Never a dull moment

The grey Langur paid us a visit the other day. In fact there were two of them. How I came to know about it was by the distress call of the Koel. To add to this the crows were all excited and were concentrating on the mango tree.   I had a closer look at the tree. After carefully scanning through the gaps in the tree, I found this cute face looking back at me. 

Had enough time to grab my camera and take some quick shots.

The crows were getting really agitated (and frustrated) as they could not swoop down on them. The second line of attackers were waiting above for action:

Meanwhile our friends decided to change location and descended on our garden. One of them perched on the bamboo scaffold and relished our flat bean shoots. 

Later while checking the net, I found that Langurs are indeed known as “leaf eating monkeys” as they feed mostly on leaves.  Other than leaves they eat fruits, shoots, roots, seeds, flowers, grass.

While enjoying the shoots, I saw him eyeing the Dutchman’s pipe (or queen of the night) flowers at the other end of the garden. I presume he gave up the idea, probably guessing that that they were the ‘already bloomed ones’ (these flowers bloom once a year and that too in the night)

The front line attackers had a clear target now and resumed their attack.  

Our friends now moved on to the adjacent tree and found the flowers on this tree really delicious. (this is the same tree on which the bats come at dusk during this season)

I suppose they had their fill on that tree and moved away, as the concentration of the crows shifted away from our house.

With some greenery around the house, there is never a dull moment.

I did manage to take some video footing too and you can see it here:

The fruit market

While in the fruit market, I saw this lady, almost lost in the heap of newspaper that was used to wrap up these papaya.  I think her job was to unwrap them.  It is said that that by covering the fruit in paper the ethylene gas emitted is trapped inside which helps the fruit to ripen faster.  I would be more worried by the printer’s ink that gets rubbed on to the fruit when a newspaper is used (especially if it is not soy ink)

Once unwrapped and segregated, these ripe ones make a pretty picture, with a dash of yellow and green.  

The variety of fruit that one gets to see in a fruit market is something that I look forward to.

For example this Dragon Fruit caught my eye. One of those fruits that I have yet to taste.

The Pitaya (Dragon Fruit) is being hailed as having remarkable health giving properties including the ability to regulate the blood sugar level in diabetics as well as providing a dose of anti-oxidants.  

For those who want to know, they were sold at Rs 200/- per kg. (may be, next time I will buy a few)

Haggling and selecting the fruit is one of the things that I enjoy watching in a market.

The heap of watermelon says that it is still in good supply even though it is well past summer time.

Saw these fresh dates and bought some. (I never knew fresh dates were red in colour) 

All these fruits reminded me of the water apple (syzygium samarangense) that I clicked at my sister's place last month. They make excellent wine. 

Talking of fruits, we usually club tomatoes under vegetables even though they are fruits.

The same goes for coconuts. We never consume them as fruits, but is used mainly for cooking in “coconut based curries”

And talking about coconuts, these pictures shows how coconut trunks are used as goal posts in “God’s own country”

Considering the world cup fever, I think this is the right picture to sign off with. 

May the best team win.

The Big Basin

Some pictures from the Archives – The Redwood forest in California that we visited last year.

The Big Basin has different trails and you can select the trail you want depending upon the time you have at your disposal.

The trees are real tall and the size of the trees can be judged by these pictures when compared with people in front of the tree (or rather inside the tree)

I like the confident stance of this little guy:

Surprisingly for a tree of this height the roots are only 6 to 10 feet deep, but they grow laterally holding on to the roots of the adjacent trees.  

There are some endangered species of birds here. One of the sea birds, the Marbled Murrelet, nests in the canopy of the old growth of Redwood trees.

picture source 

These birds lay only one egg in a year. Unfortunately the Steller Jay bird is a threat to these eggs as they chase away the Marbled Murrelet and eat up the egg. This is a huge loss to the species. One of the reasons why the Steller Jay bird visits this place is the easy availability of food left by visitors. This is well explained in this video

To protect these birds, visitors are strictly warned not to litter nor leave any crumbs of food after eating.

Once you climb up a little you get to see a magnificent view of the hills and how these trees cover the place.  

Noticed many professional photographers with their complete kit making the best of it.   

There are two trees that are named as the Mother of the Forest and the Father of the Forest. The sizes of these trees are given here:  

Some more pictures can be seen in this 3 min  video: