Why Do Fall Leaves Change Colour?

That's the question that intrigued me recently, when Chitrakka sent me an album of fall colours in New England. In a strange moment of serendipity, just yesterday I saw a cartoon in the newspaper about a little boy asking his mum about whether she knew why leaves change colour in the fall. In the cartoon, the mom launches into a romantic explanation involving God, Nature and Beauty. The next frame shows the boy drily saying isnt it because there's less sunlight and the plants are producing less chlorophyll?!

There's so much beauty in fall colours that I just gawp at pictures, and have never found out why. (And if they did teach me in school, I've long since forgotten!) So, deciding to re-educate myself, I googled away.

National Geographic had this nice essay, where I was informed that the lower levels of light means lower levels of chlorophhyll and the caroteinoids (which were always there) begin to show themselves.

It got a bit more complicated as I read further - there is also anthocyanin produced in the cooler months (the flaming red colour-giver), though from what I read, its role is a bit of a mystery. Hmmm... Scientists are doing extensive research as to why some turn golden and some turn red. And both seem successful at keeping the tree alive!!

Well, couldn't it just be that the maple thinks red is cool and the aspen loves yellow?! I mean imagine if a Martian were trying to research why some human females chose pink dresses, others black and still others yellow, green and blue!! They will be kept busy for a long time!!

Update:

Kamini sent me these aboslutely gorgeous photos of fall colours in Westchester, USA this year.

See, some like it yellow, others red!

Lovely photos, Kamini, and thanks for sending them along!

E7's record bested

E7 was a bar-tailed godwit which was recorded as flying some 11,570 kms non-stop from Alaska to new Zealand! If you thought that was a lot, then the record has been beaten this year!

11,655 kms is this years' record for non-stop flying. Same route. Same species.

Birds Fly More Than 7,000 Miles Nonstop, Study Shows - washingtonpost.com

Gill and his colleagues outfitted 23 bar-tailed godwits with satellite transmitters that periodically sent a signal detected by a satellite.

Female godwits are substantially larger than males. A one-ounce, battery-powered device was surgically implanted in them, with the antennas exiting their bodies just beneath the tail. The smaller males got a solar-powered device weighing less than half an ounce strapped to their backs.

Nine of the transmitters functioned well enough on the southward flight to provide evidence of sustained, nonstop flight.

One female flew directly from the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta of Alaska to New Zealand in eight days. Other birds either landed short of their destination in the Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea, or the signal was lost near those places. Four were later identified in New Zealand by leg bands.

The birds weigh no more than 1.5 pounds when they leave. Half of that is fat, which they burn off completely during the flight. Some of the males may have lost their transmitters in flight as their bodies shrank.

The starting and stopping places are not chosen by chance. The Kuskokwim Delta is rich in food supply, which the birds must consume in prodigious quantities before leaving. The wintering site in New Zealand is largely free of predators. When the birds arrive in early October, they molt almost immediately.

The birds leave from late August to late September, departing only with favorable tail winds. How much of their journey is wind-aided is something the researchers hope to determine by overlaying the birds' routes with day-by-day meteorological data.

A major mystery is how high the birds fly. Gill said that since word of his research has spread, researchers on boats in the Pacific have told him of seeing godwits 3,000 feet high and "smoking by at deck level."

PS: If you do read the Washington Post article, check out the comments as well - some are intsructional, and some are pretty funny - lots of Palin jokes, what with the Alaska connection.

Butterflies

If you spot a butterfly and dont know what it is, these are two great reference points I found.  

Ryan Brookes and Naseer Ommer have each got a wonderful set of photos, which they have labelled as well.

I saw a red and black butterfly yesterday in our garden, and checked out these two sets.  Aha, there it is, I thought, a Common Mormon! Only to be informed by the detail that what I saw may be a Crimson Rose which is what the Mormon likes to pretend to be?!!  All very confusing!

Why are there so many kites in Bangalore?

Just back from a quick trip to Bangalore. The reason-to-go was a wedding in the family. What I did a lot was spend time in a car - a nice, comfy black car actually, much better than any cab I could have taken - as I went from one part of the city to another. So, an hour from the station to Indira Nagar, almost two hours from there to Banashankari, getting lost from there to Jayanagar, before I headed back to the station.

Okay, okay, it was not all on the same day, and in the middle of that I did have my auto rides in the city as well, but you get the point. You dont? What I'm trying to say was that I was on the streets a lot of the time, and as we were stuck in traffic with nothing to do, it gave me more than enough time to stare at the skies, trees and buildings all around!

And as a result, I saw kites in the air, kites roosting on the cell station towers, kites sitting on water tanks, coconut trees and the advertising hoardings, you know I think I saw more kites than crows in Bangalore this time! Black kites, Brahminy kites and I think a black-shouldered one as well. I cursed since I had not taken my binocs (what kind of a bad birder am I?) and neither did I have a camera. I did have some silk sarees though, not that it helped.

So, why are there so many of these raptors in Baangalore? I wonder if it is to do with the stony nature of the terrain, lots of building activity, and vermin being displaced from their hidey holes. Or is it the garbage?

Its not only me, even the recent cricket match saw Spectators of a different kind

And Charlie, the better birder that he is, had his camera on the ready to click this feeding black kite

Shall pack that binocs the next time, I promise.

The great horned owl at Nanmangalam

My first encounter with the Great Horned Owl, GHO or Bubo bubo was not so long ago at Nanmangalam.

Mr Ramanan, a veteran of many a GHO encounter, was there again recently, and captured this magnificent picture above.  These large birds are quite something else.   They breed post-monsoon, so maybe another set of chicks we shall soon see?  We had seen some chicks during the bird race, earlier this year.  Quite grown they were by then.  Read about it here.  

Recounting an interesting story, Mr Ramanan narrated how, in the early days there were no roads around Nanmangalam, and the Velachery roads were all full of potholes, and in some places a mud track as well.  The Nanmangalam scrub was not that thick either, and the planted eucalytus was also still young.

Not familiar with the ways of the Bubo bubo, learning was by experience, which included getting his ear clipped by this large owl!  Using the help of a shepherd boy, Mr Ramanan would scramble up to the nest of the GHO, to check and record the growth of the chicks.  

While inspecting the nest for recording the growth of the chick, the adult GHO clipped my ear! From that day onwards I used to wear a helmet whenever I approached the nest!  May be my regular presence and the fact that I was not a threat to the chick, the adult bird became some what friendly.  When ever I was alone or with MNS members or with lot of birds enthusiasts from abroad, the bird immediately with loud calls of "bubo bubo" approached us."

The adult that clipped his ear!

Through his numerous visits, he has seen the "broken wing" and the threat displays of the GHO.  Hopefully, one day I will see this fascinating behaviour.

What the owl does when it feels that its nest is under threat is that it lands on the ground some distance from the threat, acts as if its wing is broken and scurries along the ground, leading the threat away from the nest.  When it feels that the prey/stranger is far enough away from the nest, it takes off and flies back to the nest.

Amazing isnt it!

A broken wing display

Then there is the "threat" display, where the GHO would call its mate and then the two birds would puff their feathers out spread their wings, and look as menacing as possible, making threatening sounds, and swaying back and forth on their legs.

The threat display

Mr Ramanan recalls that he has seen three consecutive broods of the same pair of GHOs, over the span of a few years, and once also saw two pairs breeding together!

I sincerely hope the GHOs continue to survive and thrive in the Nanmangalam quarries.

The black buck and the tortoise - another GNP tale

One is fleet of foot, full of grace and with horns to kill for (or so it seems).

The other is endearingly slow, moves clumsily and deliberately and makes good soup(?)

Both are typical to this part of the world, endangered now, done in by our greed, and both are found in the Guindy National Park.  The GNP site claims there are 400 blackbucks in the sanctuary.  But there are rumblings among the naturalists that this number is far exaggerated.

Sorry, but I just cannot fathom how anyone could go around killing the black buck, or any protected animal for that matter, for sport.  What can be so sporty about hunting?  How can so uneven a contest be called a sport?  And did anybody ask the black buck whether it wanted to "play" in the first place?  

And the star tortoise has its own problems of being too endearing.  May I have one as a pet?  Every few months I read an article about how a hundred of them were seized by customs in Patna, another 1,000 on a Singapore-bound flight, another 600 at Kuppam railway station...

They dont do well as pets, most die from over feeding or wrong feeding, too much water, too little water, but still there are websites that persist in their trade, giving you tips on how you can care for them!  I came across a blog that giggles about her dad having bought these two start tortoises and then fed it Panadol?!  There are photos as well.

Yes, we will be in conflict with the animal world, as we try to survive and improve our lives.  But this is not survival, this is greed dont you think?  And selfishness.

The peacock - what a bird!

Enjoy!

Great pictures of our national bird, from Mr Ramanan, taken at Kanha.  Pavo cristatus.

I just read the peahen weighs about 4 kgs and the peacock in breeding plumage weighs six.  So, those feathers probably weigh 2 kgs?!

I cant decide which is my favourite picture - the train of feathers or the fan of feathers!  Tell me what you think!

Update - 11th November 2008

Here's one more picture that Mr Ramanan sent along, in order to complete the trilogy in a manner of speaking!

He comments wryly that when the photo-op comes along, its usually when the lighting is far from ideal.  But this picture below is quite spectacular, is it not?  Do click on the photo and enjoy a full-screen view.

Of crows and tigers - a tale from GNP

October 5th 2008:

Morning Guindy National park with MNS.

Through the southern entrance, rather than the western entrance which we used last time.

And we see tigers - hundreds of them, blue ones!  

Well that's what some one in their infinite wisdom named these butterflies - Blue Tigers.  Why? There's nothing tiger looking about them.  Strange.

There were also Glassy Tigers in plenty, and GNP for me was transformed by these lovely butterflies flitting from branch to branch and tree to tree, all over the park.

The Common India Crow is what this lovely brown butterfly is called.  Common, I can understand, but crow?!

I learnt that its the butterfly season, and I just soaked in the sight of all these butterflies, and the fragrance of the Divi divi flowers, which they all seemed to love.

There were little Pierrots (those small white butterflies) and the Common Grass yellow (little yellow ones) as well.  And though the white-browed bulbuls called noisily, the koels sang and the parakeets screeched, it was a butterfly morning for me.

Sekar found these lovely blooms of the Sickle Bush. Dichrostachys cinerea - a small tree with these interesting yellow and pink flowers.  Strangely, these vivid colours did not seem to attract the butterflies, or was I just imagining? 
And the Pink Cassia blooms filled the tree.  There are so many Cassia types aren't there?  

The weaver ants were busy as well...  Check out the Wikipedia entry on Weaver Ants - their nest building, or should I stay stitching, is quite fascinating.  I remember we saw one of these at close quarters at Penchalakona, and the ants themselves are large and menacingly red.

A weaver ant nest I think
Bhanu was very excited on seeing these yellow flowers - and muttered (more to herself I think) that this was Gmelina asiatica, a herb with lots of uses I think.  Some googling revealed that this was also called the Asian Bushbeech and mulkumizh in Tamil.  I hope I'm right!

More tigers!  As is evident, I coudn't get enough of them!

The tree is called Inky maram - because the make a dye/ink from it! 

A tiger and a sloth bear have a conversation

Read Shekar Dattatri's retelling of this Wow Moment, as he calls it!


Like something out of The Jungle Book!

Friends of Adyar Poonga

I attended a Friends of Adyar Poonga meeting this afternoon - so I think I qualify as "friend". (Nowadays, have you noticed, this "friend" is a very important concept. So I am friends with so-and-so in Facebook, I could be a friend of the Chennai Museum, or part of the elite Friends of Dakshinchitra.)

Anyways, for those of you wondering what Adyar Poonga is in the first place, its about 58 acres of wasteland, which the government has decide to restore back to nature. No, no that does not mean that all male citizens of our great metro can go and use it to answer their calls of nature, nor does it mean that we can throw our natural (and unnatural) rubbish there. No, it means that the TN government has finally seen the light and ordered that the Adyar Estuary, creek and wetlands around it need to be improved from the sewage pond and garbage dump they are currently, into some sort of eco park.

Thankfully, they got in some outsiders - Pitchandikulam Forest Consultants, all the way from Auroville, who have worked doggedly, enthusiastically and cooperatively.

This is the current status, as was shared with us at the meeting -

• Finally, they have been able to get the officials to cooperate and block the sewage entering the marshland and the stormwater drains in the neighbourhood
• The colonies around are now not throwing their waste and garbage into the 58 acres!
• A freshwater pond has been excavated, and has already benefitted from the rains, and has water.
• Tree planting - only native species for the most part - has begun.
• Educational boards and wildlife exhibitions are being hosted
• There is a semi-permanent display on the plans for the area.  (Do go and take a look, a lot of thought and planning has gone into it.)
• There are talks on with the large corporates and commercial buildings around to provide treated grey water for the development of the greenery.

So, what did I do?  Just listened actually, for the most part, and fed off some of the enthusiasm and optimism that was in the air regarding the future of the project.  Oh yes, I made an important "contribution" - I suggested that since they were not giving us a ration card or a voter's id, details like Father's Name could be dropped from the enrolling form!!

Next meeting on Oct 26th.  I hope to attend if I am in town.

PS:  Kailash of MNS pointed out some Large pied wagtails which was my first time seeing this wagtail! Thanks Kailash!    

Red-vented bulbuls

A non-descript looking light. What's it doing in a nature blog you think. Well, it seemed to have caught the fancy of red-vented bulbuls in Madras!
Here's what Geetha had to say:

"The bulbul has made a nest (for the fourth time in the same place) in the verandah my relative's house (in Karpagam
Gardens, Adyar) above a brass lampshade. It is seen feeding its three chicks with banyan figs and singapore cherries.
Apparently, the birds were very wary and shy at the time of the first nesting, but have become bolder with each new nesting tryout. At the moment, they are totally fearless and carry on their busy schedule irrespective of humans watching them at close quarters! Wonder whether it is the same pair or descendents of the original pair! At night, one of the parent birds sleeps in the nest along with the chicks. They are not disturbed when the lamp is switched on in the late evenings."

All the pictures courtesy Geetha and Jaikumar.

Now part of I and the Bird #106 - 4th Anniversary edition.