Soaring High

There is a beauty in this bird………the Indian Spotted eagle. Look at it from any angle, its flight is perfect and effortless, terror and excitement grips you when you see it hunt and the easy maneuvers it does in flight.



I managed to get close enough to an Indian spotted eagle in flight and the photographs that came out even surprised me. It’s a stocky bird, around 60-65cm in length, falling under the mid size category of birds of prey. Essentially brown in color, it appears lighter, slimmer and less bulky in flight.



In mumbai, I have seen this bird of prey frequently being irritated by crows. I have seen the eagles flight plan disrupted a number of times by crows that don’t allow this bird to come anywhere close to their nest.

This perticular pair of Spotted eagle made their nest on top of a crane that was not in operation for a last couple of months. The recession in the building industry was proving to be beneficial for these birds. I have seen them once to often sitting on the crane with their wings spread, probably sunbathing.

From Beaks to Claws

A journey into Ranthambore

Sun, sweat and dust! That’s what one faces in Ranthambore, especially when you go there in the month of April and May. But then, you really don’t have much choice, if you are seriously interested in looking at the wildlife that this national park has to offer. The incessant heat of Rajasthan drives all the animals and birds to the few water holes that you can visit as a tourist on routes 1 to 5.

Every year, thousands of tourists folk to Ranthambore to try their luck with the sighting of the Tiger, in its natural habitat. I have never seen a bigger game of chance, then the sport of getting a glimpse of the big cat. Just like gambling, the stakes can also be increased by the bigger players, while the smaller ones go back, happy or sad, with small or no winnings. The intoxication of the game increases the stakes from having a glimpse of the tiger in the dry vegetation, to a full body view, to a hunt or more. In my mind, no one returns back really fulfilled, for there was some other perceived victory just round the corner, which they have missed.



Setting the expectations correct is the name of the game, and for a person like me, the tiger was one, but not the only attraction that I was looking forward to. For me this journey, I hope, becomes a start of something that I always wanted to do. So I started the journey with two objectives in mind – a) to click as many photographs of as many varieties of animals as I could get, and b) lay down the foundation of future travels to other parts of the county and, hopefully, the world.

One thing that I was pretty sure about was that you cant have good photograph when you are on a guided, three hour tour with company of people who treat it as a picnic or a zoo ride. In Ranthambore trip, due to miscommunication between my agent and the hotel staff, I was booked for a twenty seater, petrol driven, canter ride. On one occasion, I had the company of people who felt it was their right to see the tiger as they have paid for the trip, and blamed the guide for not taking them to the right spots. In second instance it was the company of twelve collage students and their teacher, who treated things like school picnic. They came in late, made rowdy jokes, which were just below the threshold limit of their teacher and had no clue on what was expected from the trip, except the tiger.





My learning – Always take a gypsy, if you have the money, book the whole thing for yourself or the people you want to be a part of the tour. Second, three hours are never enough, two trips are not enough. You need to spend at least five days and make multiple trips till you are satisfied with the results, or at least closer to them. If you have some political connections, then arrange to get an approval from the ministry of forest and environment of the state or center. Pass on the same to the DFO so that you have full and unlimited access to the park with your guide and driver. This way you can not only have access to the ‘non-tourist’ locations within the park, but you can spend enough time at your chosen spot till you get your dream run. If you have direct access to the DFO itself then even the ministry route can be avoided.



In addition to this little ‘mishap’, my second more serious problem was that my camera conked off. From my experience, its motherboard got fried. Here I was, stuck in the middle of the tour, with no camera. Thankfully, one of the staff members at the hotel had a digital SLR with a 75-300 mm lens and was willing to loan the same to me at a rental. My main problem was to get accustomed to his Nikon prehistoric model and use it to the best advantage possible. I couldn’t take too many pictures with his camera, for setting it up was a time consuming thing, but I got some good results with it. I thanked god that I had something instead of nothing.




Now coming to the main question: What can one expect from the tour? All the five routes that are open to the tourist, start at the gate and end at one of the main water hole within the jungle. Between the two points you will be able to see a lot of peacocks and peahen resting on the ground among the fallen leaves, You will be able to see a lot many groups of langurs on the ground or swinging in the trees, but looking at you with a common expression ‘What! You again?’. They usually try to hide their young ones behind their backs, which is a very hard thing to do for its very difficult to contain something that is forever jumping, fighting and running around. Cheetal and Sambhar are common sights. Tiger’s are rare but you may still have a chance of spotting one. Getting a leopard is really difficult. You can get an odd crocodile near the water holes but they are so beautifully camouflaged that it’s difficult to spot them. Peacock is very common, but then they are common in whole of Rajasthan. So spotting them here was no surprise. Seeing them dance was a welcome addition.




I ended up getting some good photographs, which I am sharing with you on this blog. Hope my next attempts will be less jinxed an more fruitful. I am thinking of taking on a prominent South Indian national park next.