My lunar eclipse

10th December.  Chennai, from our balcony.

6:57 pm

7:20 pm

7:40 pm

8:48 pm

9:48 pm

It was lovely to see the moon fully eclipsed, like a cheese ball, all reddish brown and yummy.  Or was it more like a gulab jamun?!

Next one in India - 2018.  

Composting diary - troubleshooting

Just as I was feeling smug about my trouble-free khamba debut, I ran into my first "trouble".  I had not checked on the bottom-most, empty (thus far) pot, since it was well empty, no?

With two pots filled with composting garbage, it was time for the semi-composted middle pot to move to the lower pot.  When I peered into it, it was far from empty - it was filled halfway with water, and there were maggots swimming merrily in the watery sludge - EWWWWWW!  The water was rain water, which I should have realised would have entered via the side openings when we had our monsoonic depression and heavy wind and rain last week.

Emergency action!  Take the pot down slosh it all out, clean well and sun!

That was yesterday.  So, today I went and refilled it (dry and clean) with a little sand at the bottom.  This is Unit C.  Moved the dry, semi-composted Unit A stuff into it and moved Unit B above it.  With all the rains, Unit B is more wet than I like - it will definitely breed more maggots, so I have added more dry leaf.  Let me see if this works.

Should add even more dry leaf tomorrow I think.

Roadside tree planting

Preamble

The residents of New Beach Road felt the need to plant more trees at the eastern end of the road, that leads on to the beach front. The western parts of the road are tree-lined and shady, while the eastern end has looked bare.
So, there was discussion and dialogue as to how to go about this and what follows is our experience in planting trees on the road, for the benefit of anyone else looking to do so.
We decided to do this just before the rains, rather than in the summer, so that the saplings would get a head start with good water and cool weather. Little did we realise that our chosen date would work to a "T" - the monsoons broke over Chennai, the morning after we had done our tree planting!

Pitting

Saplings were sourced from Nizhal.  We got five punnai and five pooarasam saplings - both of which are expected to do well in coastal areas, with sandy soil, harsh sunny climes, and they are both native species as well. Oct 23rd, a Sunday was agreed upon as several of teh residents were available, post Deepavali.

Then to figure out costs - we need sand and red earth/manure, plus labour to dig pits 2ft by 2ft, and 2 ft deep too.  One of the residents got in touch with Malathi Nursery in the neighbourhood, and we worked out costs as Rs 250 per tree planting, with sand/manure and labour.

Next question - how do we share these costs?  We decided that each tree would be "sponsored" by a child of the road, who would then be responsible for keeping an eye on it, watering it in the dry season, and reporting if the sapling was not doing well.  Overnight, we had ten "sponsors" and the money question was answered!

We then spoke to the Additional Engineer, Chennai Corporation Thiruvanmyur, informed him, then got the permission of the AC, Adyar division, who promised us tree guards too.  I was sceptical that the tree guards would arrive in time, but lo and behold, come 22nd Oct evening, and a fishcart trundled up to our flat and disgorged the tree guards!

Planting

Sunday morning dawned and we gathered at 8am, deciding on the spots where we wanted to plant.

Soon, the gardener and the sand and manure showed up too, and he began pitting,  digging the pits for our saplings.  The young men of our road also added their muscle power.  The nursery had packed ten bags of manure and ten bags of red earth, so we just had to empty one packet of each into each pit.
The kids enjoyed planting their saplings, placing them in the middle of the pit, and filling up the space around with manure and sand, making sure it was firm and well-packed.

Tree guards
Then, it was time for the tree guards.  The tree guards that we were supplied with had these long, spindly legs, which had to be buried in the pit.

This was done diligently, and the kids wrote their names on the little blank bits of metal that you see.  They are the designated caregivers for each sapling now.

I underestimated the need for the tree guard.  A couple of days later while walking to the beach, we were dismayed to see that one tree guard had disappeared, and the punnai which it had protected stood bare, exposed and covered with plastic refuse.

Then, just ten days ago, we noticed that the garbage truck had obviously banged into another one, which was then all bent out of shape.

Watered

The saplings were all watered well, as we hauled water in some empty drinking water dispensers to the saplings.  The plan is that during the dry season, we will just carry water in a 2-litre bottle, and each family will take care of the one sapling in their name.

One of the pooarasam saplings - all done!

It has been raining heavily ever since, and we hope this has given a good start to these saplings. We also uncovered other pooarasam saplings among the weeds, obviously from some previous planting efforts.  Lets hope these saplings grow, along with our kids, into lovely tall, shady trees!

Composting Diary - Beginning

September 24th 2011:  Have begun composting with a khamba that looks like this.

I have kept it on my terrace in an area where there is light, cross ventilation, some sun, but it is protected from the rain.

The khamba is rather ingeniously designed.  The top two pots have little vents for circulation, covered with guaze to prevent unwanted rodents' entry.

The instructions say that the bottom of the middle and upper pots, which just have some netted cords running through, need to be lined with newspaper, which I did, before dumping my organic waste.

I am putting all veggie and fruit peels, egg shells, used coffee powder from my filter, tea bags, tea leaves and stuff like dried leaves from my potted plants.  I have so far filled up one pot, which is now in the middle, and am halfway through the next one.

Happy to report the absence of foul smell and fruit flies or other such stuff, (so far at least).  The reason could be that the place I have kept it is airy and so the aerobic microbes are more?

The bottom most pot has a lining of sand.

The middle pot's waste now has blackened and shrivelled, but has not yet become like this.

Finally!

Japan 2007. Fujigoko.

Ticket counter at the lava caves.  A little bird. Friends with the ticket collector.

What was it, I wondered.  So cute and colourful

And have continued to wonder all these years.  Until just recently, when I came across Stu's blog and this post from Hakadote.

Varied Tit - Cyanestes varius.  I also realised that it must be fairly common there - he has 51 tags for the bird!

This was where we were. Past Lake Saiko.

The caves had a walkway through them, these "bloody" icicles from the walls, and snake-like solidified rivers of larva.

And these fossilised eggs!

Outside was the Aokigahara.  The dense dark forests, famed for suicides, and quite creepy in the day.  Imagine how it would be in the night!

"A collection of starlings is called a murmuration"!

And then, see this, for more information: My learning for the day.

Mr Ramanan's unusual finds in our city

The Hindu : Photo op:

Orange-breasted green pigeon. Photo: Ramanan Padmanabhan

Photo op PRINCE FREDERICK Ramanan Padmanabhan studies and photographs the great horned owl at the Nanmangalam Reserve Forest. While trekking through the scrub jungle on the morning of August 31 and searching for his favourite bird, he was greeted with a rare sight. It was an orange-breasted green pigeon.

A senior member of the Madras Naturalists Society and a wildlife photographer, Ramanan identified the frugivorous bird straightaway. “The lone bird was feeding on scrub fruits and when I drew near for a clearer view through the lens, it glided into thicker greenery to avoid detection. This is a camouflage technique typical of this pigeon,” recalls Ramanan. This is the first time anyone has reported sighting an orange-breasted green pigeon at any reserve forest in and around Chennai. “This bird is found in the evergreen forests of the Western and Eastern Ghats,” says Ramanan.

It's interesting to note that two months later, the birdwatcher had another rare sighting — this time, it was a dark-sided flycatcher perched on a rain tree in his backyard. “The dark-sided flycatcher was sighted at 3.30 p.m. on November 3 on a raintree at Shastri Nagar. Despite an unrelenting downpour, the bird was busy pecking at insects and it took up different perches on the same tree. From beak to tail, the flycatcher was around 13 cm long,” says Ramanan. For two more days, he sighted the bird on the same tree and, when the skies cleared up, he snapped a few pictures of it. “The dark-sided flycatcher is a long-distance migrant: it breeds in Siberia, Mongolia and travels to the western and eastern Himalayas during winter,” says Ramanan. Commenting on both sightings — confirmed as first-of-their-kind in Chennai by the Madras Naturalists Society — naturalist V. Guruswami says: “Through sustained observation and research, we arrive at the geographical limits of birds. They may exceed these known limits, but this fact often goes unnoticed. It takes bird enthusiasts to spot these birds, when they ‘stray' off their known haunts. The dark-sided flycatcher is an arboreal bird. But for birdwatchers, who are in the habit of looking deeper into canopies, this bird is often not easily sighted. The orange-breasted green pigeon is essentially a hill bird and found in the Eastern and Western Ghats. Habitat destruction can scatter such birds and can be one of the reasons why they are seen in places other than their known homes."

The dark-sided flycatcher. Photo by Mr Ramanan

Mr Ramanan is no stranger to readers of this blog!  And so I am doubly delighted!!

More winged visitors flock to Adyar Poonga

The Hindu : NATIONAL / TAMIL NADU : More winged visitors flock to Adyar Poonga

By Aloysius Xavier Lopez

  A painted stork in the Adyar Poonga on Friday. — Photo: K.V.Srinivasan With more species of migratory birds arriving at the Adyar Poonga (Tholkaapiya Poonga) this monsoon, the documentation of such species in the 58 acres is likely to commence shortly. Painted storks have come for the first time after eco-restoration of the first phase of the park. Grey heron, large egret, and black winged stilt are some of the other species spotted amid the vast lush green area after the northeast monsoon began last month. “Painted stork has not been seen in the Adyar Estuary for many years. Getting to see painted stork this year is very good news,” said K.V.Sudhakar, president of Madras Naturalists' Society. Around 200 species of birds have been reported in the Adyar area in the past, he added. Many of such species had vanished from the vicinity because of rapid urbanisation. According to officials, increased availability of fish in the waterbodies of the 58 acre area and improvement in habitat on account of the eco-restoration are some of the reasons for the migration of birds to the park. “We are not going to introduce any species. Every new species attracted to the park should be because of natural process,” said an official. The tidal inflow to the Adyar Poonga plays a crucial role in complete restoration of the ecosystem and attraction of new species of fish to the estuary, said officials. After the second phase of the project, the normal tidal inflow would be completely restored. Saplings planted The State government spent over Rs.23 crore in the first phase of eco-restoration. About 1.37 lakh saplings of around 172 endemic species of trees, herbs, shrubs, reeds and tuberous plants were planted to serve as habitat for aquatic, terrestrial and arboreal species.

An unusual visitor

Dark-sided flycatcher

Mr Ramanan spots the dark-sided flycatcher(Muscicapa sibirica) near his home in Shastri nagar, Adyar. November 3rd.  Not the brown-breasted flycatcher, usually seen every winter.

Skandan says that, "The streaks in the throat and flanks/the white line running through the belly are the identification tips," differentiating from the other more common winter visitor, the Asian Brown Flycatcher.

As V Santharam says, "This is usually seen in the Himalayan region and northern India and so is an unusual sighting for Chennai, where it was seen in the backyard in the heart of the city."

Along with the monsoons, November has brought this unusual flycatcher! I need to be extra vigilant now. Who knows what I may find on the Millingtonia, badam or teak tree in my neighbourhood.

By the way, young Vikas had an Indian Pitta wander into his balcony, which was set free in the gardens.

Other migrants spotted include Orange Headed Ground Thrush sighted at TS and IIT. (Geetha and Kumaran). Ashy Drongo at IIT. (Kumaran).  And Lallitha spotted a vagrant Western Reef Egret close to the Sholavaram lake. 

The Big B and Gir.

Gir sanctury gets 60 per cent bonus tourists this Diwali vacation - Express India

So the Gujarat govt uses the Big B to promote the Gir sanctuary, and the tourists are flowing in! Not only that, seems there's a new Gateway hotel as well.

Gir sanctury gets 60 per cent bonus tourists this Diwali vacation

ADAM HALLIDAY,hitarthpandya,Hitarth Pandya Posted: Oct 15, 2011 at 0443 hrs
VADODARA/AHMEDABAD The Big-B charm continued to work for the forest department at Gir Wildlife Sanctuary (GWS), the only abode to Asiatic lions in the world. At least 60 per cent more tourists are booked at this sanctuary for Diwali vacations, compared to last year. The sanctuary will open on Sunday after a three-month break for monsoon, which also coincides with the mating season for the beasts.
According to officials at GWS, the tourist flow has increased drastically as compared to the last year. The conducive environment and the facilities provided by the department has turned out to be a major aspect attracting the tourist, officials said. Even the Gateway hotel at Sasan Gir is completely booked, weeks after it opened.

“After the poaching incidents, which surfaced in 2007, we have taken several measures to change the entire perspective about Gir. The staff has been changed totally and about 400 of them are new recruits and that makes a lot of difference. The old staff had been working as typical forest department staff whereas it needed something more than that because it was all about attracting more tourists,” Chief Conservator of Forests, Junagadh, R L Meena told The Indian Express.

“Not only that, the local tourist guides have gained a lot of confidence in explaining about wildlife to the tourists,” he added.

Roping in Amitabh Bachchan as tourism ambassador has done wonders for the department. “There is no doubt that his presence has made direct impact on the tourist flow. After all, he is a superstar and people do acknowledge him,” said Meena.

During 2009-10, a total of 2,06,563 persons visited the sanctuary and Devaliya Safari Park. During 2010-11, 2,71,745 persons visited GWS and Devaliya Safari Park, he said. “There is an increase of 65,182 tourists in the financial year 2010-11 in comparison to 2009-10, which shows 31.55% increase in the tourist flow. During the current financial year, 1,08,996 persons have visited the sanctuary and Devaliya Safari Park. The sanctuary remained closed for tourists from June 16 to October 1,” said Meena. The tourism campaign has also benefitted the private hospitality sector, with the first large foray into the area booked full for the Diwali season.

The newly opened Gateway hotel at Sasan Gir — a part of the Taj hospitality chain with 28 rooms and a regular jeep safaris — has already been booked to capacity for the Diwali holiday season. “We are completely sold out. It’s a mix (of foreign and domestic tourists), but a lot of domestic,” said Chaula Mazmudar, hotel’s general manager.

And, they are thinking of opening new safari routes too.

http://www.travelbizmonitor.com/gujarat-govt-to-introduce-new-lion-safari-14855

13 nations come together to save tigers - The Times of India

13 nations come together to save tigers - The Times of India

Since when did the CBI have the responsibility of saving tigers?! Or is it for poaching crimes across borders? Not very clear.