March & April 2019 Diaries
It has been a long marathon in various forests of India as we started with the Mowgli land – Pench, headed off to Kanha and then to Bandhavgarh is search of the famed tiger mothers of central Indian tiger heartland. The tiger action in Bandhavgarh was fabulous as we spent countless hours with Spotty, Dotty and Solo – the 3 breeding females of the park. From Central India we headed to Kaziranga for some rhinos and elephants and were blessed with a beautiful sighting of a 1 month old rhino calf.
Here are some images to summarise the last fortnight.
Snow Leopards to Savannah
I have been living in a suitcase for the past few months and have no time to share updates from the field. We at Nature Wanderers, wrapped up our snow leopard expedition series in Spiti with some fabulous sightings of the mysterious Himalayan cat including wonderful natural history moments like mating snow leopards.
We also wrapped up a Masai Mara photo safari in February which we followed up with a training session I conducted around remote photography of African wildlife. Some amazing perspectives were created in the process. Here our some photo updates from the month of February 2019
Image by my guest – Shishir Kumar Jain
Image Courtesy – Nature Wanderers Photo Guide, Saurabh Desai
Image Courtesy – Nature Wanderers Photo Guide, Saurabh Desai
Dazzling Keoladeo
We kickstarted 2019 with our first photography tour in Keoladeo National Park in Bharatpur. The park has the apt quantity of water this year and flocks of pelicans are back in the park after a long gap of 4-5 years. The darters and cormorants were busy in their daily fishing chores and the ever charismatic Saras Cranes have been raising their young with utmost care and love. The winter mist added a special flavour to the images.
Here is how we began our 2019 this week.
Tiger Season Opener 2018
We started a brand new tiger season in a green rejuvenated Ranthambore. The park was in a bad state during the last season because of lack of water and animals were in distress and a good monsoon was critical for Ranthambore. September turned around the fortunes of Ranthambore as the park received heavy rains filling up all the water bodies of the park and the dazzling green vegetation along with the rain water accumulated in every corner of the park made Ranthambore gorgeous like never before. The tiger sightings gradually picked up and the highlight of the first week was the mating of the ever charismatic Noor (T39) and T57. Will the reigning queen of Ranthambore gear up for her 5th litter in the coming months?
The tigers seen in the first week were T8 & cubs, T97, T98, all 3 of Noor’s separated daughters. Machali Junior (Arrowhead), T19 and cubs, T41 and cub, T34 and T73.
Good news poured in from Bandhavgarh as well we ended week 1 as Spotty’s new litter of 4 was seen. With multiple breeding females Bandhavgarh would surely be a park teaming with tiger action this season.
Here are some images summarising the first week of the new season in Ranthambore.
Migration 2018 – Week 2 & 3
It has been a tiring run of 14 day migration photo safaris in Masai Mara and hence I didn’t have time to update this space. The last fortnight has been interesting as we tracked and worked on Kaboso (the leopard) with her 2 cubs on multiple occasions. We were fortunate one evening to catch Amani (the cheetah) with her 3 young cubs as she has spending a lot of time in the conservancies outside the park but decided to venture in the park that evening. The marsh lion cubs were also under our constant radar but during our search for the cubs, we bumped into another lioness in the pride who revealed her 2 little secret fur balls and our guests got the first photo record of these tiny month old lion cubs.
Here are some images to sum up the entire fortnight. Gearing up for another fortnight in the African bush.
A Decade with Tigers – Curtain Raiser
In the past 14 years I have documented the lives of some of the most iconic tigers of India. I am pleased to announce the launch of my book – A Decade with Tigers – which is a compilation of images and stories depicting love, romance, motherhood, rivalry and revenge in the world of tigers in the past decade. Here is a curtain raiser to the book.
Stay tuned for launch updates…
Remembering the Mighty Elephants
It is World Elephant Day today and I take this opportunity to showcase to beauty of these magnificent creatures of Mother Nature. They are symbolic from various aspects – be it culture, mythology, religion or just their sheer presence in our forests. The Asiatic Elephants are one of the many shining jewels of wild India.
