Breakfast

Another one straight out of Daulat Bagh (Ajmer). I was off from my clicking some snaps here and on my way back home, hungry, when I noticed these pigeons having their morning breakfast of grains. Lucky them!

Vector

Generally vectors are used to represent physical quantities which have both magnitude and direction. I titled this snap as vector only because all that was common between these five birds was their vector. Usually, birds of the same feather create an aerodynamic shape to reduce air drag while flying, but these birds did not display the usual trait.

Walk The Line

Recently I visited Todgarh, a wildlife sanctuary in Ajmer (Rajasthan) spread in total in an area of 495.27 Kms. Unfortunately, the only wildlife I saw was this pretty li'l creature whom with my limited knowledge in this field I am unable to work out about. But this one was damn interesting, especially with its three differently enabled set of legs and a radar-like tail-cum-sting. I titled it so because this creature was totally unmoved by my coming close to it, and just kept itself busy in reaching the other end of this twig.

I was quite curious to see its typical eyes, but later, on close scrutiny I found that the yellow circle with blue dots within was nothing more than a mere pattern, and the real eyes were in the front. Now, except the fact that I did not find any wildlife, Todgarh is an amazing place, especially to be visited in the rainy season.

Packaging

Its an Indian Star Tortoise [Geochelone Elegans], and well, it comes in a package. Its hard bony or chitinous carapace covering the head and thorax has always been a point of curiosity. But well, I think its one of the best packed animals, having a ready home, and aptly protected against any predators. The carapaces are available in various colours, attractive all of them. I love this snap because of the way he's standing in it, like an aristocrat.

Follow Me!

This guy's cute. Its an Indian Star Tortoise [Geochelone Elegans] and is stunning in its beauty with the radiating star pattern on its carapace making him an eye-catching display. He's a baby, probably a month old or so, and was quite interested in the camera lens initially, sniffing it to see if it could be eaten. But when found nothing to his taste, he just turned away... as if he was asking me to follow him if I needed to click a snap.

Camouflage

A green grasshopper sitting on a green leaf ready to greet you; that's what camouflage is all about. When I noticed him initially, he was sitting on some other leaf, and by the time I came running back with my Nikon, he'd already left that place. It took me 2 minutes to locate him again, but to my good luck, he was sitting on a more clickable position on a greener leaf. So, all I had to do was to look at him from my viewfinder, and Click!

Vespers

The setting sun, and a bird of prey, back at its abode, bidding an adieu to it. That's what I tried to capture in this one. This peacock, sitting on a tree standing at Deer Park, Pushkar, was staring intently at the sunset as if making his vespers for the day.

Strike

Female Rock Pythons lay up to 100 eggs between March and June and stay with them for the 80 days till they hatch. I guess this kid freshly out of his shell came to my house. He was only approximately 9 inches long and looked so damn cute. I tried to hold his tail with my bare hand, but I guess that scared him enough to get back to my hand only to bite. Luckily, apprehensive enough to be alert with him, I removed my hand in time. Otherwise, though not venomous, the bite of a python is painful because of the many sharp teeth it has in its mouth. Then with the help of a stick it was caught and put in a bucket.

This snap of him is while he is inside the bucket aiming for a strike at anything that comes nearby. Although I did leave a live earthworm for him to feast over, he did not even care to kill that one. He too must be a 'Jain' I guess.

Beauty and the Beast

Hmmm... I know Maneka Gandhi and PETA would not like my calling this honey bee a beast, but this is only a symbolic description of this beautiful (and dangerous) insect. I've been bitten by eight of them once, so I know how dangerous they are!!!

I was planning to take a snap of this beautiful flower belonging to the Touch-Me-Not plant [Mimosa Pudica] when this hungry beast came flying by. It was hard capturing her primarily because my D60 was on a tripod and the settings were made for capturing a still flower. Without wasting time I changed the settings to capture this moving bee, but still, I guess the speed at which she was flying was more than what I assumed- that's why her wings couldn't come well into the snap, but only a glimpse of them. Anyways, something's better than nothing; would try clicking a better snap next time!

Oh! If you think the way I do, let me tell you... No! The flowers of Touch-Me-Not plant are not like its leaves which fold inward and droop when touched or shaken. I'd seen the flowers for the first time in such plant. So, my first instinct was to go touch the flower to see if it also droops. It didn't..!

The Eye

The unemotional eye of an Indian Rock Python. I love the way he stared at me while I clicked him. Well, Snakes appear to stare at their prey because they have no eyelids. The eyes of snakes are lidless, but are protected by a tough, transparent covering, or scale, that is shed with the skin. Within the animal world, they tend to have one of the most beautiful eyes.

Chit Chat

An evening on a rainy day. I was, again, in Pushkar... the best place to be at, near Ajmer, if its raining. I noticed these pigeons sitting on the overhead transmission lines, as if they were cursing the rains and chit chatting amongst themselves about when would it stop.

When I thought initially to take the snap, I was apprehensive about really getting one, because it was dark and I prefer not using the flash (just kills the natural beauty!!). So, I just set the ISO settings to get something meaningful outta that click... and here it is. See if you can notice, many pigeons are sitting in exactly the same position, as if its a customary way of their sitting.

Crossing the Line

Squirrels are one of the cutest animals that you can find in your home garden; obviously if you have a puppy, there's no match for him. Its hard to click squirrels because they are too apprehensive of humans, so going near them is impossible. I was following this young one for quite sometime when I got this shot. She was small and very very cute. It was the first time I'd seen a squirrel baby, and take my word for it, they are absolutely adorable..!!

The tag has been given simply because this one looked as if she was waiting to cross the road. Traffic Sense, hunh?

Fear

Only four snake species across the whole of India are venomous enough to kill us. They are- Cobras, Kraits, Russell's Vipers and Pit Vipers. But the fear of these four make us kill the rest of them all too. Poor them, for no fault of theirs what they are awarded by us is nothing but a cruel death.

I had to click three snaps before I could capture his tongue once. Its just so fast. A Snake or a Python finds its prey by using this tongue. It places its tongue on its Jacobson's organ after having its tongue in the air. It touches its tongue on the two pits by the Jacobson's organ to allow it to properly sense its prey. The reason snakes have a forked tongue is so that the tongue can touch these pits. The deeper the fork in a snake's tongue, the more the snake uses its Jacobson's organ.

Collage

Nothing to say for this one- A macro close up of a python's scales. Collage is well-suited because of the way these varied scales are forming a distinct pattern giving him his identity.

Pace

This snail is very small, at max one centimetre long. I didn't know snails were found in Ajmer unless I noticed this one climbing up the side wall of the lawn, coming out of rain water stagnated there. Its a mysterious animal: Small and Slow, I donno how it even manages to have a stomach full every night before going off to sleep in its very own custom created abode, a spiral shell into which the whole body can be withdrawn. They are soft bodied invertibrates having antenna like eyes. Look into the snap above and you'll be able to locate them in the front, standing above.

After gaining some knowledge from Wikipedia, I've come to know its a pulmonate land snail. This specie which is found in gardens is anthropophilic, that is, found most often around human habitation. The easiest part of clicking him was that whatsoever may happen, it could not run away from me; and the hardest part was that it was so small that to click his features properly I had to bring my lens too close to him, and the moment I did that, it went inside the shell. Frustrated for not having been able to click a front pose, I rather got satisfied with a side pose... Yep! The snail running its pace!!!

Curvaceous

What else could have I tagged this beauty with? This is the second snap of that same python which you can find below. He is a 2 year old Indian Rock Python still growing. You may notice the recent growth towards its tail, still bright and shiny. Sitting tranquil in my house's front lawn this one just kept on curling in a splendid yet bravura display of raw power. It being a cold-blooded animal, actually feels cold to touch to. You can actually feel its constricting muscles moving inside the body which give you a good idea how would you feel if caught between them.

Although this python stayed mostly idle and motionless here, but when we went off to free him in the jungle, the speed with which he jumped out of the sack was worth admiration. I never could have attributed that agility to this bulky creature unless seen with my own eye. Once in a lifetime opportunity I must say!!

Herculean

The two species of Python found in India are the Indian Rock Python, which lives in both scrub forests and dense jungles throughout the country, and the Regal Python, which is found in north-east India and Nicobar islands. The one there is possibility of your seeing is the Indian Rock Python [Python Molurus] although the snakeskin industry has all but wiped it out in many areas. This is a non-venomous, python species, often been killed for its fine skin and is endangered. Lethargic and slow moving even in its native habitat, they exhibit little timidity and rarely try to escape even when attacked. After a heavy meal, they are disinclined to move. If forced to, hard parts of the meal may tear through the body. Therefore, if disturbed, some specimens will disgorge their meal in order to escape from potential predators.

Caught near my home at Ajmer, the same is what happened with this guy- He'd just had a nice breakfast out of a peacock. So, when he'd been caught, he just vomitted out the whole of peacock. So far there have been no authentic cases of a human being eaten by this species; but this one with his neat 10 feet long body and weighing approximately 10 Kgs did look overbearing. After clicking his snaps, I went along with the Forest Department to free him into the nearby forests.

Clutches

Another Big Ant snap. This one's drastically different than the other one though, bigger and scarier. I had to stand over their colony to identify a healthy tentacled guy and then follow him along to click this snap. Since they don't generally stop, its hard to focus over them in macro mode.

The Climb

This feather was lying in our front lawn when it caught my eye. I just picked it up to click it when I noticed this Big Ant climbing upon it. I love this snap because I like the will of this insect- Whatever may happen, it won't stop climbing.

It was hard clicking this snap because firstly I was holding this feather with one hand, and holding my Nikon with the other. And above that, this scary guy was not ready to stop climbing. Only someone who has been bitten by them can understand my fears because the other end of this feather was being held by my hand...!!

Take Off

This one's a Dragonfly [Anisoptera] that landed on a cactus branch shooting up. I was trying to make my way between those cactii when I noticed it. It flew a few times, here and there, and then landed right in front of me, giving me just enough time to focus upon it and click!

The image has been shot in Guna (Madhya Pradesh). To capture it well, I took it at a low shutter speed of 1/30th of a second, aperture being F5.6. It was tough to go near it, coz it'd have just taken off in apprehension of any threat.