Upriver, a monsoon love affair with the Ganga
It’s easy to see why Lord Shiva fell in love with the Ganga. Mere mortals can be hopelessly smitten.
Heading for Bangladesh’s Sundarbans
Everybody speaks about the Sundarbans as if they belong in India. En route to Jessore we endured fog delays and an interminable wait. #travel
A Diwali away from the madding crowd
For this Chital stag at Bannerghatta, Diwali was a faraway rumble Diwali, the festival of lights that signifies the victory of good over evil, makes us Ogres nervous. Noise, smoke, runny eyes, shortness of breath and sadness at the colossal waste darken our moods. And because we don’t want to…
Le Question: Will you get me a new globe?
For his seventh birthday I gifted Shashwat a globe. It met a long-standing demand and soon enough he had charted the oceans, seas, continents, polar ice caps (the great melt, breaking ice shelf), the Pacific Ring of Fire (volcanoes), Polynesia (extinct flightless birds), Madagascar (the island and the movie), the…
Slowly down Bangladesh’s Shitalakhya River
Jennifer Nandi recounts her travels along the Shitalakhya River in Bangladesh in this first of a multi-part blog series on exploring the intriguing mangrove forests of the Sundarbans, by boat!
Encounter: Running into a golden raptor
A glimpse of the majestic Golden Eagle When I set out on the Madmaheshwar trek in September 2010, I had not entertained hopes of seeing a Golden Eagle (Aquila chrysaetos daphanea) as the altitudes we would frequent would not be high enough to be the habitat of this majestic raptor.…
Encounter: A monsoon brush with Cobra Lilies
A not-so-pale view of hills I woke up to the sound of rain pounding the tin roof of the rented shack and the remnants of a nightmare lingering on. I dreamed that the mountain looming above us has suddenly sprung a gigantic waterfall, which is nonchalantly carrying my shack to…
Encounter – Royle’s Pika
Half-mouse and half-hare is the Royle’s Pika. One of the most adorable mammals in the Himalaya
Chaukhamba, the four-pronged mountain of Garhwal
I was drawn to the massif gleaming in the horizon as it towered over the lesser ranges in the foreground Chaukhamba (right) from Bedni Bugyal. The peak next to it is Shivling (near Gangotri). Photo: Sahastrarashmi (2002) In September 2009, Sahastra and I took a train from Delhi to Haridwar…
Valley of Potpourri – Autumn in the Valley of Flowers
In late September 2009, I joined Sahastra and four friends on a trek to the Valley of Flowers in Uttarakhand. When we reached there we were told that the season for flowers had slipped behind us by two weeks. We prepared for disappointment but instead discovered to our happy surprise that…
Encounter – Red-headed Bullfinch (in a wall-eating cameo!)
We had finally stumbled upon the beauty secrets of the gorgeous Red-headed Bullfinch, and his mate
Le Question: What happened to the Sidewinder?
The Sidewinder is a rattlesnake that has adapted to life in the desert with unique sinusoidal-diagonal locomotion that enables it to negotiate smooth sand dunes with ease This post concerns a certain question asked after a storytelling session at my son’s school, though this could be any child’s question…
Encounter with the tiny giant – The Giant Wood Spider
Male and female spiders are not exactly lovey-dovey. The female ends up feeding on the male soon after mating or, in some cases, even before he mates with her. Posted by Arun Spiders have always fascinated me. These arachnids, even though they are considered a lesser order of creatures, have…
Death of a Sperm Whale
Posted by Sahastrarashmi On Tuesday, August 4, 2010, morning walkers on Goubert Avenue, Pondicherry, were greeted by a creature larger than most of them would ever have seen, tossing in the waves near the shore. It was a 37-feet-long Sperm Whale (Physeter macrocephalus) and it was quite dead. The visitor was…
Like The Green Ogre? Show your allegiance on Facebook!
Since The Green Ogre became a group blog last month we have been getting a fair bit of eyeballs. Our Facebook page, started last weekend, has already enlisted a few “likers”. We have a lot more to offer here — photo albums, discussions, videos, etc. And the opportunity to share…