter Wren, Eurasian Robin, Blackbird, Blue Tit, Short-toed Treecreeper, Eurasian Magpie

I'll end my post of this weekend with this beautiful landscape shot.

And heres a complete bird list -

1. Podiceps cristatus - Great Crested Grebe
2. Tachybaptus ruficollis - Little Grebe
3. Phalacrocorax carbo - Great Cormorant
4. Blauwe reiger - Ardea cinerea - Grey Heron
5. Alopochen aegyptiacus - Egyptian Goose
6. Anas platyrhynchos - Mallard
7. Anas querquedula - Garganey
8. Gallinula chloropus - Common Moorhen
9. Fulica altra - Eurasian Coot
10. Larus ridibundus - Black-Headed Gull
11. Columba palumbus - Wood Pigeon
12. Streptopelia decaocto - Eurasian Collared-Dove
13. Troglodytes troglodytes - Winter Wren
14. Erithacus rubecula - Eurasian Robin
15. Turdus merula - Blackbird
16. Parus major - Great Tit
17. Parus caeruleus - Blue Tit
18. Certhia brachydactyla - Short-toed Treecreeper
19. Pica pica - Eurasian Magpie
20. Corvus monedula - Eurasian Jackdaw
21. Corvus corone - Carrion Crow
22. Sturnus vulgaris - Starling

Finally !! This blog goes global.

Since the inception of this blog I have finally got to travel outside India. The following snaps are from the Ras-Al-Khor Bird Sanctuary in Dubai. A great place close to the heart of this fast growing cosmopolitan city.


These Greater Flamingos have to be the star of this Sanctuary (quiet like our Flamingos in Sewri - back in Mumbai)

Birds of interest seen here - (besides the Greater Flamingos) Painted Stork, Grey Herons and hundreds of waders including this Pacific Golden Plover (Male seen here in Breeding Plumage).

@ Asola

Went to check out the Conservation Education Centre here in Delhi @ the Asola Wildlife Sanctuary a few days back.



This good scrub forest- is a great place for Crimson tips and Arab Butterflies.

The Green Lynx

One more of this small beauty.

Drosera - The Carnivorous plant

Members of this genus are called 'sundews'. There are about 150-160 Drosera species described, and they are scattered around the globe. These plants bear stalks or tentacles on their leaves, and these stalks are tipped with glands (which are often brightly coloured). The glands exude attractive nectar, adhesive compounds, and digestive enzymes. Insects that land on the leaves stick fast and are digested. Often nearby glandular tentacles are stimulated and also adhere to the insect, and on many species the entire leaf coils around the prey. These motions are slow, taking minutes or hours to occur.

Unsuspecting prey (like this unided blue butterfly) get stuck and digested by the Drosera

This sticky substance secreted from its tentacles bearing leaves help this Carnivorous plant in catching unsuspecting prey

@ Siri Fort

This from a few days back at the Siri Fort Park in South Delhi

The Common Gull also from the Park

Dragon Season

Its Dragon/Damsel season and I'm celebrating it in my own way by this Odonata only posting session for a few days. Though I've clicked most of these specimens in the past one month I'm also going to be using some from my archieves.


Firstly, the very beautiful Damsel - Agriocnemis nana

This is a very common dragonfly - Orthetrum sabina sabina -Also @ home. These voracious eaters are known to catch insects that are much bigger than them.

Sorry about the quality of the snap, this beautiful and fast dragonfly - Ictinogomphus rapax - was snapped thru my binoculars near the Vihar Lake inside SGNP, Mumbai

The male and female of this species shows a lot of variation. The below snap is of a female - Diplacodes trivialis

This Crocothemis servillia from Powai, I have another angle of this same species posted earlier - showing the black line on it's back clearly.

The Bradinophyga geminata is usually found (like in this snap) on rock surfaces and on the ground, where it becomes difficult to spot them quickly.

This Brachydiplax chalybea from home in Calicut

This Ischnura senegalensis was clicked at home in Calicut.

This Lestes (Spreadwing) from Phansad Wildlife Sanctuary in Maharashtra

This species -'Orthetrum-triangularis'- was quiet common @ Kasauli

These dragonflies are known as "Onathumbikal" in Malayalam, since they are commonly found close to the Onam festival.

I clicked this a year back

And here is the less impressive Male - "Onathumbi"
Also clicked last year

This one probably my most interesting Odonata photo - Though the photo is not that great in quality - it shows an Anax immaculifrons female trying to lay eggs.

This one was taken at the hill station of Panchgani in Maharashtra.

This Brachythemis contaminata from Mumbai's very own Powai Lake.

Also from Powai, the black line on it's back is a key to the positive id of this species - Crocothemis servillia.

Last one from Powai (at least for now). I've seen these dragonflies -Trithemis pallidinervis- everywhere.

Especially lots of them at the edge of Vihar lake inside SGNP, Mumbai.

This male -Neurothemis fulvia- from the smallest hillstation in the world - "Matheran".

The lake at Matheran is a great place to watch dragonflies.

These photos of a Orthetrum pruinosum clelia taken at one of the pereniel streams in the ever-green patch deep inside the Phansad Wildlife Sanctuary in Maharashtra.

Very similar to the Common - Ceriagrion coramandalianum - but very easily distinguished by its striking orange colouration

These guys as there Common name suggests is very Common. Now-a-days India Nature Pixs has been receiving a lot of these guys from all over Peninsular India

These fellows have the most beautiful yellow legs

Shot this particular specimen in the outskirts of Calicut.

But I've seen these fellows before in Mumbai and lots of them around the Lake at Matheran.

These Black and White guys/gals are quite common.

But I seem to see the female more often.

One more from the archieves. Clicked this fellow very close the Conservation Education Centre in the Sanjay Gandhi National Park, Mumbai.

Logo-Trials

Here's three logos I designed for the Malabar Natural History Society for the upcoming All India Butterfly Meet that they are organizing at the Aralam Wildlife Sanctuary near Kannur in Kerala.


(Sadly since I had to leave for Europe to pursue my further studies I couldn't attend the Butterfly Meet and nor did I get the time to follow up on these logos so that they could be used)

@ Paithal Mala

Exactly a month back was @ the beautiful - Paithal Mala. In the north-eastern part of Kannur Distt. It's an enchanting places of Rubber Plantations and Forests that connect into some of the best forests of Karnataka. But alas, the Rain-Gods didn't let us to explore much.

It's supposed to be one of the best places in Kerala for trekking. December is a good season and quiet a few tourists flock in here from all over (India and World) to be one with nature.




I was using my Cousin's D70 and managed very few shots on this rainy day. Here's one of the better ones -

The Fulvous Pied Flat a 'lifer' for me.

This line drawing my me of Malabar Gliding Frog ,Rhacophorus malabaricus (Jerdon, 1870) has been used for the cover of the Malabar Natural History Society's quaterly newsletter - Trogon

Closing in on Wayanad

The very popular Tusharagiri Waterfalls. It's a great place for trekking - Guaranteed amazing sightings of birds, butterflies and Dragonflies.
In Calicut Distt., Kerala and just over an hour's drive from Calicut town.

The foothills of the Western Ghats
Calicut Distt., Kerala

Giant wood spider (Nephila maculate)
Tusharagiri, Calicut Distt., Kerala


Check the size difference between the male and female (The female being the larger)

Tusharagiri is a great place for spotting these fellows...
(Though very difficult to click a good sighting can be made here for sure)

Neurobasis chinensis chinensis - Male
Calicut, Kerala