Tadoba, The Jewel of Vidarbha - Oct 2013 (Camp 10)

One of my Doctor friends contacted me. They had a conference in Nagpur and they had 2 days to spare. He asked me about planning mini camp at Tadoba in those 2 days. When it comes to traveling to the Jungle, I can take whatever it takes to make it happen. I generally take larger groups to the forests. But it was long time since I had been to Tadoba and I wanted to create a base for upcoming camps so I said, let me come with you. So I decided to join them on Saturday morning to lead this mini camp. 

Tadoba Andhari Reserve is the largest national park in Maharashtra. Total area of the Reserve is 625.4 sq km. Tadoba reserve is a predominantly Dry Deciduous Forest with dense woodlands. Teakis the prdominant tree species. Other deciduous trees include crocodile bark, Salai, Semal, Tendu, beheda, hirda and mahua are other common species. Large amount Bamboo grass is also present all over the jungle.

After a long time I was traveling alone in train to Nagpur. But sometime, alone is also fun. Got few new friends in trains. Also caught some quick snaps using my iPhone while traveling.. This time iPhone is another gadget in my arsenal..

 

Speeding Train

In early morning caught nice landscapes from the running train to test the iPhone camera. And believe me, iPhone rocks!!
 

Sun rise

Overcast to begin with

 

I met this group for the first time and we became friend very quickly. All were doctors so few of their jokes went 2-3 feet above my head. But we adjusted pretty quickly. I gave them some initial instructions and understood what were their expectations from the camp!!

Every time I plan such camps, I plan 4 to 5 or even more rides inside the jungle. This was one of my first camps in which we had planned for only 2 safaris. This year, it rained a lot and it was raining till today October. Even at this time the weather was overcast. This kind of gloomy weather is not very useful for wildlife / bird watching. The hot sun is far better. Even true for photography. 

Many of us were the first time campers and were very eager to see the tiger in the wild. But in all such conditions spotting tiger in just 2 rides was a donting task. Till this camp, due to all the good luck iCampers have seen the tiger in every camp. And in some of the camps we had seen tigers multiple times. And as I always say there is something called as "First Time Campers Luck". So we were hoping for the best..

We started from Nagpur at around 11.30 AM. We reached the hotel at 2PM. We had a quick but delicious lunch and were ready to go inside the jungle for the first time. This time forest department has added a hefty Rs 500 charge on bigger cameras. I have to pay that :( but not with high regrets...

There are some classic paintings on the gate, and my camera did not miss to capture those. This one is very real and very interesting...

Lovely Cartoon.. Very Real..

Why parks are closed in Monsoon

As we enter the jungle I realized that there are huge spider webs making invisible curtains between the trees. And those were just too many in numbers. Those were weaved by Giant wood spider. The female of this species is bigger in size as compared to the male. The toughest thing to believe is that, the female spider eats up the male after mating.. 

Front View - Giant Wood Spider Female..

Huge Web

The backside..

We had many jokes about the above fact as we moved further. We saw many spotted deer on the way..

Spotted Deer

Male Spotted Deer

The dirt track was still moist due to rains and there were many small ponds on the road...

Water puddles all the way..

Tadoba lake is a beautiful and is situated in the middle of the forest which is home for marsh crocs and many water birds. We were lucky to see one swimming across the lake..

Marsh Crocodile

Tadoba Lake

It was getting dark and there was hardly any movement or alarm calls in the jungle. I thought this ride is almost done. No sights of the tiger till now.. But we saw few vehicles stopping at one location and staring on their left. That was surely something interesting. We stood up in our vehicle. And to everyone's surprise a young 2-3 year old male tiger walked out from think woods towards the roads. This was not fully grown yet. I pointed my camera to catch him in frame. But some overexcited tourists made lot of noise and one of the immature gypsy drivers started his vehicle and moved rapidly to get good view. The big cat did not like this at all and quickly ran back in the woods. We got to see him, but no one could capture it. The low light and fast moving animal made my photo a disaster.. Nevertheless this is good enough to prove that we had seen him :)

Illusive...

While coming back to the hotel, took some photos on my iPhone

Landscape..

Magic of colors

The ride ended with that sweet memories of tiger..

In the evening we asked the hotel staff to make chicken for us. We had a great party that night with Gawaran Chicken! Post dinner I asked few of the folks to come over for a walk on the way to Jungle gate. When we started, it looked like an innocent walk in the dark. But as we went away from the hotel, it was total dark. The innocent walk did not remain that innocent at all when we started hearing different noises along with croaking of frogs and chirping of crickets in that dark night. Sky with so many stars can be seen only when you are away from cities. That sight, feeling was beyond words. And just from the top of our heads in that star cladded sky we saw a shooting star for more than 2-3 seconds. This bright and moving heavenly body was the icing on the cake.. If I could have captured that, I could have signed the camera man contract with Yash Raj Film...

Next day morning the plan was to get up early and go for our final ride in the jungle. The sighting of the big cat had happened in earlier ride but that was just momentarily. We wanted to see this guy again in more light and for more time.. Seeing tiger in the wild is the unending thirst... You always want to see it again and again. No matter what.. I had seen the tiger for more than 30 odd times in the jungle but I still get excited to see it. With that thirst and to get the feel of jungle we again started our final jungle safari..

While waiting in queue before entering the jungle, I caught the half moon in my camera..

Moon

The lighting was still not perfect even today morning. I had to capture the animals and birds at low ISO levels. Birding was big on my agenda today.. Here are few of those I could capture..

Grey Headed Fish Eagle

Paradise Flycatcher - Juvenile

Common Kingfisher

Shikra

Immature Display

Little green bee-eater

Crested Serpent Eagle

The best of these were the Brown Fish Owl. The huge sized owl lives near water and as the name suggests it eats the fish. I had seen it long back in Bandhavgadh. Here we could see 2 of these huge birds on the ghost tree..

Brown Fish Eagle

Looking Back

No jungle ride comes to an end till I shoot one of these 'near human' things :)

Hanuman Langur

Few more animals we saw on the way were..

Wild Boar in high ISO

Ruddy Mongoose

At one of the check posts, the other drivers told us that there is a leopard 10 mins drive on this road. Leopard is generally a shy animal and does not show up so easily. I couldn't believe we could find it after 10 mins. But behind the bush he was there. I am not sure if it was injured. This is just the second time I had seen this spotted beauty in the wild. Lot of vehicles were queuing to see it. Again the leopard was so camouflaged in the surrounding that it was tough to find it. I put my camera on manual mode and tried to locate it. One more big cat seen in the wild but just to say we have seen it..

Leopard

Mammals, Aves and  Reptiles were seen along with spiders. The remaining were some insects, which also showed up on the way back.. 

Commander Butterfly

Damesfly

Grey Pansy

With all lovely memories of the below sightings, and with great company of friends, we ended our final ride in the jungle.

Our sightings in these 2 rider were as follows -


Mammals -
Tiger
Leopard
Spotted Deer
Sambar Deer
Rudy Moongose
Barking deer
Jackel
Nilgai
Langoor
Wild Boar




Reptiles -

Crocodile
Snake (can't Identify)
 
Birds -
Black drongo
Racket tailed drongo
Little Green bee eater
Grey headed fish eagle
Brown fish Owl
Created serpant eagle
White eyes buzzard
Shikra
Black ibis
Painted stork
Open bill stork
Common blue Kingfisher
Hoopoo
Grey jungle fowl
Peacock
Paradise flycatcher female
Pond heron
Intermediate egret
Little egret
Cattle egret
Red vented bulbul
Long tailed shrike
Indian Roller
Spotted dove
Collared dove
Yellow footed green pigeon
Rofous treepie
Magpie robin
Flameback woodpecker
Jungle babbler
Indian crow
Red wattled lapwing
Rose ring parakeet
Plum headed parakeet

And unforgettable
Giant wood spiders in numbers

Thanking all the iCampers for joining this mini camp we said good bye to Tadoba..

iCampers

Thanks to all the readers who have reached till here...

Kaas - The Plateau of Flowers!! (Sept 2013)

Sahyadri’s, commonly known as Western Ghats has so many beautiful places which attracts thousands of tourists across the world. Especially in Monsoon when the mighty nature changes the whole landscape of this region, it’s the most beautiful place to visit. The pouring rains, guzzling streams and waterfalls make their way through the valleys and the lush green mountains. Western Ghats is home for as many as 500+ bird species, 100+ mammals along with large number of fish, amphibians, reptiles and huge number of insects. Most of these are endemic to this region. This region is very rich in the biodiversity and needs the deserving care to keep these endemic living things from getting extinct.   

Very popular places in Western Ghats and especially in Maharashtra are Mahabaleshwar, Matheran, Lonavala and Khandala. Western Ghats receives huge amount of rains so has many evergreen and semi-evergreen forests. The climate is pleasant during monsoon and winter. In summer also its much cooler than the cities in Deccan plateau. So, most of the tourists plan their outings to these places over the weekends throughout the year.

There are many other locations which are not so popular. The one of them which lately has started attracting many nature lovers is ‘Kaas Plateau’. This is 1000 hectors of plateau situated in the Western Ghats of Maharashtra. This place is near to Satara and is home for many of the endemic species of animals, birds, reptiles and most importantly the herbs and shrubs. This plateau has a tough rock surface and very little soil on it. Due to which there are not many large trees on this plateau. Still for about 8-10 months of the year (Except couple of months of Summer) many small shrubs and herbs grow and bloom in this area. Towards the end of the monsoon, when clouds and sun play hide and seek and sprinkle water over this region is the time when lot of small plants bloom and the green cover on the plateau starts taking different colours. September and October are the times when the colourful flower carpets change their colour and attract the nature lovers, artists and photographers.  

Last year a great thing has happened. UNESCO has declared Kaas Plateau as a World Heritage Site. Due to this special efforts were made by the forest department of India and made fencing around this area. They created pathways for the people to roam around without stepping on some endemic plants. Lot of security guards are appointed now to keep tourists disciplined. Parking space has been created. Road side parking and stopping is prohibited. All good steps have been taken to save this land of flowers. Also the entry fees have been introduced, which are very nicely utilized in securing the biodiversity of the region.

Fence guarded by Malabar Crested Lark

Before we reach to the plateau, the yellow carpet of flowers forces you to take a halt. These lovely small flowers called as Kawla or Mickey Mouse flower by the locals. The botanical name for these flowers is 'Smithia Hirsuta'

Yellow Carpet

The closeup photo gives you an idea why its called as Mickey Mouse flower.

Smithia Hirsuta Closeup

7 Dwarfs

Just near the parking some small herbs and shrubs seek your attention.

Fern

One of those is the lovely star like flowers. At different stages they have different colors. You could see white, pink and lavender color in a single bunch.

तारे जमीन पर!

And some galaxies as well!

रानवांग

Id?

As we parked our vehicle and started towards the plateau, the rains spoiled our plans. We took a lunch break and decided to come back after 2-3 hours. But as they say that, 'every cloud has a silver lining', we got an opportunity to catch some lovely droplets on the colorful flowers. 

सोनकी /Senecio Bombayensis is a lovely yellow flower which is very commonly found allover India.

सोनकी

High Five!

Mix..

तुतारी

A very small herb called Snake Flower / वायतुरा is endemic to this region. I think the name वायतुरा came from the fact that it has structure like the English letter Y

वायतुरा

There is this lovely small herb found in the shadows of bigger trees. This grows near to the moss. This has a lovely 4 petal structure. 

Id?

 Also with their fragrance and bright colors, these flowers attracts lot of insects.

There are some insectivorous plans which are found in this area. The one which is endemic to this region is Dorsera Indica / गवती बिंदू. This small herb has small thread like structures which have dew drop like endings. These dewdrops are sticky in nature. Once the insects get in touch with these, they get stuck there and the small stem winds around the insect and kills it. All the nutrition from the insects body are then sucked by the plant. 

Another beautiful 3 petal flower found in this area is Muradannia Lanuginosa. This is called as अबोलीना in Marathi. This is one of the attractions of this plateau. This flower is endemic and engendered specie.

अबोलीना

Clouds play Hide and Seek with Sun!

जरतारी

नीलिमा

The other lovely flower of the region makes a blue carpets on the plateau. Utricularia Purpurascens also called as निळी पापणी / सीतेची आसव.

निळी पापणी / सीतेची आसव

Blue Carpet

निळी पापणी / सीतेची आसव आणि गेंद

Eriocaulon / गेंद is another endemic plant of this region. This also grows in numbers and creates a white carpet in some places.

गेंद

जांभळी मंजिरी

Kaas Landscape

Kaas Landscape

तेरडा

Pink Carpet

तेरडा

आभाळी

Orchid Id?

Id?

Finally got to see some guest appearance of the reptiles..

Indian Forest Skink / सापसुरळी

सापसुरळी

The Spider gets his pray in his diamond cladded web!

Id?

And finally we started our journey back. In the way we captured this lovely city of Satara which is situated in the valleys of lush green Sahyadri. With all those lovely moments captured in eyes and camera we said goodbye to Kaas without forgetting to say, we would visit again, soon, very soon!!

Thanks for reading! Have a great day!