I usually go for birding and photography on weekends. I usually look for birds and try to fill the frame with different perspectives. Approaching birds and getting them in a frame is most difficult of all tasks in bird photography. As i am an amateur bird photographer, till now i was looking for birds in certain places and was trying to get them in frame, with my known camera skills and exploring some settings. It was last to last saturday, i decided to stop researching on camera settings and started to concentrate on knowing their behavior, understanding their activities and try to get their possible shots from what i have learned till now from some professionals on the field and their experience on their website. Lingambudhi Lake in Mysore is one of the best known places for birding, i visit alternative weekends looking for some new species and try and make best of the available species. After the rainy season the lake was almost full and approaching birds was bit tough. Now the summer has started and lake has dried almost, some of the migratory birds available there have gone now and some resident migratory birds are still available. One of my long time favorites is Red Watted Lapwing, whose call is so unique - "Did you do it??" amazing na... which is more shy and approaching them was the toughest thing i had. On that particular day i made my mind to concentrate on making some good images of these guys. As i said earlier, lake is dried approaching them was bit easy since i got access to remote parts of lakes, which was not possible earlier with lake being full. I waited @ one of those dried up lake beds where these guys were turning around. At first they notified me and started moving around giving alarm calls, then after 15 mins they rested @ around 50 - 70 ft from where i was waiting. There were some common sandpipers around and they were busy looking for food and had an eye on me too, they use to frequent close to some 10 ft and 60 - 70 ft, i tried getting one of them and as the sun wa slowly rising light was not sufficient to get them. The dried lake bed was very hard and rough and i had good time kneeling around and i finally sat there. After half an hour or 45 mins from nowhere a Yellow wagtail landed just 5ft in front of me. I was amazed to see this guy and it gave 2 - 3 good frames and finally was checking around for some grass hoppers and other insects for food. It was a beautiful experience that if you sit and wait @ a particular point like a rock, you will certainly be amazed by someone, which i had not done earlier and i had a good learning. Then after an hour or so i lost my patience [ which is bad :( ] i tried moving slowly towards them. I usually get disturbed by any other species of bird while concentrating on one, on that day even when some bush chats, larks and others were around i did not get diverted and started moving towards my goal [ Red Watted Lapwing ]. They were still had an eye on me and were moving away. I thought i will some time for them to adjust i went in search of this yellow wagtails which were plenty around. on the way there was a hoopoe sitting in the shade and my presence disturbed it and it flew off, it was my bad luck that i didn't notice it and then i saw some stilts and pond heron with breeding colours. Made some good perspectives and @ that time i had my fellow friend Ashik who was also trying to get some of them. I saw a Marsh Harrier Male who was on the ground in a Majestic posture enjoying the morning light. I started slowly moving towards him and @ one point i started crawling, seeing me crawling ashik came and he also wanted some perspectives, i told him not go straightly approaching and not to move fast but he rushed and all my effort in getting the Majestic guy went in vain. I cursed him and as i was on ground some wagtails were close to me and i made some amazing perspectives of them. I will always be amazed by the stilts, their body colour and especially those thin pink colored legs are just mind blowing gods creation. I made some perspectives of them but could make any close ups, which is still a dream for me and also as they will be settled always pretty far around 100 ft also in water, I just was able to make some perspectives. while looking back for my goal, i was amazed to see Asian Paradise Flycatcher Male, the most beautiful guy on the other side of the dried up lake. I had glimpse but it went inside bushes, what amazes me of this guy is it pure white long tail, which is atleast 3 to 4 longer than its body length. Then i was caught by ashy prinia which was roaming around for some food. I didn't had a decent image of ashy till date. I was happy when i got this one on the branch of small plant. Next was the turn of laughing dove, I had decent images of these, but all of them either on wire or in some gutter. This time it was sitting on the open branch of a medium sized tree, it was nice to see them in the view finder. He posed me for 5 mins and then flew off. A Grey heron from no where came and landed some 100 ft away, it was looking for something and flew off just giving a glimpse. A Indian Grey Mangoose was sun bathing and as i went looking for grey heron, it ran behind a small bushy area. I went in search of him and found larks, they were very much sensitive and approaching was difficult as the surface they were placed was very uneven. Finally i caught with my goal [ Red Watted Lapwing ], which was standing and posing @ them same place where i earlier got stilts, it was on the other sid of the bank and still started approaching slowly and it noticed me and flew off. I followed him for sometime and my patience totally went off as the sun was burning hot and it was nearly three and half to 4 hours had past, i left my hope and i saw some stilts on the other part of the dried lake and there were freely roaming, so slowly moved and then @ around 60 - 70 ft i started crawling. finally i reach the end point of the wet land and infront of @ around 40 - 50 ft stilts and some common sandpipers were moving freely without any signs of danger. I cliked some perspectives and my ankles were burning and first time i came to know the advantages and disadvantages of crawling. Firstly to mention advantages - you can get the birds decent full frame image in ground level, which is amazing angle and birds won't be disturbed and they won't consider a person lying flat on ground to be a danger. Disadvantages - You will get back ache, ankle burns, injuries and totally forget your dress. You need a lot of patience to do this and hand holding the lens with your ankles placed on ground is like rubbing your skin with grades of sandpaper.
I made some decent images of sandpipers and stilts and since it was first time i could resist the pain and just rested on my hand for sometime. The sun was burning, ankles and hands paining and after four and half hours i am still on ground without a single drop of water and still my goal not being achieved. I rested for a min or two and opened my eyes to see my goal in front of me and within minimum focusing distance. It was like reaching top of himalayas, i was overwhelmed by its presence and i made 2 frames when my battery went off and my backup battery was in my bag @ 200 ft away. I just thanked god for those 2 frames that i made after which my battery went off. I was on top achieving my goal and all my pain didn't bother me. I just loved those 30 -40 secs which it was posing for me, i was stunned by its looks viewing through my viewfinder., after that it just flew away and i slowly woke up without disturbing the stilts. I packed my camera and was in full of excitement when a surprise @ that entrance to the lake stunned me and it was none other than Black Shouldered Kite. I was just recollecting the beauty of lingambudhi in Jan, when this guy dived in front of me without noticing me and flew away. I went in search to see that beautiful raptor but couldn't found him. When i was on the way to the gate i saw sun birds playing closely and @ the gate a Great tit was dashing against a white wall. a very strange behavior. I went home happily with my goal finally being achieved. I once again thank god who gave me such wonderful moment [ 30 -40 secs ] to achieve my goal. It was a superb experience. Sorry i am not able to upload my images as policy denies here in my office and also as i said in my previous post my grand old man is departing i have huge backlog of images. Catch you soon .. Picture abhi bakhi hain mere dost.. Till then Have a Nice Time.
Cheers,
Anoop
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