Members of the SeaWorld Orlando Rescue Team at Florida, USA traveled to Charleston, S.C. recently, where in collaboration with multiple organisations and volunteers – they helped save 10 wayward manatees. The manatees were spotted in the upper reaches of the Cooper River, near a warm water outflow area. Historically, manatees move south into warmer waters when the water temperature drops below 68 degrees. Due to rapidly dropping water temperatures in the river, the manatees remained close to the warm water outflow, instead of continuing to travel south. In doing so, they were isolated from adequate food sources and naturally warm waters. Following close coordination with some members of the Manatee Rescue & Rehabilitation Partnership (MRP), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) staf...
Read MoreTag: wildlife conservation
SO finally the cliché of the visit. Earlier four accounts- Bhangarh, Kankwari, Neelkanth and the Birds were quite fascinating and actually different from usual routines of visit to the national park. But then what about the wild inside you? Bhangarh might not haunt you but not sighting a tiger in the tiger reserve is certainly going to haunt you to a certain degree for a considerable duration of time. Purely on that terms Sariska has been third time lucky for me. My first trip to Sariska was almost thirty years ago when tiger safari was not a fancy idea, and second one 17 years ago when tiger was always second in my thought. (What was the first?) But then as I have always said that though its always fascinating to watch a tiger in the wild, but not watching it doesn't creates a sort
Read MoreThis is last post from my visit to Panna Tiger Reserve and National Park last month. And this one is not about tigers. I had always enjoyed wild, whether there is sighting of a big cat or not. Wild is always beautiful. Wanna Tiger Reserve and National Park has a beautiful topography and it owes much to the beautiful Ken river flowing through the reserve. It works as a lifeline for the forest and the wildlife here as you can see in the image below. A pair of Nilgai, no jungle in India is complete without them! A male sambhar crossing the road. This is one of the favourite foods of big cats. Something I captured for the first time- a spotted deer making a mating call to his partner. Novices will often misjudge a deer's mating call as an alarm call for the tiger sighting....
Read MoreTiger is a solitary animal, it likes to be alone in its territory along with his female partners. Often tigers get injured, many times fatally in territorial fights. Even two brothers will search for different territories once they are adult enough to hunt and feed for themselves and hence eventually their mother will leave them. As I mentioned in my last post (Read: Returning to the tiger in Panna) I was fortunate to watch two cubs on play. Mother was around but we couldn't see her as she was down in a nullah at a cooler place. Cubs don't look like cubs as they were almost more than a year old, but were still with their mother. We and the few other tourist vehicles located this family on a grassland right on the banks of the Ken river. Ken river flows through Panna Tiger reserve. So he
Read MorePanna tiger reserve has a special place personally for me. I have three personal firsts associated with this national park. It was here that I had my very first tiger sighting in the wild. This was also the place where I had my first and only tiger sighting while sitting on an elephant. Lastly, this is the only tiger reserve where I visited twice and had tiger sightings on both the occasions. And this time around, it was fortunate sighting of two cubs (photo above and below). Unluckily though, their mother remained elusive, although she was around. The gap of almost eleven years between these two visits to Panna had been a period of turmoil for this Tiger reserve. The story of Panna Tiger Reserve has not an ordinary one. A story of all hopes lost to an extraordinary resurrection. By
Read MoreIts World Wildlife Day today. UN has been celebrating this day since last year. This year theme for the World Wildlife Day is "The Future of wildlife is in our hands" and it also has a sub-theme "The future of elephants is in our hands". What an immense joy this nature gives us in form of these beautiful creatures. Few rare and many around us! Wildlife is a photographer's delight. SO here are some images of few rare wildlife creatures that we need to preserve or we are going to miss them for ever. A journey of a photographer all these years and through many terrains, starting with our sub-theme of the day on elephants. A kid is all ears to some important life lessons from mother elephant UN agrees that world's wildlife, whether charismatic or lesser known is facing many challenges. T
Read MoreAs the norm is, being to a national park or reserve invariably means watching a big cat. The success of visit always depends on having a sight or not having it. This over enthusiasm of looking for a tiger or a lion actually robs one of the 'thrill of the unexpected'. Every jungle has its own beauty, even in terms of the wildlife. In search of expected, we miss the 'unexpected other' which actually make the jungle beautiful. So for all those, who return with their heads down after missing on the big cat, here are few 'non-cat' moments from a recent safari in the GIR national park and wildlife sanctuary in Gujarat. Known as only haven for Asiatic Lions in the wild in world, this dry deciduous forest has a fair share of other wildlife- 39 species of mammals, 37 species of reptiles, 300 spe...
Read MoreDogs and cats might have a love-hate relationship but these dogs are determined to protect the bigger cats in the jungle. These are wildlife sniffer dogs. And these dogs recently had a very glorious passing out parade for the new recruits. With the passing out parade and a magnificent display of learnt skills by the 14 sniffer dogs and their 28 handlers at the 23rd Battalion of Special Armed Reserve Forces, located at Bhopal in the state of Madhya Pradesh, India doubled its strength of wildlife sniffer dogs, by deploying these newly trained dogs to its wildlife protection and anti poaching squads across India. Passing out parade was organised at the Dog Training Centre in Bhopal by TRAFFIC and WWF-India to celebrate the successful completion of the training programme in presence of the
Read MoreFrom bear paw soup to pangolin scales, people can now report suspected illegal wildlife trade in South-East Asia using a smartphone app developed by the Taronga Conservation Society Australia in partnership with TRAFFIC. The ‘Wildlife Witness’ app enables users to report suspected illegal wildlife in trade in the region easily and quickly by taking a photo, pinning the exact location of an incident and sending these important details to TRAFFIC.Reports by app users will be analysed by a Wildlife Crime Data Analyst and over time, the information will help build data and enrich understanding of illegal wildlife trade across the region, help prioritise response action and highlight areas in need of increased enforcement resources. Wildlife Witness will also feature information o...
Read MoreAfter the mayhem reported last year, Amur Falcons have been safe in India so far this year, thanks to the determined efforts by the Government of Nagaland and the conservation fraternity. In 2012, the killing of around 120,000 Amur Falcons over a one week period in the State of Nagaland raised alarm across India. The bird stops over in Nagaland for a brief refueling halt during its long migration flight. However, the catastrophe may not be repeating itself this year largely due to the efforts of the Forest Department, NGOs and local communities. The Amur Falcon Falco amurensis is a small raptor in the falcon family that is an exceptional long distance flyer. It breeds in north-east Asia (China, North Korea and Russia) and in winter migrates to south-east Africa, undertaking one of the l
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