The Indian "Steppes" - eagle visitors at Taal Chhapar

Jan 16th 2015.  As we soaked in the beauty of the Blackbucks on the one hand, we were also awed by the majesty of the soaring Steppe Eagles, as they dotted the grasslands, sitting on rocky outcrops, gliding over the grass and making the territory their own.

I step back into my school geography class and Ms Rohini when I think of the Steppes - those grasslands that once spread across Asia and Europe.  It coexists in my memory along with the nomadic pastoralists and Genghis Khan swooping across the plains

From the lands of the great Khan come these large eagles, swooping down to winter in our own grasslands in north-western India.

By far, they were the most common raptors we saw that day at Taal Chhapar.  Aquila nipalensis.  They eat carrion too, which accounts for the fact that we saw them at the carcass dump the next day as well.

They would take off on sorties every now and then, probably searching for small rodents and partridges.  Their large wingspans were a sight to see.

The characteristic brown and black flight feathers and tail.  This is the largest eagle I have seen so far.

The yellow gape that extends beyond the eye distinguishes it from the Tawny Eagle

The Tawny and Spotted eagles also have this yellow gape, but the extent of it, the shape of the nostrils and mouth are all different.  For our amateur eyes, we would have problems differentiating I am sure, but then we saw only the Steppes, so there was no "idying" confusion.

We almost missed the red collared doves shuffling around next to the road, as we trained our binoculars on the eagles afar. Streptopelia tranquebarica.  My first sighting of them of these reddish-matron doves that are found in fields, gleaning for seed in the undergrowth.

As the light faded, we also saw Harriers.  Couldn't figure out which one this was....

...though this one looked like a juvenile Pied Harrier

We had to leave, and our final sighting was a huge herd of wild boar grunting and scuffling through the grass.  They passed quite close to the eagles who did not seem to care!

A hot dinner awaited at Churu, in the same home where we had lunch, which was so fresh and wholesome that we shamelessly invited ourselves for the night as well!

We met the five daughters of the couple who were our hosts, and it was indeed heartwarming to see such well educated, confident and outgoing girls, where one would least expect it.

I think they were also intrigued by this strange bunch  from the south, with a large smattering of women who were by far more noisy than the men!

Horn, OK Please.

16th January 2015

The magical Taal Chhapar grasslands in Rajasthan. A tiny little sanctuary at seven square kms on the eastern borders of the Thar.  We were coming from the western ends of the desert and the gigantic Desert National Park (more than 3000 sq kms).

We left Sujangarh and motored to the ghoshaala in the early morning mist, where we chased the tree creeper most successfully.

So it was with cheer and anticipation that we arrived at this little sanctuary of the blackbuck.  Antilope cervicapra rajputanae.  Bhanu had visited Taal Chhapar in 2014, and her pictures of the beautiful blackbucks in the rolling grasslands had piqued my interest.

The 7-8 sq kms of this sanctuary is filled with grassland and saline rock and khejri trees.

Blackbuck are at home in grasslands, no forests for them.  The browns merging with the mothiya grass and only their horns standing out like a ships' flag mast! The grasslands give them an advantage when fleeing from predators, and they do not mind the semi-arid conditions. So, as we convert grasslands into farms, the blackbuck habitat shrinks.  

These beautiful antelopes are endemic to the Indian subcontinent, and we are the only country with a sizeable though endangered population.  Hunted with cheetahs by our maharajahs, protected fiercely by the Bishnois, they seemed almost mythical and magical as they moved around in the grass.  

The males have horns and the skin turns darker with age.  The fawns don't have horns and are a much lighter hue.  The ponds are formed in the low-lying parts of the sanctuary.

Young males, with a fawn brown colouring.

An adult male posed proudly, its horns resplendent.  And those rings around the eyes like big moons.

Those horns!  "A well-formed pair of horns on a mature blackbuck male may reach two feet in length and have a nearly equal spread between the tips." observes R K Menon

They grow from the base, do not fall off, grow spiralling outwards and are a pretty handy weapon of territoriality, as we saw later.    

As dusk fell, we grew quiet, watching these shadows pass by in the grass, their silhouettes like a Japanese painting.

As I saw the sun go down, I dreamed of the plains of Africa.  Would I ever make it there?

But the drama of nature had one more act.  A male passed purposefully on the track ahead of us.

And before our eyes, horns were locked and a turf war began.

Just as quickly. it ended, with both the males trotting off in different directions, and to us, it seemed like it was a "draw"!

"Blackbuck are territorial animals. A territorial animal like the blackbuck male holds a piece of meadow or land that he defends against invasion of conspecific males. The male in its white and black coat stands prominently on its territory, which he hasfought for and taken from an earlier holder or, in some cases,colonised by himself. The ownership of the territory may pass on from one individual to another each year or a single, strong male may be able to retain it for several years. 
Fights between males for territory possession can be violent.The two males clash head on to lock horns and push mightily against each other. This is where the corkscrew shape of the horns comes into use. The spirals of the horns lock into one another so that they do not slip, much as the antler of deer like chital lock during battle. Where the males are almost evenly matched, a fight may continue over a few days. 
After the first bout, the contestants withdraw for a short while, only to clash again. The contestants engage, break off, and re-engage in this turf battle until the issue is settled. When the loser flees, it is usually chased only for a few yards, and then it may be seen somewhere else where it is more comfortable.
The winner then stands in the territory waiting for the females to come, for, in blackbuck, territory is the ticket to reproductive success. When the females do arrive, the male tries to herd them and keep them within his patch of land. This it does by what is called the 'head-up' or 'nose-up' display. The male raises its tail upright to show the white underside, raises his nose till the horns are almost flat along its back, turns its ears downward and backward and moves with mincing steps, all the while forcing the females deeper inside his territory. It may also grunt during this behaviour. The females may move inward in response to the 'head-up' display and begin to graze there, but if they are not so inclined, they simply walk across into an adjoining territory. 
The male has no recourse other than to do the'head-up' display in front of the wandering female. It appears strange that once a female or herd of females crosses over into another territory, the pursuing male will stop short at the end of his territory and not take one step more. In most cases, the neighbouring male will come forward to escort the female into its own territory.To the human eye, the exact demarcation line between two adjoining territories is not always visible."

The Quintessential Antelope - Life of the Blackbuck - by R K Menon

A canopy of life - The Hindu

If there is one person I know who is earning good karma everyday, it is Shobha of Nizhal!



A canopy of life - The Hindu

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  KALAKSHETRA FOUNDATION

  From the Banyan sapling which Rukmini Devi planted to get Kalakshetra going, there grew the Banyan tree under which Rukmini Devi, Arundale and others sat.
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  KALAKSHETRA FOUNDATION

  Girls dance under the banyan tree in a picture from the present.
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  The Grange now called Kanchi

TOPICS

Rukmini Devi (Arundale) once wrote, “I brought a small sapling of the great Banyan in the Theosophical Society and on the 1st January 1951 we had a small ceremony for planting it in our new campus. Many friends from different parts of the world brought earth from their own countries for this ceremonial planting. The land was bare except for small saplings that we had been planting from time to time. It was a vast sandy beach with not a speck of green and only the sea to make us feel cool under the hot sun. But I had a great feeling of benign presence and in my heart I felt hopeful.” And with that hope in her heart — and that banyan sapling’s promise — there began the growth of the verdant campus in which Kalakshetra has now sunk deep roots.

Today, a rich forest has grown on what was barren land. And to celebrate it, the Kalakshetra Foundation has recently brought out a book rich with the pictures of trees, flowers and fruit, insects and birds in all their brilliant hues: Pidhana — The Canopy of Life. What it reveals could not have been imagined by people like Prof. Janardhanan when he arrived at Kalakshetra in 1958 and saw “a largely empty campus, with a four-roomed cottage and a L-shaped studio the only construction.” It was a sea of barrenness that almost merged with a sea of “roaring waves”. To bring life to such barrenness was Rukmini Devi’s aim and when she had succeeded she would say, “From the harmony of environment — life, thought, philosophy and nature — with the creative spirit within, inspiration is born and art is the expression.”

Supplementing the striking photographs by R. Prasana Venkatesh, Sai Archana and Sreedhar Vaidya is the textual tree species documentation by Nizhal. It was Nizhal, twenty this year, that sowed the seeds for the book. A ‘Tree Walk’ it organised at Kalakshetra in 2013 led to it suggesting a documentation of the trees on the campus — and a book was born. It’s a book that will have many wanting to follow the nature trails Kalakshetra could add to its offerings. It is also a book that needs cloning by such Nature-rich campuses of institutions like the Government Museum, the Theosophical Society, the Madras Christian College, the Madras Club, and the Kotturpuram Tree Park.

The Kotturpuram Tree Park is another signal contribution to the greening of the city by Shobha Menon-led Nizhal. From wasteland on the northern bank of the Adyar River, near the Kotturpuram end, Nizhal led a movement of the citizens in the neighbourhood into creating and tending this Park, which now is also supported by the Corporation of Madras. Almost every tree in the Park bears a plaque announcing its species, deer roam where they have long meandered, a paved track has citizens of every financial status discovering the joys of walking, scores of benches provide space for those who want to enjoy fresh air while they gossip, a gazebo houses the story of the Park, and, best of all, there’s virgin forest at the eastern end of the Park with trails in it for those seeking ‘nature-in-the-raw’. The Park’s still a work in progress, but in 10 years’ time, if cared for, will be another ‘forest’ in the city. It’s a model to be followed in other parts of Madras that is Chennai if we are to make a green city greener.