The Unseen Birds

I present few unique shots of birds. Well these could be common birds. The main unique point is that most of these birds I have not seen  in that way in the wild or I am sighting these for the 1st time.

• The Vulture

I am not an expert in vulture but quick search answers me that this could be a "Red-headed vulture".

This was shot at kabini during the safari at Rajiv Gandhi National Park. Just  before we spotted this vulture, there was strong decayed​ smell  though we could not spot. It could have been a kill by some animal but was deep inside. This vulture was on the highest point on the tree and quite far away from my shooting range to get a clean shot.

• The Dancing peacock

Seeing a peacock dance in its natural environment is really a good feeling.

This bird was dancing in the grassland for a long time. It was quite far away and out of reach from my 300mm to get sharp image. We stopped the safari jeep for a while to see this beauty.

• The Hoopoe bird

I wish I could had a better shot, I was bit late and this one flew to the next branch, still I managed to get an ok view. It's a beautiful bird with it's shades.

 

I can't call this a colorful bird, still absolutely this bird is really rich with colors. Probably this could be the fact that when we term a bird to be colorful our mind expects it to be with bright colors. Well yet it's beautiful. 

• The kingfisher

There is nothing unique about this, its very common in city and the jungle. The guide spotted this and explained as a verity of white kingfisher. I clarified this again to check if this is really a kingfisher, and the and answer was yes. I have not seen this kind of kingfisher without long beaks. 

We also spotted a common one as well!!!!

• The Indian roller

This one is really a beautiful bird. I already posted one earlier. Here i am trying to present two different angles though the best colors come out of this bird is while flying!!

• Emerald Green Pigeon 

The colors of this are really nice. I have not seen this in the city sides!!!

Birds are always very good subject for photography and each of these are unique by itself.

 

Please visit my flick page where i try to post the better quality shots, Comments, Critique and suggestions are welcomes.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/panantha

 

The Majestic Tiger

A visit to Kabini Jungle lodges and resorts was much awaited trip. The safari at Nagarhole National Park turned to be the best safari which i did till now. It will be definitely the most memorable one for sure. It was 8th April 2017 and the summer is at its peak when myself, Nisha and Surya checked-in. We started very early from Bangalore and reached resort by 10:30am. We had good lunch and took a short nap before we got the call for safari.

We are out to safari by 3:45pm. It was an open van which accommodates about 10 people and a guide and the driver. As there were few families and couple of kids in the wan we gossiped that these​ special van would have special route where the animals won't be seen. We turned out to be completely wrong.

As we entered the forest territory we were fortunate to sight a Tusker Elephant. It was quite close that I could not capture the full elephant with my 300mm lens. Then we spotted few deers and peacocks. It's always great to see these animals free in their own natural habitat.

Indian Roller - State bird of karnataka

The blue wings are really a beauty to watch. 

Emerald Green Pigeon

Sighted a pair of emerald green pigeon and another peacock when our safari guide spotted the Majestic beast.

Our guide cum driver sighted it very early and he started telling

"Sir Tiger, sir tiger"

This the one of the first sight...

Since I was sitting at the front seat, I started searching for it first. It took few minutes for me to sight the beautiful beast. More than the actual sight of the tiger, it was the realization that we are infact sighting a tiger took a while to sink!!!! After entertaining us for about 5 minutes this shy cat decided to walk into the bushes.

 

We will never forget these 5 minutes where we had spotted a tiger in the wild for the first time. 

After the sighting of the tiger we drove again slowly, sighted peacock, langur , couple of serpant eagles, an elephant and many many spotted deers.

Peacock

Gray Langur

 The news of tiger sighting had been passed to other safari drivers and rightly so everyone wanted to reach that place to try the luck.

At the same time we got news of a python sighting, but after reaching to that spot we were unlucky.

We almost reached the end of our safari where we saw about 3 safari jeeps parked on the way. While approaching we were really surprise to spot another majestic tiger. This one looked bit more smaller than the earlier one. It also turned out to be not shy at all.

 

 

This gave us many many good poses to click the shots and finally after about 15 minutes of good good sighting we finally decided to leave the beast in its own world and we headed back to the resort ......................felling blessed 😀