A Flight of Barn Swallows

April 7, 2018June 24, 2018 ~ Lalitha Krishnan ~ Leave a comment

Hirundo rustica revisits Landour at 7000 ft

Like summer visitors on the hillside, barn swallows descended on me in troves, unannounced, one fine morning. Then as swiftly (pardon the pun), they shot up, flew past a corner, looped around a tree or two, took a nose dive, twisted and turned and swung by again fleetingly. I stood rooted to my spot for a good few minutes, hypnotized by their acrobatics in the sky. What an air show…and a pain in the neck.

I noticed the swallows didn’t stay together like, say, white-throated laughing thrushes do, instead, they did their own thing, taking random flight paths “tweet-tweeting” without seeming to take a break. Almost like they had left their kids at home alone and needed to get back soon. It is the breeding season. Landour town shops already have swallow-nesting inside.

If there was a pattern to the swallows’ flight, I didn’t get it. It was impossible to stay focused on one bird continuously, let alone a flock. What I was watching was, in fact, nothing but a feeding frenzy. Summer bugs are out as well and the dives and swoops were directed by where the bugs were. Swallows catch them in mid-flight making a competitive reality TV game show look like child play. Not to be left behind, I zipped in and out with a camera and started randomly taking shots of swallows. 50+ blurs-in-the-sky has been promptly deposited in the trash. The rest I’m sharing with you.

A summer visitor - swallows in Landour — A summer visitor – swallows in Landour

Read more about Swallows, Swifts via eden.uktv: https://eden.uktv.co.uk/animals/birds/article/swifts-and-swallows/

via BBC Nature: http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/22527420

Of Dogs and Nests.

March 19, 2018April 16, 2018 ~ Lalitha Krishnan ~ Leave a comment

View from Jaberkeht Nature Reserve, Mussoorie, Uttarakhand, India

My mountain dog, Chingoo, sheds like there is no tomorrow. His fur coats everything I own, borrow or dream of. If I needed an autopsy, they’d probably find traces of it in my stomach lining as well. Not that I care.

On the other hand, fur on my jacket seems to get some folks into a tizzy. These ‘uncontrollables’ start brushing it off without so much as pausing to ask. Hello, take your hand off my… This is me, fur et al. Restrain yourself. Shed the thought or face the consequences, I think to myself. But of course, I say the very opposite looking as obliged as someone rescued from a terrible wardrobe malfunction just in the nick of time.

Guests are pre-warned of unique conditions in my home. It’s not about so much about being unafraid of dogs as of being prepared. My dog is allergic to some people I tell them. Honestly, he sneezes. (I don’t tell them we share the same allergies.) Don’t pack blacks I say. And don’t bother to remove your shoes. Oh definitely don’t walk in socks…you’re in the doghouse now. Every time I sweep the house (I don’t vacuum), Chingoo’s fur takes on a life of its own. It swirls into individual fur devils taking flight routes of their own making. Not even our large hills spiders are spared. I often see them donning a fur-cloak as they drag themselves to safety behind the flush tank.

Unlike anything I’ve seen, Chingoo’s fur seems to have a survival instinct. It has gone forth and seems to have multiplied over the years. You only have to step onto my porch. My entire ecosystem has paled out. The deodars, the oaks the little weeds that are surfacing the hard earth, the little bugs that are on these weeds and even dung left behind by roaming cows have been consecrated by the travelling Furburys.

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Not all has gone to waste. Once in a while I see little creatures of the wood pick and collect Chingoo’s fur to line their nests. They go at it all day long collecting as much fluff as their beaks can hold before flying out to their new home-in-the-making. I love the idea of comfy fur-lined nests. It feels like giving back…through your dog. More so, if you own a down-jacket or two. I’m just saying.

Know your Bycatch before your Bitcoin. And take a good look at your toothpaste.

December 12, 2017April 16, 2018 ~ Lalitha Krishnan ~ 1 Comment

Lost at sea? Here are ready-mined terms and facts that are easier to comprehend. They might be hard to swallow but follow these leads in the right spirit and we could possibly see some tangible long-term yields across the globe.

Did you know that for every kg of prawn you eat this holiday season approx 6-9 kilos, [sometimes more] other fish and marine species would die in trawler nets? The extra, unintentionally fished marine life called bycatch is discarded dead or dying. Often, these are juvenile species that don’t fetch a price but they definitely pay a huge sum themselves in terms of never reaching maturity or reproducing, thereby reducing their total species population.

OK, so you’re a vegan. But you use plastic.

Get a taste of this. Scientists predict by 2025 the ocean will contain 1 ton of plastic for every 3 tons of fish. Plastics disintegrate very slowly into microplastics (sesame seed sized plastic bits) that move in the ocean, absorb DDT and collect in the currents. The fish, birds and turtles mistake these microplastics for food and bigger fish eat smaller ones. Their bodies can’t rid of the toxins fast enough and it ends quite tragically. This is called Bioaccumulation. It takes place within an organism when the rate of intake of a substance (in this case toxic chemicals) is greater than the rate of excretion or metabolic transformation of that substance.

So what does your exfoliating face wash have anything to do with the price of fish?

Your favoured brand stands out in a shop shelf because it probably contains colourful microbeads (a type of microplastic) or tiny plastic pellets generously added to personal care, cosmetic and household cleaning products like your body scrubs, washing powders. And toothpaste. Teeth feel squeaky clean?You’re a regular at the sea-front promenade. Ever wonder about the mangroves it replaced? Or why storms batter your city annually?

Mangroves reduce wind and high waves as they pass through mangroves, lessening damage during storms. Wide areas of mangroves have been known to reduce tsunami heights. Mangroves are carbon-rich habitats. Their dense roots build up soils, increasing soil thickness that may be crucial as sea levels rise. Mangroves and seagrasses capture carbon monoxide from the atmosphere a hundred times faster than terrestrial forests. Take a deep breath.

It seems appropriate to talk of human-induced Marine Death zones now.

These are hypoxic (low-oxygen) areas in the world’s oceans and large lakes, caused by “excessive nutrient pollution from human activities”. Chemical runoff from our industrial waste, fertilizers and use of fossil fuel to our daily floor cleaners find their way into our rivers and oceans killing massive swathes of fish and marine species. There are 405 identified dead zones worldwide.

Planning a long cruise?

I read that a one-week voyage on a cruise ship with 2, 200 passengers and 800 crewmembers generates 210,000 gallons of sewage and eight tons of garbage. Marine pollution analysts in Germany and Brussels say that such a large ship would probably burn at least 150 tones’ of fuel a day, and emit more sulphur than several million cars, more NO2 (nitrogen dioxide) gas than all the traffic passing through a medium-sized town.

Do take the kids [our future stakeholders] to see a coral reef a.s.a.p. #investintheenvironment

Be positive. Stay healthy. Be conscious. Happy holidays.

PS: And oh here’s some further reading for the beach.

Some sources and references via:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/may/21/the-worlds-largest-cruise-ship-and-its-supersized-pollution-problem

https://www.1millionwomen.com.au/blog/how-do-i-tell-if-product-contains-microbeads/

https://www.marineconservation.org.au/pages/microplastics.html

https://www.treehugger.com/green-food/6-shocking-facts-about-seafood-production.html

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/oceans-plastic-fish-2050_us_569e9963e4b00f3e986327a0

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fishing_down_the_food_web

http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/Huge-‘dead-zone’-discovered-in-Bay-of-Bengal/article16908928.ece

https://www.nature.org/media/oceansandcoasts/mangroves-for-coastal-defence.pdf

Photo credit: Lalitha Krishnan. All photos are copyrighted.

Sharing my piece ‘Confessions of a porch photographer’ which was published in the Hindu.

Deodar cones dispersing seeds in winter. Photo credit: Lalitha Krishnan

November 16, 2017April 10, 2018 ~ Lalitha Krishnan ~ Leave a comment

How did I manage to get published? I’m clueless. I only know that The Hindu-Open Page editor’s click of approval transported me to a new level of thrilled. All those zillion rewrites, years of rejections and no replies from other publications finally paid off. This piece was way shorter, the timing was right perhaps–around Salim Ali’s birth anniversary–and I think my writing struck a chord with nature-loving folk who are missing the ‘wild’ connect. Reading their appreciative emails brought me as much joy as writing. There is no greater reward. Will I get published again? I can’t tell but you will know if I do.:) Why don’t you read the article (via The Hindu link below) and tell me what you think of it in the comments space?

http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/open-page/confessions-of-a-porch-photographer/article20217923.ece

A Grey langur watches me watch him. Photo credit: Lalitha Krishnan”

“I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.” – Henry David Thoreau, in Walden, or Life in the Woods

The curious case of an owl which wrestled a woodpecker for housing benefits.

May 12, 2017April 5, 2018 ~ Lalitha Krishnan ~ Leave a comment

I recently witnessed a pint-sized owl (Asia’s smallest) taking on a woodpecker. It happened even before I could shout out “owlet”. I barely believed what I had seen. I’ve been following this particular owl couple for a month now. I noticed they make three different owl calls or utterances*. Unlike what I’ve heard, these little munchkins are easy to spot and observe. That’s mostly because they’re also active when I am—diurnal and crepuscular birds—calling, mating, giving me multiple chances of focusing right and behaving like they look. Adorably.

I watched them turn their heads poltergeist style multiple times. It’s fascinating and spooky at the same time as they have false eyes on the back of their head that seemed to look directly at me. I was warming up to them until I saw one of them literally clash with this little yellow crowned woodpecker while it was on the verge of squeezing into the burrow which it had carved out with the finesse of a master craftsman. I know that for a fact because I’d documented the woodpeckers last year and marveled at the time and effort it took them to renovate the hole-in-the-tree into a home that’s woodpecker worthy*.* When I heard the woodpecker shriek, I thought its fate was sealed; it was going to end up as owl tapas. But that wasn’t the case.

One morning I responded to owl hoots and walked out with the camera but I just couldn’t locate them. Dumbfounded and annoyed, I almost gave up. Suddenly there was a flutter of activity and I saw the male make a dash for the tree hollow. I absolutely knew then, that the woodpeckers were evacuated from their premises and were probably house hunting again. The female was calling from inside the hollow which I why I never spotted her.

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The male owl was carrying a pale, largish insect which it promptly began feeding to its mate. The lifeless insect was probably a cicada. They’re plenty around; their deafening buzz crescendoes overhead. I noticed the owls feeding on them twice; they must be beak-smacking good. Watch the video.

I miss my old neighbours but I’m keeping an eye out (spying actually) for my new ones without intervening. If I see hungry little owlets peek out of that hollow anytime soon, I’ll let you know. Follow me.

Read more about the woodpeckers here: http://bit.ly/8LifeSkillsFromABird

Watch collared owlets makes three distinct calls:http://bit.ly/MyCollaredOwlet

Wildlife conservation, for citizens. How a WII course is changing the way I think of conservationists.

January 19, 2017June 18, 2017 ~ Lalitha Krishnan ~ Leave a comment

A year ago I realized I want to spend the rest of life working for wildlife conservation. It wasn’t a midlife crisis moment. On the contrary, what should have been obvious all along dawned on me rather slowly.

How does one begin to live the dream?

My new wannabe goal lacks the prerequisite academic backing. I don’t know anyone influential enough to open doors for me. Nor am I a donor. Scientific papers are mostly beyond my realm of understanding. I don’t recognize every other bird or ungulate. What I do know is that it’s not too late.

I want to get up close and personal with wildlife. Go out on field trips. Be involved. Inspire. Document. Help a researcher. Assist a vet. Be better informed. Tell the world. Invest in serious skills. Attempt to bridge that gap between scientists and citizens. Do what needs to be done 101%. For the rest of my life!

A friend, also a WII alumnus, happened to mention Wildlife Institute of India’s IV course on Wildlife Conservation for Wildlife Enthusiasts. It’s exactly what I was looking for. They hadn’t put in an age limit, so I applied. I was selected and it was everything I hoped it to be. And more. The ten-day course was divided into lecture-style classes and a field trek/trip into a core forest area.

Indispensable. Mules make it all possible.

A second revelation

I hate stereotyping but in startling contrast to the ‘government babus’ in my head, WII staff were a breath of fresh air. I interacted with charismatic and enterprising individuals from various departments. Their passion is admirable, their involvement, inspiring and their generosity in sharing, genuine.

The path of an environmentalist, as you and I know, is not an easy one. A few of our mentors joined WII as students and chose never to leave. 15-20 years on, these research scientists continue to battle on at great personal cost. Graciously, they make time to motivate ordinary people like myself. It’s humbling.

“When someone has spent decades devoted to observing certain creatures, their observations are not to be taken lightly.”-Carl Safina

I agree. If there’s one way to learn, it’s to walk with the experts. As a trekker, the highlight of the course for me was visiting core forest areas on foot. After a few days in the field with Dr. R Suresh Kumar and Dr. Lakshminarayana—both storehouses of information—my respect for conservationists has risen several-fold.

It’s one thing to learn in the classroom about how elephants communicate. It’s another, to be startled awake by trumpeting a few yards away from where you lie, trapped in a flimsy sleeping bag.

Fresh prints are evidence of high traffic in the forests.

This course is undoubtedly a significant one. The WII campus, tucked away in a green haven, hosts a great number of wild inhabitants. I am honestly astounded by WII’s collective wealth of expertise and by the impact they’re making, unknown to the rest of the world. I’m sure my course mates echo my sentiments. We’re a mixed bunch of adults from diverse professional backgrounds, different states, and varying ages. We were a rather enthusiastic and animated bunch: absorbing, theorizing, questioning and arguing. I can now say with conviction that there are 14 more Indian citizens in this world, who are better informed, convinced, and committed to saving our natural wealth.

Scope of conservation lectures

Biogeography of India/History of Indian Natural History/Achievements/Challenges and opportunities in wildlife conservation /Wildlife of Himalayas: conservation through science/ Large carnivore conservation in India/Saving Tigers in a human-dominated landscape/Science and management of tiger reintroduction/ Elephant conservation challenges/ Wetland conservation in India/Saving our sea turtles/ turtle trade/ Fish conservation in India/Dealing with wildlife crimes/A need for developing wildlife forensics/ Managing wild animals in distress/ Dealing with snakes, venomous and non-venomous in India/ Introduction to classic natural history books.

And that’s the tip of the iceberg.

If you’d like to read more of my blog posts:

http://bit.ly/reserveclosetohome

http://bit.ly/HimalayanWolves

http://bit.ly/8LifeSkillsFromABird

http://bit.ly/WildernessFirstAidMussoorie

Do visit me on Instagram @lalithainsta

Enquire within upon everything

November 6, 2016November 6, 2018 ~ Lalitha Krishnan ~ Leave a comment

Way before the age of Goddess Google and looking within oneself for answers, I used to depend a great deal on my grandmother or ammamma as I called her. She’d make ink stains disappear just like that and resolve every query I ever had as a kid. Most of the time, she knew what to do or she’d pull out her one-stop book for everything and ask me to read. The book, Enquire Within Upon Everything, was her paperback version of our modern day browser.

I owe ammamma for nurturing my curiosity. She grand mothered us four siblings under one roof. Like most children, I felt she considered me more special. I loved her to death of course. So much so, after her passing, I promptly staked claim to her book by scrawling a crude signature on it long before I could truly sign.

Though Enquire Within Upon Everything holds an obscure place on my shelf, it’s still a valued possession. Books were a luxury then. We made it a point to cover them and keep them dust free as far as possible. The brown paper cover has since been silver-fished through. The pages have yellowed, as they should. It smells nice like all old books do.

Intrinsic worth. Varied usefulness. And cheapness.

The publisher of Enquire Within Upon Everything, Herbert Jenkins Ltd., published PG Wodehouse novels. What I have is the 119th edition, reprinted in 1939. It sold nearly 2,000,000 copies. Not bad for a how-to book back in the day. In the Publisher’s preface, there’s special mention of how its “intrinsic worth, varied usefulness, and cheapness have won for it universal esteem.” Amusing use of words. Come to think of it, I’m subconsciously always looking for these very qualities in a mall.

“Life is too short for mean anxieties”.

Every page in this book—there are 545 pages in all—has a quote in the header. Quotes you and I could put to use on social media.I may never read Enquire Within Upon Everything from cover to cover. Nor will I give it away. The book connects me to my grandmother in far more poignant ways than an ouija board would. A lot has changed since the book has been published but there’s a lot more that hasn’t. It’s still a great reference source if I need old recipes. Household hints. Rules for card games. Remedies. The author is unknown. I looked on the net and was amazed to see the book is still available for next to nothing. If I were you, I’d grab it. This one is for keeps. Read it.