Raptor Friday – Eurasian Marsh Harrier
Why are male Eurasian Marsh Harriers so hard to come by in winter? A juvenile, banking in flight With early winter the wetlands of India become the haunt of a chocolate-brown raptor, some individuals showing…
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
Pachydermophobia!
A few things to remember before you are battered to death by a wild elephant There are two opinions on elephants with respect to their behaviour. Some say they are foul-tempered creatures while others contend…
Encounter: Otter in the water!
At first they looked like coconuts bobbing in the water. The next second we were gaping with wide-eyed delight at a family of Smooth-coated Otters! Champion Swimmer’s Rule #1: Keep your nose above the water…
Tree or no tree, who gives a fig?
A fig tree in fruit is a forest in itself: every creature in the vicinity is attracted to the sprawling canopy to eat the ripe red fruits, or the fruit-eaters. Sadly, these lovely fig trees are disappearing with our appetite for wider roads
Raptor Friday – The Lesser Fish-Eagle
Formerly thought to be a resident of the Himalayan foothills, the Lesser Fish-Eagle has pleasantly surprised us by nesting along rivers in southern India Formerly thought to occur only in the Himalayan foothills, the Lesser…
Encounter – What’s black and white, and hovers?
Ogres Sandy and Arun recollect their encounters with the common but lovable Pied Kingfisher Black, white and eats fish Sandy: The first time I saw the Pied Kingfisher (Ceryle rudis) was in Thekkady, Kerala, in my…
Raptor Friday: The Shaheen Falcon
Two Ogres compare notes about their respective sightings of a fast-flying falcon. Was that a Peregrine or a Shaheen? Sandy: I saw it fly at a height where it looked like a fast-moving orange-and-black speck in…
The next time you see a leopard in your town…
If you took the city of Tokyo and turned it upside down and shook it you would be amazed at the animals that fall out: badgers, wolves, boa constrictors, crocodiles, ostriches, baboons, capybaras, wild boars,…
Raptor Friday – The Shikra
I have a faint memory of my grandmother telling me about a small bird that swooped down from the trees and picked up the young chickens that she reared on her little farm. She called…
Wordless Wednesday – The gorilla’s kiss
The Green Ogre – Birds, Wildlife, Ecology and Nature notes from India.
Raptor Friday – The Common Kestrel
The Common Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus) visits the subcontinent in winter. It is also resident in the Himalayas and to a lesser extent in the Western Ghats
And swiftly fell the swift
It was a typical Friday morning at work. I was getting a status update from my team when my friend Deepu called. Another friend Prajual had informed him that he had found a fallen raptor…
Raptor Friday – Tawny Eagle
The name has a definite ring, doesn’t it? So much that a friend, a newbie birder who had just come down to bird with me Mysore, went back and told his friends that he had…
Raptor Friday – Black-Shouldered Kite
The Black-winged Kite alias the Black-shouldered Kite (Elanus caeruleus) is easily the most handsome and the most distinguishable of kites. The first time I saw this bird was in a photo, shot by my photography…