Embracing darkness – celebrating the night sky
A photographic quest for the Milky Way under truly dark skies on Sunday, April 26, which marks the end of the Dark Sky Week organized by the International Dark Skies Association
Author: Sandeep Somasekharan
Sandeep Somasekharan (or Sandy as friends call him) took his headlong plunge into photography with a three-megapixel Nikon point-and-shoot he purchased in 2003. The avid reader and occasional scribbler started enjoying travel and nature more as he spent more time photographing. Meeting Beej in 2008 helped him channel his creative energies in the form of essays and nature photographs that he started publishing on The Green Ogre.
Sandy loves to photograph birds and landscapes, and considers photography and writing as his meditation. Now based out of the US, Sandy juggles his time between parental duties, a full time engineering role, writing short fiction in Malayalam, and an occasional birding trip thrown in between. His debut novel in Malayalam hits the bookstalls in January 2025.
Sandy can be found at instagram as @footprintsonlight
Fall Fable – celebrating the en-masse death of leaves
Every year, leaves die off en masse during fall. What’s the science behind this glorious phenomenon?
Eastern Bluebirds – Spare the rod and spoil the child?
A run in with a rat snake prompts a question about conservation and ethics while setting up nest-boxes for Eastern Bluebirds
The night the moon blushed red
It was a cold, windy night on the coast of North Carolina. But there was a celestial event that brought one determined photographer out to gaze skyward – the blood moon!
Stalking Sunsets – the art of burn
The order of events of a sunrise meter out like a well-written piece of poetry. The sunset is just a sunrise turned upside down on its head, a perfect mirror image.
Dogwood Day Afternoon – A walk in the flowering woods
Come spring, the first thing you would notice in every pocket of woods in Raleigh, NC are dazzling white flowers. Meet the Flowering Dogwood, the state flower of North Carolina
Birding at Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge – A Photographer’s Diary
The ebb of winter is a fine time for birders. At Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge, a nature photographer has a field day. Here’s a page from his diary
Winter birding at the doorstep
Winter storm Helena was supposed to hit us harder. Six inches of snow, failed power, and freezing pipes. The storm came and went, and the dull morning made way for a bright and sunny afternoon. Then the birds began to come out
Can the koel find another tree?
Trees are an inconvenience. Leaves falling, light being blocked, snakes showing up, tree roots destabilizing the walls, the need to widen the approach road – we have so many excuses to cut down our trees, and none for planting one.
Northern Mockingbird – the many-tongued mimic
To shoot a mockingbird was the ultimate quest. After a year of waiting, it finally happened. Meet the many-tongued mimic – the Northern Mockingbird
Cary Glen – Images of a lovely North Carolina lake
Cary Glen in North Carolina has little cosmic significance. It is a little lake in a little town. But nature thrives here, and it provides a much-needed escape from life’s machinations
Balcony Safari – The idle joy of birding
Why go on an expensive safari to watch birds when your backyard is just as well endowed as any forest?
Chasing a Sunset
When a sunset that seemed improbable only a moment ago bloodies the sky, it becomes the fulcrum balancing idle desolation and mad euphoria. A photographic meditation
Encounter with a picky eater – Carolina Anole
One thing is clear after watching this Carolina Anole wrestle a stick-fast caterpillar off its leafy perch – this picky eater really loves its greens
Slumbering Giants – Northern Elephant Seals of Point Reyes
Epiphany on wandering into a gentlemen’s club of sexually exhausted Northern Elephant Seals on a beach in Point Reyes