Somehow had missed out on posting this one. Jugal our naturalist and bird guide had mentioned this bird "Hoopoe Lark" was a specialty of Great Rann of Kutch. We went out looking for this in Great rann of Kutch. This bird partly resembles the common Hoopoe and hence it gets its name. The peculiarity with this bird is every time it would allow us to get closer and once we settle down the bird would start running. The bird every time it runs on wet soil the foot marks were immediately baked by kutch heat highlighted by the exposed salt.

Hoopoe Lark footprints


After two hours of running behind we almost gave up and got on to the vehicle thinking of going back. Magically the bird suddenly approached us close and climbed on to a nearby shrub giving us eye level shot from the vehicle itself. After running behind the bird by foot it was ironical the way we finally managed to make images of this bird.

Hoopoe Lark - Potrait

An Evening in Kutch. A B&W image from Kutch trip.

Spotted Flycatcher
Another migrant to kutch. Made this image near the place where we stayed. A portrait image made in morning light.

Environmental shot of White Eared bulbul. Shots in shaded areas always introduces a color cast. In Canon with auto white balance it introduces a blue cast leading to a color shift. Though I would like to keep the white balance constant and not disturb it at all times when auto white balance gives incorrect result have to manually adjust it while processing. This is also the advantage of shooting in raw. It it not possible to change white balance during processing in a straight forward way if you are shooting jpeg.

Demoiselle Cranes flight formation.

Shrikes of Kutch
Shrikes use thorns like spears to kill its prey. These are some varieties of shrikes that can be seen in Kutch. Though these are different types the commonality comes from the fact they all share a similar thorny habitat.

Red Backed Shrike - Male
Guess because of their look the english common name for them is "worrier".



Southern Grey Shrike
Think you can call this Black & White shrike :) Unlike other shrikes this has only shades of grey, black and white. Both Male and female look alike.



Rufous Tailed Shrike - Female
Cousin of Brown shrike.



Rufous Tailed Shrike - Male

A rabari tribal from Kutch in his traditional white dress. They are nomadic in nature and only 3000 families are believed to be around kutch. Their main job is herding camels. This old man is in his eighties and he told us even today he herds camels across kutch for kilometers in search of vegetation and pasture. In the dry kutch heat when we were worried about heat related issues like dehydration though we were traveling in jeep and had lot of supply of water it was amazing to the see the way the tribals had adapted themselves to live in this harsh desert setting and go about their daily lives.

Had mentioned in my earlier post about the candelilla shrub. This is a slightly wider view of the same with an european roller on one of its pencil like stems. At dawn and dusk it is common to see a bunch of small birds occupying individual stems. Down south bird photographers are always on lookout for setting like these since it gives a chance to get clean blurred background and achieve nice subject isolation in the image.

A variable wheatear takes off from its perch. The perch here is the candelilla shrub that mainly grows in the desert. This shrubs gets its name from its little candle like appearance. Their pencil like stems grow in bunches with reasonable spacing between them making them ideal perches for birds in a desert setting. In a desert environment with sparse vegetation hanging around near candelilla shrubs is always a good bet to spot some variety of small birds.

Blue Cheeked Bee Eater ( Juvenile )
This is a juvenile one. Merops persicus is its scientific name and it is one of those bee eaters that appears on the stamps of africa bearing its scientific name.

Journey through Kutch
A small video presentation. Dont forget to turn up the volume :)



Alternatively if the video does not show up above can be seen here also.

European Roller ( Kutch )
Winter migrant to Kutch from Europe.

A full frame shot of Male Montagu Harrier. Did manage to get an eye level shot with clear foreground and background. But like this shot as well made at an angle which shows the caked kutch terrain along with the bird.

- Great Rann of Kutch -
GRK ( Great Rann of Kutch ) being a low lying area floods every year and the water starts to evaporate once the summer sets in with its 50deg heat. The evaporating water leaves behind an earth coated with hardened salt. The residual water is so strong with brine concentration the water body turns pink and the horizon over the water glows with a pink tinge.

Montagu Harrier
This harrier gets its name after the britain naturalist George Montagu ( source wikipedia ). True to its harrier nature it flys low scanning the terrain for potential prey. This is a male montagu harrier. He was quite tolerant about our presence. After making the regular images with clean background at eye level was trying out some approaches to make some different images. A cooperative subject is a prerequisite to try something different in the field. In this scenario moved myself on the ground so that there was some grass between myself and the harrier. The idea here was I wanted to sandwich the harrier between the blur from foreground grass and the background blur.

Calling it a day - Banni Grasslands ( Kutch )

This grey mongoose saw us the same moment we spotted him. Not knowing what to do he quickly jumped for safety of his burrow. From there he partially peeped out to keep an eye on us...just in case...

Camel flock crossing Banni grasslands herded by Rabari tribals.

The Look
Every time you approach a bird there is a initial phase where every bird gives that look while running through its checklist
- Is the approaching object coming fast ... Check
- Is object coming within my security radius ... Check
- Is the object a known threat ... Check
Even if one of items in the check list is a tick mark the bird takes off. This is the black shouldered kite's version of "The look" while it runs through its check list.

Naliya Grasslands @ Sunset
A lone chinkara stands amidst glowing grass at sunset. The glowing grass is due to the setting sun at horizon. I wanted to include more of the horizon but could not because I was using prime lens. One of the disadvantages of using prime lens. Nevertheless of all the images I made in Kutch this one is close to my heart and is my favorite from the trip. Happy Diwali Everyone !!!