Gorookana / Gorukana

Last weekend I had been to BR Hills with kids of valley school, volunteering for a nature camp in association with ATREE. Although I cut short my stay down to one day, it's nice to be back in jungles and especially with the kids. Deepa had caught the whole episode on her blog at http://deponti.livejournal.com/740798.html in detailed posts.

Soligas are the tribals living in BR Hills and surrounding areas (in adjoining tamilnadu forests). They have been living in jungles from ages and depends on nature and forest for their livelihood. They have very good knowlegde of jungles, the wild life, medicinal plants found there. We visited VGKK, started by Dr.Sudarshan which is insrumental is tranforming their lives. Meeting the kids there, made the trip more memorable.

The contrast in lives of the soliga kids and the city bred kids is quite visible, but kids are kids and we had good fun. When the question "How many of you spotted tiger", apparently the hands kept going up. Can't believe that the kids goes to jungle everyday after school to collect firewood! No Xboxes, No Cartoon network, No Theme parks. All they have are green and lush jungles around, a lake to swim, a hillock to climb and fresh air and full of plays and loads of fun!

What kept me haunting from the trip is the beautiful song the children sung while interacting with valley school kids. All I could understand was the word Gorookana (or was it Gorukana) which we were told means a spider (my guess - giant wood spiders that we found every 10 mts while walking). But the song was too tempting that I ended up searching for the lyrics and meaning.

Although I didn't find the right song, here I found something closer. 

http://www.musicindiaonline.com/album/31-Kannada_Movie_Songs/22427-Bhoomigeetha__1997_/#/album/31-Kannada_Movie_Songs/22427-Bhoomigeetha__1997_/

It's nice, melodic and I can understand few words in the lyrics that they are referring the jungles in the song titled "Gorookana". I have recorded the audio when the kids sang, but  I guess it's not kannada. I want to go back document the lyrics, translate and publish here, since I cannot find them on net. All I found was a reference mentioned in someone's profile that he was instumental in taking sholiga's to delhi to sing this song. 

If any of you could help in translating the original (i guess the song was not in kannada) or the commercial version of it (in kannada in the link above) drop me a mail. Till then enjoy the music of ilayaraja in the above link.Almost forgot, VGKK started a resort and hired all sholiga's there. It's equaly beautiful. Here is the link to it .

Birding at Sakaleshpur

When do you say you had a great birding trip??
A. When you get to see some lifers
B. When the place is full of bird and resonates with their calls
C. When you had good food and had great time
D. When you meet like-minded people and make good friends

If we were asked this question about our birding trip to Sakaleshpur last week, without thinking we choose another option "ALL THE ABOVE". Last weekend, we (Soumyajit nandy and I) were planning to go for a birdwatching trip and were pondering about the place. That's when we saw the mail from Dr.Javid on bngbirds offering birders to stay at his place with no cost and do birding. We instantly decided to visit his place and now we are glad we did!.Now, if you have time, read through the detailed report, othewise you can scroll down to see the bird list.

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If you thought "drag racing" happens in bangalore city, we dare prove you wrong. Do board one of those private buses to "Kukke Subramanya" that can drop you at Sakaleshpur and one hour past bangalore, it's game on!! I doubt how many souls had dozed off in our bus. Rash driving is too small a word to compare what we witnessed. Finally, we were dropped at 4 am in Sakaleshpur. Thanks to Dr.Javid, who arranged us a vehicle that can pick us up from the bus stand. At 4-30 we were picked up after watching the bats go after the moths and insects at the lamp post! After a 40 min drive, we reached Dr.Javids estate. We were greeted by Dr.Javid and his cute pups and we opted to take a quick nap after the horrendous ride that made evaded us the sleep.

Day one:
At 6-30 am, we woke up and came out to hear the symphony going around the estate. We can hear hornbills, jungle fowl, bulbuls, barbets and some strange calls (which we identified later) and the place is full of activity. We went out and the first sighting was "Ashy wood swallows". A pair of them are nesting in a tree in the estate compound. They came out and are drying out in the morning sun. Barely few minutes later, we saw a couple of racket-tailed drongos perching on a tree and flyng off in no time and a pair of White-browed wagtails were fooudn nesting in the top of the bungalow. The start made us exciting and we moved out after a cup of steaming coffee.

We selected the eastward route which goes through the coffee plantation and further down to a stream. Hardly 5 minutes into the walk, we realized what is it like birding in that terrain. Our necks have to bent more than the "plains" and our binocs and camera have to be pointed up at extreme angles. While we try to focus and identify a bird, either it fly off or another one comes and perches. We realized how diiferent it is to find, focus and identify birds in the canopy. I must admit, birding in plains is lot easier , compared to this terrain.But the variety and vocals will keep you mesmerizing and makes your neck bend!

We spotted the noisy Plum-headed parakeets followed by scarlet minivets and we can hear the wood peckers hiting hard against the wood. To be honest, for few minutes we were lost and little worried, because we can hear so mancy calls but they are too quick for us to spot, focus and identify. Later, we regained hope and chose a track that had a decent elevation over another track that goes down. Barely 20 meters into the route, the yellow-browed bulbul came and perched hardly 10 meters from us and we did had a great time watching it!Later, Malabar parakeets came along, in fact it's just the start, all through our stay and outings, malabar parakeets are spotted very frequently.

As we proceeded another 50 metres through the coffee plantation, we saw a fruiting creeper with activity around .We stopped and waited and spotted the Asian Fairy blue bird maleat "eye level" and barely 20 metres away. This guy is a beauty to be adorned. We stayed back for a while and soon a white-cheeked barbet joined the party and a couple of Orange-headed thrushes too. We had a satisfying look at them and went ahead to see the Malabar Grey hornbill perched up on a dead tree with a feed.

Few seconds later, it went further down and that's when we noticed that it is feeding another hornbill (not sure if it's young one or female, too far). Further down we spotted a Pompodaur Green pigeon.

We stayed back at the spot for half an hour since the view from the place shows the valley and all tree tops are at eye-level from the spot. We were not dissapointed as we saw the racket-tailed drongo swooping down chasing an insect catching it in mid-air and back on perch and finishing it off. It's an amazing experience to watch them do it with long trailing tail.Further, we spotted an Ashy drongo and a cuckoo-shrike.

We turned back from the spot and while walking back we finally spotted the woodpeckers that eluded us in the morning. The first one turned out to be Lesser Yellownape. As we turned to our left we saw this small bird on tree top almost at the edge of a branch. I was wondering what it was and a closer look revealed it to be Brown-capped Pygmy woodpecker (our first). In between we managed to spot the Red-whiskered bulbuls, Jungle Mynas and surprisingly no red-vented bulbuls and missed out id-ing a flycacher (looks similar to Asian brown). After 3 hours we returned to have an yummy breakfast accompanied by wonderful company of Javid sir.

As the sun came out harsh we just relaxed in the bungalow, played with the pups and enjoyed the smooth, slow and soothing music collection of Javid sir. We did a verandah birding and spotted the yellow-browed bulbul again, watched the activities at the Ashy wood swallows nest and listened to Booted warbler calls, watched the coffee seeds being cleaned and dried out in the sun. We then went down to the stream hoping to see fly-catchers but were dissapointed with no spottings and came back since sun was harsh.A little while later, I started to hear this call from closeby which I am not familiar. I walked down few metres and finally spotted a couple of Rufous treepie. The best part is, one of them perched nicely on tree top(female) and the other one started "hopping" next to it. It makes a call, hops and lands at the same place. Is this a mating ritual?This is the first time I observed this. This went on for some time and then both flew past to another tree. We had a good lunch, caught a little nap and off we go in the evening to the fields in the valley with packed tea and biscuits.

From morning one call kept haunting us. It sounded like coming off an electrical musical instrument and it was loud. We hoped that we would chase the mystery and the opporunity came ou way in the evening. While walking down the road through coffe plantations, we spotted chest-nut tailed starlings, blue-capped rock thrush and malabar parakeets. After 20 mins walk we reached the stream to see a fleeing cobra. We saw a big tree at this place where lots of birds were perching and one guy stood out. We initially thought it was a hornbill but the tail seems to be longer and as we approached closer, we saw it clearly and it turned out to be a white-bellied treepie. As we went closer to the tree is started making calls, the same one's that haunted from morning and our puzzle was solved. It's indeed a pleasure to watch a white-bellied treepie call. It moves it's whole body and let's out the call which is a little harsh, but we found it pleasing. From then, we heard the call on numerous ocassions all over the place, the next day as well. It in fact made our trip worth it. We turned back finished tea and sancks and headed home and called it a day after a simple but delicious dinner.
(if you managed to reach here.. thanks.. read on)

Day 2:
We started off little late since there was mist around. We both headed in different directions. While my friend spotted couple of cobras. I stay put at the gate of another coffe estate and I did had a replay of the species of the previous day. Added to the list are a pair of nuthatches. Yellow-browed bulbuls re-appeared, racket-tailed drongos chased each other. Another interested sighting is of a squirell which is rufous in color and short tailed compared to the palm squirell. I do not have a field guide to mammals. Can anyone help educate us about it? Later added to the list are Oriental-wheite eyes and black throated munia.

Post breakfast we rejoined and at around noon we headed one last time for spotting. This time we had our lessons and chosed the road that had a decent elevation and activity to save our neck from straining too much.we saw Chest-nut tailed starlings of malabaricus species along with the other species together. We could differentiate them clearly. Do they both colonise together?Further down, we spotted a Bronze drongo with the bright wings and dull tail and not-so-deep fork of the tail. Then came a Black-lored tit with nuthatches and while we are spotting them, we saw a movement on tree bark and it turned out to be DRACO! It displayed its amazing camouflage and the bright throat and flew to the next tree. We wrapped up our outing satisifed with the sighing, but the story didnt end there, we spotted a Common Flameback busy searching for some insects on a tree!

We finished our lunch and picked up a vehicle and planned to go to "Kadamane", the huge tea esate next to the forest.We reached there at 4-00 pm and were told that we have half-an-hour before they close. Although the view is exciting, but the fact that so many hills are converted to tea-estate made me feel bad. We causally walked down the road and there came another best moment of the trip. Another white-bellied treepie, came out and perched at 10 mts from us and kept on giving the closest possible views we can every ask for. We had a great time watching it from close quarters and the 45 mins we spent there was worth it!!. Our flycatchers luck was not bad as we spotted a flycatcher on the way back. We are not sure if it is Nilgiri or Verditar Flycatcher. Any help?? We could not get a good look at it, due to blocking twigs and shortage of time and we didnt want to trouble the shy bird more and left the place.

We were dropped back in Sakaleshpur at 6-00 from where we took a KSRTC "Sarige" and reached bangalore at midnight.We had wonderful trip, thanks to like-minded bird lover Dr.Javid. Sir, we owe you a big thanks for letting us stay at your place and had these lovely moments.

The day Pharaoh visited..

Yesterday I had a surprise in office! After a lazy lunch, as I went to our break out room, a colleague of mine showed a picture she clicked on her mobile of what she thought is an "eagle" perching near the window of the women's loo. Seeing at the visual I jumped... it's the Pharaoh himself!! I exclaimed, goodness it's the "Egyptian Vulture"!!!
(more info on wiki- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egyptian_Vulture)

My office is very close to ITPL (precisely 1 km away from ITPL, on the main road ) and knock knock, we have an Egyptian vulture resting near the window pane today. (place similar to where blue rock pigeons nest in apartments). This is so exciting, since people travel all the way to Ramangaram off Mysore road to get a glimpe of a nesting pair there and we found one in our building.

I struggled hard to held back my temptation of breaking into a women's loo. But had to settle with a view from far when few kind women colleagues opened the door for a long glimpse. (to stop your imagination going elsewhere, the window where it perched is dead opposite to the loo's door). So near yet so far for "men".That fella must be male..grr

Upon my request the ladies brought us this video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSsdOPtXCEE

Smart fella he knows that we can't touch him because of the window glass and let people come very very close !! So, my earlier suspicion of sighting one at my office is true. So you all know where I will be peeping everyday after lunch time.. just kidding!

Bheemeswari - Part 1

A post pending from 3 weeks. Finally a 4 day leave on grounds of ill health helping me post this.

All right here we go - as usual our manager B was grinning wide when our partner confirmed funding for team outing and with no second thought the option to choose the place has been passed on to yours truly. After being tired with the usual city resorts, I thought this is the time to try Jungle Lodges and Resorts day visits. Quickly checking facts of JLR we zeroed in on Bheemeswari on the banks of Cauvery. In fact JLR had 3 nature and fishing camps located on the banks of cauvery - Doddamakalli and Galibore being the other two.

Off late our team had become more family centric- hence I starte calling it AUT, well nothing to do with Applicatin Under Test, but it's the "Aunties n Uncles Team". The moment guys hear about a trip they start it-"only day trips","I can't leave my husband/wife, but I can't bring them either", "I have a baby to take care"! "My in-laws won't let me go", "we are expecting guests"..... the list goes on. Whatever, we realized that we cannot afford an overnight trip with team anymore! Hence the day trip is best for us. Once we finalized the place the usual games of "Who's IN" and "Who's OUT" for the trip started. Finally 2 people dropped out. So we ended up with 9.

Let me stop this crap and start the drive. Soothing the nerves of our manager, sap(my best buddy at office) and I made it just in time for the 7-00 am deadline for transport and for a change everything went smooth with transport and breakfast and bloody hell I again endedup counting money, collecting bills, maintaining accounts! WTF!? When will I relax and enjoy the trip as a member than worrying about money, food for driver, route etc. We hit Adigas at Banashankari for some yummy breakfast and started off.

The travel till Kanakapura had no surprises and the tiny town of Kanakapura which seems to have got some inspiration from Bangalore with roads being laid and expanded! Guys reminded about the Water rafting and i went searching for an ATM. I was in 2 minds on water rafting but on a safer side carried enough cash to try it just in case my decision changed. After travelling down to Satahanur we took the right turn to Muthathi. The terrain started changing and we didn't feel that its been hardly 1.5 hours away from bangalore. This is the beauty of bangalore, travel for 2 hours in all 4 directions of bangalore, you end up seeing different jungles and eautiful landscapes!

Finally after traversing mini ghat roads, we reached the place - "Cauvery Fishing camp aka Bheemeshwari Fishing and Nature camp" at 10 am after paying a 50 RS village developement fee which I wonder where it ends up. The moment we entered the resorts, we are in for surprises.. 1. The resort manager was not informed of our arrival (I made payment just the evening before the day we left) 2. Cauvery is in full flow!! Man you gotta see the beautiful cauvery which appear to be flowing slow and silent but a closer look tells you that it's a strong current! The monkey menace has to be noted here, these guys having used to visitor littering have become smarter. One chap jumped into the van and despite of Shalini's balooned body and trying to converse in English with him/her, he/she didn't give a damn flicked a packet of chips!! Evolution hmmm..

The bird watcher and the naturalist enthu in me could no longer be hidden. I started with bird watching pulling the whole team into watching the Green bee eater, the king fisher and the red rumped swallows! Most of them wondered how to use the binocs!!Whatever after a refreshing welcome drink (my favorite- lime juice), we were asked if we are game for rafting since another team are leaving for rafting then, we choose to do it in the afternoon after lot of debating. The first activity was a trek up the hill to the view point.

While yasvanth and I were busy chasing the butterflies with cameras, rest of the team walked half a kilometer and were shouting. So we ran and caught up with them. I soon realized why we were served lime juice. The sun is blazing and trek at 11-00 am is not a good idea espcially with 90% obese persons in the gang!! (uff including me). I was dissapointed that this camp do not have a naturalist! But still, I love JLR camps for the ambience, the places and the food! Although I have been to only 3 (Bandipur, Bannerghatta and Bheemeswari.. oh wait all B's). The log huts make me think wild and feel like staying back there for some more time.

Before you forget about the trek, let me go back,.. so with lots of huff and puffs we reached the view point after 45 minuts. I was the last one to reach clicking pictures and complaining about the trek not being a walk. Well there is a big difference between a nature walk and trek. A trek is something you start early in the day (to restirct loss of energy due to sun) and your aim is to reach a particular place by so & so time and come back and time is the utmost thing. But a nature walk is where you hardly walk... yes if you have the keen eyes and the company of a true naturalist like Karthik, every step shows you something and catches your imagination and attention. Every flower had a story to tell every bird makes you think about it's behavior, every thing in the jungle tells you a story if only you can hear! Unfortunately our urban souls could not hear or understand those and half of our team mates think I am crazy and they hoot, shout and scream.. thinking it's a picnic place.


The view from top is just amazing... with cauvery flowing full, it's just WOW! Here is how it looked like. Imaging one sititng here and enjoying the view.

The late monsson showers ensured good patches of grass on the hill.

here is the watch tower

and the butterfly that made me wait and wait to pose like this..

Finally the JLR guy who accompanied us thought we had enough fun and just before we started back, we spotted the water rafting group and the 12x zoom + digital zoom helped me click this one at the "splashing moment"More to continue in Part 2...

Beat d heat..

What are you doing this summer to beat the heat??

Here is some cool thing to do this summer!!




If that was not enough, spend the evenings at a beautiful place with your loved one's



For the non-bangaloreans reading this, that's the lung space of bangalore named lalbagh

Well, house hunting is eating my free time and more on that in a detailed post.For now, wish me a good spotting (read house)

The "much needed" vacation

Finally, I grabbed time to update my blog after looooong vacation. Had a memorable trip down to Coastal karnataka. Watched the last sun set of last year followed by the sunrise on the first day of the year that made me spell bound(i still had the images reeling in front of my eyes).

A detailed report on the vacation will follow. But for the time being here are some pics I loved- made during the vacation.

"Makara Sankranti" is the time of the year where the farmers bring home their yield and rejoice with family. Here is the corn yield pile! Wish you all a happy sankranthi!



Here is a NATURE CANVAS I found at Bandipur at the day-break!!


I tried some B & W images off late and loved the feel in these..here are couples of them..


One more... look at the "change of times" in this one!!



I sing off this post with one beautiful image. Here is the First sun of the year.. emerging from the clouds-clad hills near Agumbe. Wishing a great beginning in your life and a great year ahead!!

Random Update

Nothing much, just landed in office straight from a trip to hometown and bloody APSRTC buses always runs slow and I repeatedly trust them and ends up feeling cheated. Finally after some grueling 16 hours journey I went straight to office (barring the 2 hours break to fresh up) and half asleep as i was typing this post. (continuing it on Wednesday below.. )

Trip to home town was refreshing and urban birding was exciting. I started noticing things at home town which I never did before!I tried sharing the observations with our family and thankfully they think I am not insane!!Here is the strange perch of the White throated King Fisher that is commonly found across.
Must be waiting for it's mate to play see-saw!??It is not it's usual perch, once can find it usually near water bodies, wonder what is it up to?

I always felt that my hometown do not have those special or bright or colorful birds. But I was proved wrong. Just when I moved out for a haircut, there came the highlight of my whole trip.. the Eurasian Golden Oriole. What a beauty!!!I was very happy to see this one at my hometown! Not surprisingly my uncle never noticed it.,. I told you it's just a matter of "noticing" things that makes a difference..

These bright golden yellow birds leaves you at awe and this one is no exception. It is a winter migrant to South India and not a "resident". The Drongos are chasing it away from their territory. This made me resolve that I would explore more wooded areas around my hometown pretty soon.

Now I am sure all of us had seen this guy near our homes.

This is the DRONGO and look at it's beautiful tail, the big give-away. They are found very widely across India. A couple seems to have nested close to our home and they put up a great show.

Next came the black beauty - the male ASIAN KOEL with it's stunning RED eyes!
A generic note- All beautiful and colorful birds are male!! (although we have very few exceptions). So next time you see a beautiful bird with a bright colors or plumage, the chances that it is MALE is high.God is a Fair man!:)

Besides these, I noticed the Ants and their relationship with the ticks (another post) and few other birds. Finally the urge in me to find our the birding places around my home town is increasing!! This trip had given the right inspiration!!So donno where I end up...

Now if you are tired of watching and reading about birds... (you need to bear with this trend in my new blog for a while..) here is a Homo Sapien at work..

A naturographer at work!! or PAW- Photgprapher at work .. the way my friend Deepa called it.

The most exciting thing I am looking forward is the 15 day vacation that we are going to enjoy this year end starting 19 December and ending 4th Jan.. Thank god I am with this company!!! (aah I can smell some J factor)

The Love of Nature

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Prelogue:
~I woke up in the morning, got out of bed. Picked up the news paper. Read it a while sipping coffee.

~I started to office, cursed the traffic, waited impatiently at the signals and finally reached the office and rushed in with impatience.

~I took a break and came out of office, crossed the road cursing the traffic yet again and finished off my work and get back to office.

~While walking on the road with friends and collagues, we gossiped and discussed about job, manager and gals of course ;)

~On weekends, I sit back at home on saturday morning wondering what to do !

Epilogue:

~I woke up in the morning, went out and my eyes searched for the daily visitors- the whitebrowed wagtails and the spotted dove. While I read the newspaper I lent an ear to enjoy the song of the wagtail.

~I started to office, scanning the skies and the tress tops. Traffic signals provided ample time to look out for birds around. I reached office glancing the "resident" Rock pigeons and the huge fig tree.

~I took a break and came out of office and noticed the regular Pariah kites that dominate the skies. I found that a group of rose ringed parakeets too were making lot of noise.

~While walking on the road with colleagues gossiping, I talked less and scanned the skies and trees... besides regular gossip. I picked up something from the ground aaah a fig fruit, I opened it and searched for the fig wasps!!
( at times preaching friends about how wonderful fig pollination is..)

~On weekends, I started wondering how to manage time with so many birding places to visit!!

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Aaah.. you are right!!! I misplaced the Epilogue!!. But, it was intentionally done!

Now some questions-
What can a 3 day program do to a city/town-born spoiled brat?? - Magic!!
What can a meeting with other nature lovers can do to a nature lover--? Rub-off effect!!
What can an enlightenting session do to someone who think wild life=forest?Discover the city outskirts!!

The answers for all those can be searched by analyzing the prelog and epilog I wrote above
Between the prelog and the Epilog happened the Jungle Lodges and Resorts-Naturalist Training program! (henceforth referred JLR-NTP)

When Shalini called me on one fine day in September and informed me about the JLR-NTP Program plan, I jumped up at the thought. How can I reject such an offer, it's something that I have been looking forward to, but never thought it could happen so soon. So how can I reject such an offer. I need to attend a wedding around the same time, but gave it a slip and decided that I will spend 3 days away from the civilization learning what is it to be a naturalist. I blocked my calendar, applied for leave and was counting days.

Finally the D-day arrived and I packed off my bags and reached Ramesh's place albeit with regular delay.We are joined by a group of women and in total 11 of us set off in 2 cars to Bannerghatta to spend 2.5 precious days away from home. We stopped at one of the darshini and finished our breakfast and reached the Bannerghatta zoo well in time. From there finally we were "escorted" by the JLR staff into the herbivores park and eventually to the JLR-Bannerghatta camp where our trainer Mr.Karthikeyan was waiting for us.

I read Karthik's blog (http://wildwanderer.com/journal/) and learned more about him through websites and forums and admired him. So, the idea of meeting him excited me.Karthik came to receive us and ushered us into the meeting room. Another student named Rachana joined us. After completing the formalities, the "ice-breaker" session started where we tagged each of us with an animal or bird name and Karthik added more insights into each of those.The fun has just started!! I was asked to start the naming and I smartly passed on to my neighbour to start, but evenutally we were told that everyone should reiterate all the names quoted till then and proceed that put me in a spot!! :)Now the ball passed on and I should thank god we are only 11 members. I quicly picked up the Copersmith barbet name looking at the name of one of the tents and co-incidentally I was alloted accomodation in the same tent.That is not the end, we spotted Coppersmith Barbet in almost all 3 outings that followed and I fell in love with this bird.

The first session was very interesting (infact all sessions). It's on the "Naturalist" and "Bio-diveristy of India" which amazed us and we started to get a feel of the whole thing. We had a break which prompted us to take our cellphones and go hunting for signal. Ramesh and I went searching for signal in the JLR campus and somebody told us that we can get decent airtel signal if we walk beyond the dinner place taking the small clearing that reaches the border of the campus.

We went promptly looking at our cellphones signal and while we are searching for signal as I stepped further I heard some noise in the bush next to me. I was curious but then started looking at the signal and stepped further.I heard another sound from the bush that drew my attention and bingo out came a colorful small bird out of the bush, glanced at me and flew away.!! It's the INDIAN PITTA. It's colors are stunning and awesome and made a vivid combination. I know instantly that I had seen this birds before. Memories from childhood flashed for once. I remember, we tried rescuing it when we were kids but failed to so. It's a complete surprise to me.

Back to the sessions- the afternoon session was when we tried to draw a sketch of birds. It's fun and imagination at it's best and we are anxiously waiting for the "nature trial". Eventually at 4-30 we set out albeit a bit late on a nature trail.We started geared up wtih cameras and bincos and first spotting if i remember right was none other than the "Copper smith Barbet"...way 2 go.. !!It's an interesting birds with beautiful bright colors and never seazes to amaze me.No wonder that's why they had choosen it to be on the cover of the Grimmett and Inskipp's "Birds of Indian Subcontient ".

Once we moved out of the campus,we saw a millipede and karthik told us that it's harmless and we handled it with ease. We learnt the difference between the Centipede and Millipede.
Interestingly it had ticks or parasites clinging on to it's body. Then we debated what we say was a Jungle crow or a Common crow and moved toward the lake.We had a good outing and we started to identify birds...oops I should say we started to find out birds to identify.

I must admit as a starter it's tough on first hand to spot the bird leave alone identifying it.With the kind help of Karthik, we saw the White cheeked barbet and Pond Heron and then moved on to see the "Resident Sambar" of the Herbivore park. The light was quickly failing and just when we are about go back we saw this active brid flying around and catching something in air.The beautiful blue color and tiny body made it look awesome. It put up a great show for us. Karthik eventually told us that is' the TICKELLS BLUE FLY CATCHER.

With the ligh failing, we returned to our rooms and refreshed and watched a wonderful part from the "Life of birds" series of Sir Attenborough. Later we had a dinner and with that we called it a day and retreated to our rooms and set off to sleep.

The next day morning we set out to a lake and it rained birds in that session. We started with the bulbul cousins. The redvented and the white browed perched on the same branch and gave us a good show.The cocophony started, "where is it??", "I can't see the bird", "aah yes I can", "can you give me the binocs", "it's red tail", "no it's white, bigger than crows", "smaller than sparrow"... anwyays, we had good sigthings and returned to the resort and munched happily on the yummy breakfast.

The first session of the second day was on Bird behavior and we dwelled deeper into the subject. It helped us understood and made us awed by the depth of the details we are witnessing. It's just the introduction to the big world of Birds.Late in the afternoon Deepa and Mohan joined us. That's the second person I have been looking forward to meet in this training. I read deepa's blogs and when Shalini mentioned about deepa during some conversation and told me that she knew deepa and that she is going to drop by at the training, I was looking forward to meet her in person.

Finally I met her and yet again I realized the power of blog. If you follow someone's blog and meet the person I am sure you tend to feel that you know each other from quite some time. It's different from a situation where you hear about someone from a third party/person and meet him/her. Deepa is sweet, warm, open, active, friendly, witty (the kinds of friends I always wish to have) and Mohan who enrolled for the course was my roomie and they make a good couple!!Anush also joined us for the evening.

The afternoon session is when where we are supposed to go for lion-tiger safari. But we did not want to trouble the poor beasts and instead had a session on Mammals which was a learning experience.During a break in that session we came out and saw the drama of a WASP paralzying a spider,laying eggs inside it and trying to dig in a hole to secure it!! what a drama.. more on it here.. http://deponti.livejournal.com/451434.html

Later in the day another nature trail and some more sighting. But as we are about to start, it drizzled a bit but we procceded. We proceed in a different direction and since it just stopped raining and an overcast october sky didn't do any good to us. We could spot few drongos and barbets and just when the excitement is going down Mohan managed to see and click an EURASIAN EAGLE OWL. Although the pic shows it facing the other side, it's such a a beautiful one. It made our day and we spent quite sometime tracing it as it went into the bushes after we started looking at him. Anush with his sharp eyes was quick to spot it and then he had his belly full and left for home.

We then proceeded to the lake when the heavens thought the otherway and it started pouring. We got drenched and karthik managed to call the resort to send us a vehicle and we all were transported back. On the way back, few of us wished to have some pakods+chai in such a chill weather and Karthik had them ready by the time we got freshened up.We attacked the pakodas and tea... reminded me of Youth hostel treks....! Later, we watched video from the "Life of Birds" and concluded the day.

On the morning of the last day we went for another trial and our list of birds almost doubled on this eventfull day. We saw the malkoha, the cuckoo shrike, the robins....
Interestinlgy, we DISCOVERED a new species of birds. :) In all our nature trials Ramesh used to spot lots of birds, but eventually most of them ended up as Red-vented Bulbuls. The last day was no exception and finally mohan suggested renaming the bubuls as "Ramesh Vented Bubuls" instead of Red vented bubils

The last day had a session on Ubran wild life which was an eye-opener and dispersed the myth we usuallly have that Wild life is only in forests!!. We started to know what a big world we have around. Karthik quoted that he spent 400+ hours watching just a bird from his house window. We learnt lot which I cannot share all here, rather it need to be felt and experienced than read.
With a heavy heart (at least me) we packed off and checked out and reached home.

Now let me differ from what I wrote above. I want to share something I learnt.
~Nature hosts so many miracles that it never ceases to interest you.
~There is so much happening around us that we fail to notice and all we need is an attitude to understand and learn.
~There is never a dull moment in life when you stay close to nature.
~The joy of being with nature is unmatchable and less told and more to be experienced.
~The way you look at things will change and you will start observing minute things and details when you get used to being with nature.
~It's a duty of naturalist to spread the awareness, share knowledge and I promise myself to do so.

~Nature is a delicate web of interdependancies where a distrubance at one palce can make a big impact on lot other. So be sensitive when dealing with nature
~Every living creature (incldues flora & fauna) have a role to play in this world and all of them are equally important. An ANT is as good as a TIGER to me.
~Ultimately the same generic logic applies to be a naturalist- Be curious, Be energetic, Be patient, Be hungry to learn more, Be open to admit NO or say I DON'T KNOW....

There is so much to learn , so much to understand, that once you start exploring or understanding nature you can't help yourself from admiring it. The bonus here is there is never an end to this learning since a life time is not enough to completely understand each and everything thing that constitutes the nature and I am glad I started my journey....