The beautiful dragon fly from Varca

When I first sighted this dragon fly, I thought it was a tiny butterfly or bird. After I shot a picture on my phone and it was only after I enlarged it that I realised it was a dragon fly

It was the first time I've seen a dragon fly flap its wings in such a wide arch. Or even move the wings way below the body when in a perched position. It was only after I was able to photograph one more closely (this time on my point and shoot) and with fully spread wings that I also noticed the unique angle of the front and rear wings. A third first is the coloured wings on a dragon fly! All of these first made this set of sightings special. Have you seen this before?

Living on the edge

There's a lot of premium humans put to managing risk.  In nature's ecosystem these seem to be a normal way of life. Here's an insect (this one is like a flying ant) that was hopping from petal to petal on the flower very nonchalantly. This was a return trip it was doing after transporting some food.

I wondered whether it was the wings it had that gave it the extra courage or was it plain adaptability coming instinctively - imagine leaping from a moving petal to petal on a flower that is swinging with the swift breeze and you will get an idea of the degree of difficulty that I'm talking about, that the insect was managing with no apparent effort

It is visuals like this that make you think, that each one of us have a choice  - you can take challenges in your stride or feel overawed and get stressed out.

Yet another case where shooting pictures triggers interesting insights. The striking photo you get at the end of it is the bonus. Or is it the insight?

Snug as a bug in a ...bud

I was going through the set of pictures I took last morning when I saw this one- a set of tine pink flowers, barely three millimetres wide and extremely  pretty. In this picture I noticed what looked like a tiny bug. 

A closer look revealed a bug that was snugly ensconced in the bud that had flowered just moments ago. Very routinely, when you go through pictures taken at very close range, you notice things in the picture that you didn't while you took the photograph. This was one such happy surprise

okra production line at humgaon

experienced this fascinating production line of okra (lady finger/ bhindi) at humgaon, where we have a small patch of land.
the plant has grown up to about five feet in two months thanks to the good rainfall.  there were small yellow flowers on every branch and interesting bee/insect on almost all of them. the okra is a self pollinating plant (as different from a cross pollinating one) and has these yellow vibrant flowers. the bees drop in and help the pollination process.
saw this nature's very own busy production line and couldn't help being awestruck!
this is one picture of a bee that's just landed on a flower. alongside you can see a couple of baby okras  growing and a few buds that are also on the way!

good morning grasshopper!

On my usual jaunt taking pictures of flowers early morning at Tambudki, Bardez at Goa, and I came across this tiny (less than 2 cm) grasshopper on this flower. While the colour makes it stand out, notice how the wings mimic a formations of a leaf!
I also thought the dabs of green, melon red and yellow made for a good colour palette. What do you think?
PS: Look carefully and you can also notice another bug, still getting out of slumber from inside a cozy flower.

Can you see it?

Do you remember the times you noticed a pattern in something that reminded you of something else? As a kid, staring at the sky suddenly noticing that the clouds at that precise time resembled a dog, or anything else? The similarity or dissimilarity in the two images is what fascinated you or made you chuckle. And was a subject of subsequent chats with friends, which would start with, 'you won't believe this..

A recent trip to Dimapur and an early morning walk, gave me just a similar moment. Here's a spider's web, that reminded me of a high rise building. Can you see it?

Hi there!

This morning, as I was craning my neck into a thicket to get a good angle on a flower, I came this close to a beetle. Both of us maintained our composure (I with a fair degree of effort). That done, I also managed to get some pictures of the flower. 

Starting on a new web

This is the very first time that I was witness to a spider beginning to spin a new web. Notice the first lines of the web about to be cast. Can you see them?

getting this close to the bee...

I have a simple point and shoot camera and the way I get close ups, is to get close up to the subject. There are two attendant issues to this - there is the apprehension that the bee will fly off and the other is that it will bite.

Over time, I've learnt that if I wait till the bee starts feeding, it gets so taken in that even my camera being centimetres away does not distract it. This picture was in the garden at Swaraj Bhavan in Allahbad, the house that Indira Gandhi was born in. Apart from the historical importance of the place, the flowering plants in the garden are a spectacle by itself.

you can now start understanding how a bee feels...

around mid- morning, mid-day. a bright sun and consequently a fully bloomed flower. a mesmerising sight. even for me. when you are present in this moment, you can then start to understand how a bee feels...

dragonfly duo

Another early morning sighting at Gangtok. A dragon fly duo. The bright colours really stood out against the green. Never having seen these kind of colourful ones before, it would've been nice to take more pictures, but it would've been like intruding. So this is the only one I have

Bees and pollen baskets

This is another amazing facet of nature. Pollination - the critical intersection between the animal world and the plant world, the moment when life regenerates itself  - is something that happens as a by product of bees collecting pollen!

The back legs of bees have small indentations called pollen baskets. The bee uses its front legs to brush and comb the pollen to make it compact and fit into the basket, till it reaches the hive. Once here, it will remove the pollen from the baskets and store it in the honeycomb. Pollen, mixed with nectar/honey is stored for baby bees to feed on till they become pupae!

Here are two bees, one from Allahabad and the other from Bangalore with filled pollen baskets!

bee pollinating a white passion flower. fascinating!

It is absolutely fascinating how nature works.
Here's a bee pollinating a white passion flower (passiflora subpeltata). Notice how the pollen laden stamens are angled just so that the pollen rubs off on the bee and can easily get transferred on to the pistils!
There are about 300 known varieties of this vine and the white passiflora has been classified as a invasive/ pest. It does bear passion fruit, but the ones on this variant are'nt edible.

another beautiful fruit fly

I sighted this one on a walk in a small town called Stollen, in the Black Forest region of Germany. The early morning light and the clear air made for a very sharp and bright picture.

uphill climb

another early morning sighting at chongay tar, gangtok. another beetle (can anyone help with the name of the species) off on an uphill climb (a reminder of how we city folk have a tough time on uphill climbs in the mountains).

note the play in yellow and green across the visual in the grass, the flowers and the beetle. that's what attracted me to this frame.

the early beetle

The sun rises between 4.15 and 4.30 am in the morning at Gangtok, so all the creatures are up and about. One of the first to stir that day was this beetle.