Encounter: The Malaysian Moon Moth

This lovely moth we were admiring was probably in the last hours of a life spent in sleeping and making love
An epicurean life peppered with hints of bacchanal experiences is one that many of us would envy, and it’s interesting how insects live such a perfect life. 


It had been a week since the monsoon arrived in Agumbe and we had landed at ARRS hoping to have three field days spotting the region's famed herpetofauna. The amphibians and reptiles must have been well camouflaged and the repetitive pattern of green and brown had put me in a state of trance. That's when an apparition appeared.



Bright yellow, almost 12 inches long and half a foot across, it seemed almost artificial among the bright green leaves where I found it. I wondered first if it was a life-like miniature kite that was stuck in the leaves. I called out to the Green Ogres and exclaimed “Butterfly!” and got a curt rap on the knuckles. “Moth!” Well, most of the moths I had come across hardly had the vivid patterns I was looking at, so I knew this one was special.




We were looking at the Malaysian Moon Moth (Actias maenas) which occurs in South and Southeast Asia.  This specimen was a male, as it had brown markings on its wings with two circles resembling eyes that we might find on paper kites. The female of the species does not sport these wing markings. It is light green with a shorter tail. Striving not to disturb the moth we photographed it from a distance. When the moth did not take umbrage at our intrusion we got as close as a foot for clear shots. The moth stayed put and we found it at the same spot even when we returned that evening. 


Malaysian Moon Moths are hard to find primarily because they limit their habitat to thick forests. Further, they live in the imago stage for only 7-10 days. That would strike many as an unusually short lifespan for a attractive species of a significant size. However, it would seem entirely logical if I were to explain that these moths do not have mouths through which they can feed. All the feeding happens during the larval stage when the caterpillars go on a feeding frenzy to prepare themselves for the cocoon phase. 


Once they emerge from the cocoon the males wait until they can catch a whiff of the pheromones from the female, which they can sense even from six miles away. Female Actias maenas take flight before emitting pheromones, and this behaviour make them different from the other females of the Saturniidae moths, which emit the pheromones before taking flight. The reason for the moths' rather lethargic disposition is that they have less than 10 days to find a mate, which may involve flying a significant distance while starving.


The moth's sole mission is to mate. Now who wouldn’t envy a moth’s hedonistic lifestyle for all it involves – eat, sleep and make love!


Text by Anand Yegnaswami
Photographs: Sahastrarashmi and Sandeep Somasekharan
Thanks to Gopi Sundar for ID help


Read more Agumbe Diaries



Wordless Wednesday: The Orchid, the Slug and the Skipper

Photo: Sahastrarashmi

The Cicada's Night Out

Cicadas are diurnal, so what was this one doing up late at night?


Lo! on the topmost pine, a solitary cicada
Vainly attempts to clasp one last red beam of sun.
- Unknown Japanese poet


Nearly everyone has heard cicadas but most people confuse their music (some think it is noise) with the nocturnal chatter of crickets and tree frogs. But there's an easy tip to never be mistaken again, for in most cases cicadas never sing at night. Unless perhaps they've had a bad day, or maybe if the moon is too full, or if artificial lighting so intensely mimics daylight.

Cicada music varies with the species but usually, it resembles a gradual crescendo of violas and violins played in shrill, frenetic unison. The sound has nothing to do with the cicada's mouth. Like all insects, it does not have vocal chords. So how does a cicada rustle up that loud, penetrating din? The sound one hears is made not by one cicada but by thousands of them. These forest fiddlers rub together their ribbed membranes, called tymbals, which envelop hollow abdominal chambers that amplify the noise. Some species have been measured at over 100 decibels.

And it's almost always a love song.

An obscure Greek ode, translated roughly, goes thus: “We call you happy, O Cicada, because after you have drunk a little dew in the treetops you sing like a queen.” Certainly, that Hellenic bard didn't mean Freddy Mercury? For notwithstanding the poetic license to ascribe femininity to any creature or thing that makes music, cicada musicians are males serenading their mates. Females, unlike in our species, are relatively quiet.

And it's not dew that cicadas drink but tree sap. They have mouthparts adapted for piercing and more than a few people have complained that they've been bitten. Odd, because cicadas have no need for blood – they'd probably die of indigestion or food poisoning if they consumed it. Neither are they unreasonably aggressive. The only plausible reason is that the hungry cicada mistook the victim for a tree. Or it could be a case of mistaken identity – they were probably stung by the Cicada Killer Wasp, which predates on cicadas.

I've had many close encounters with cicadas since childhood when I used to wander about groves and grope the barks of avenue trees to locate the source of the phantom noise. But they were all daytime encounters. A couple of months ago, on a visit to the Kulgi Nature Camp in Dandeli, we were ambling about after dinner in pitch darkness with only the cold white beam of our headlamps illumining the path ahead. Suddenly, one of us stepped on something and it made an angry buzzing noise, prompting the offender to spring back in shock. Curious to know what it was, we shone our lights on it and the grumpy fellow buzzed a little more.

It was a cicada, but how very unusual to discover it at night. Now, now, do cicadas have a night life? Was he exiled, like Cacophonix, from the great village banquet? Or had some visitors from Bangalore taken the infectious BPO lifestyle a little too far? Or maybe it just fell off a tree?

We had no clear idea. So we took some pictures and let the guy go. Have you any theories or explanations of the cicada's night out? We'll be glad and grateful for any information you can share.

Text and photo by Beej

It's raining in the rainforest!

After a long, wet, leech-infested weekend in the rainforest, you return like Noah after the flood, intolerant of anyone complaining about rain
It doesn't rain in the rainforest, it pours!
Alighting at Agumbe bus stand on the first day of our planned three-day expedition, what met our eyes was a thick layer of mist that shrouded the sleepy town. Wherever you looked, all you saw was mist. The reaction from the photographer within me, seeing the bleakness around, was not dissimilar to that of the penguins in Madagascar alighting at Antarctica and regarding the emptiness around them: "Well, this sucks!" It looked pretty certain that the entire trip was going to be what we shutterbugs call a "High-ISO" trip - cranking up the sensitivity of our camera sensors to get sharp shots in low light (and invariably ending up with noisy images).
 Arecanut trees stand guard in the mist like ghostly soldiers
But then, a little introspection made me open up (as well as brighten up) a little. I have never been in a rainforest in such pristine condition. It was bound to be dripping wet, slushy and depressing but I would never get to see such rain anywhere - Agumbe is the rainiest place in south India and just trails Cherrapunji and Mawsynram with respect to the volume of rain that it receives. So I let the apprehensions drop and walked into the mist and set my first foot on the leech-infested road bordering the Agumbe Rainforest Research Station. The vertical embankments on either side of the cut-out mud road sprouted moss and ferns. Even trees had moss all over their trunks.
The whole place just throngs with life
The sky was almost permanently cloudy. Not a single ray of sun shone through. Rain and mist took turns to mate with the landscape. And it was green all around - olive-green, dark green, bright-green, bottle green, emerald green and dung green. The ground looked like it was saturated from beneath and was sweating at the surface, even when it did not rain. Sunlight probably never got to kiss the floor in these parts. There was leaf litter from the trees in various stages of decomposition all around, and we took care not to step on it -- as curled up in there might be foul-tempered Hump-nosed Pit Vipers (Hypnale hypnale), or (worse?) leeches.
The amount of moisture around is incredible...
Siddharth Rao, the director of ARRS, warned us on the dos and don'ts before we started our stroll. "And yes," he added, "Watch out for falling trees."
Andy was curious. "What kind?" 
Siddharth replied, "Every kind..."
And we saw quite a few of them had fallen. It looked like the excess of water and moisture everywhere had infiltrated through the bark and into the kernel of the wood, softening it from within, making it rot and snap at the touch of the gentlest of winds.

Despite falling, life still manages to cling on...
After the first day, when we waited for breaks in the rain, we just accepted them as a part of the package. We strolled around, drizzle notwithstanding, just ensuring that our cameras weren't soaked. When it rained, there was running water everywhere. Tiny streams flowed along the paths and would get isolated into puddles when the rains paused. Large drops of water would bomb down still, from the thick canopy above, many minutes past the showers. Drops of water clung to everything - spiderwebs, leaves, fruits, branches and insects.  
Wild berries dripping with fresh raindrops
Incredibly, despite all the rain, it was not cold, just moist. You could reach out and grab moisture from the air. Winds were gentle, just the kind that would rustle leaves and ruffle your hair.
Every strand of  this spiderweb was threaded with pearly water-drops
The nights were even more amazing. All kinds of croaks -- loud, shrill, ringing, hollow -- resounded as frogs called out to each other, the sounds echoing off the membrane walls of the bubbles under their chins.
A white nosed bush frog suddenly finds itself in the spotlight...
A silly jingle that I made up for myself "It's raining in the rainforest" looped in my head all through the trip. And once outside the forest and back in Mysore, I was irked at people making the slightest crib about a drizzle. I was Noah after the flood... 

One hundred percent attendance at the first Green Ogre Monsoon Conclave. L-R: Beej, Sahastra, Sandy, Andy and Arun
Watch out for more Agumbe Diaries!
Text and photos by Sandeep Somasekharan. All rights reserved.


Encounter: Blue-eyed Bush Frog

On a dark, wet monsoon night in Agumbe we met the very kissable blue-eyed prince of frogs
A Blue-eyed Bush Frog vocalising with its throat sac puffed out
If the name Philautus neelanethrus does not suggest a blue-blooded prince to you, an audience with the aforesaid certainly will, assuming that you will be granted one. The Blue-eyed Bush Frog inhabits the deep, dense evergreen rainforests of the Western Ghats and was described to science as recently as 2007 from the Sharavathi Valley. 

This diminutive frog, less than 3 cm long, acquires a yellow colouration during the breeding season (though in the picture it appears redder) and has a beautiful golden eye with a horizontal pupil, completely encircled by an iridescent blue ring. It owes its name to this lovely blue eye-ring. It is usually found on mid-height bushes perched on leaves. In the non-breeding season, its colour is creamy.

Our rendezvous with the blue-eyed prince occurred on a wet, rainy night at the Agumbe Rainforest Research Station. We heard the call -- one among many enigmatic mating croaks that filled up the inky monsoon night: treek tink-tink-tink. Once located, like a true celebrity, it seemed uncomfortable with the attention and stopped calling. 

After a short break, it called again and we scrambled for a view. I was lucky to get this one shot of the prince before being banished from his august presence. 

Text and photo by Sahastrarashmi 
Excellent pictures of this frog can be viewed at AMOGHAVARSHA and Sharath’s websites.


This post is the first of our Agumbe Diaries. Look out for more about monsoon in the rainforest.



Raptor Friday - Last Hope for Disappearing Vultures

There are enough roadkills, but why are vultures absent from our skies? An independent filmmaker explores the reasons
Himalayan Griffons engage in a scuffle
Several animals are killed in road accidents but we hardly see any vultures hovering above and swooping down for a cleanup operation. Ever wondered why? Neloy Bandyopadhyay's film on vulture conservation The Last Hope aims to highlight why these efficient scavengers are absent from our skies. Anand Yegnaswami catches up with the man and his work.

Excerpts from an interview to The Green Ogre:

Could you please share in your words what the film "The Last Hope" was about?

The Last Hope is a film about the relentless struggle of vulture conservationists in India and this subcontinent where activists are fighting a tough battle to protect this great scavenger bird from the brink of extinction. The film is made to create awareness about the importance of the vulture in nature, and against the use of a drug which is the main reason for the [decline] of the vultures.
On the sets of the film
Why did you pick vultures as your subject?

The scenario of the numbers of vultures in India is worrisome. If we don’t take proper action right away, we will probably lose this great bird forever. The vulture doesn’t have the great looks of the tiger, lion or rhino, but from an importance perspective it’s a great bird.

Why are vultures such an important part of the ecosystem and what is the need to protect them?

Vultures play a crucial role in the food chain. They eat carcasses. In India, and the subcontinent, it has been an age-old practice to [dispose of] dead domestic animals in the dumpyard. Vultures can eat an animal the size of a bull within an hour and leave little chance for diseases to spread.


A hide used to film vultures at a carcass without disturbing them
Could you elaborate on the vulture conservation efforts that you came across while making the film?

The killer drug [Dicofenac] has been banned. Some NGOS are working towards vulture conservation. Bombay National History Society is working on a captive breeding programme. However, we have a lot to do to save this species.
Himalayan Griffons
What are the factors hampering vulture conservation? Are there threats other than Diclofenac that pose a danger to the vulture population?

Diclofenac is the main reason. To save vultures we have to ban the use of this drug. Today, Diclofenac meant for humans is being used on cattle.
Long-billed Vultures at a nest
How long will it take for the vulture population to bounce back from the effects of Diclofenac?


Unfortunately, the breeding cycle of vultures is pretty slow. They lay one egg per breeding cycle. We have to take extra precaution and we have to phase out Diclofenac immediately and completely. If we can do that I am sure the vulture population will [be restored] to a substantial number.
During the making of the film
Now that you have completed this film, how do you plan to get the message of conservation across?


Broadcast this film as much as possible.



Neloy works as a IT security consulting manager in Bangalore. He is a nature lover and wildlife enthusiast with a passion for cinematography and photography. In addition to The Last Hope, Neloy has also filmed a documentary on Snow Leopard conservation, An Unavoidable Disagreement.

Anand Yegnaswami is an IT professional and an intrepid nature enthusiast. He has contributed previously to The Green Ogre.


All photographs in this post are the copyrighted property of Neloy Bandyopadhyay and are used here with his kind permission.


This is a special edition of our series Raptor Friday. Read more about vultures and diclofenac in The Green Ogre archives.

Encounter: Cannon Ball Tree, an explosion of beauty

In flower the Cannon-Ball Tree is lovely but, by Toutatis, beware the skull-crushing quality of its menacing fruits
The first time I looked up at a Cannon Ball tree, my upward drifting gaze was arrested midway and forced downwards in shock. The reaction, in hindsight, was perfectly natural. Being a great fan of a particular Gaulish village I ascribe to the fear that anything that can fall on your head eventually will. In this case I was staring at huge rusty balls, by all appearance of skull-cracking hardness, hanging 40 feet up in the air and waiting to cause mortal damage to an unsuspecting victim.

Cannon Ball Tree (Couroupita guianensis) is a native of the southern Caribbean and northern parts of South America (Colombia, Guyana, Surinam, French Guiana, Amazonian Ecuador, Amazonian Peru, and parts of Amazonian Brazil). It belongs to the Brazil Nut family and is a botanical oddity. Its unique appearance has ensured its presence in botanical collections worldwide. This evergreen tree, first described in 1775, can grow up to 30 m tall. It seems to have been known in India for hundreds of years – a mystery, since we do not know how and when it came to our shores.


The “odd” feature of the tree is that the flowers and eventually the fruits grow out of woody extrusions from the trunk of the tree. These extrusions can be very small, from an upward-jutting stick adorned with a flower cluster, to a tangled mass of 6-feet long extrusions just below the foliage. When not weighed down by the fruits these extrusions resemble a thorny patch of vines twisted, entwined and jumbled up in maddening confusion, each carrying bulbous buds or fleshy six-petalled scarlet flowers.


Once the fruits develop some of these extrusions will straighten out into long thick rope-like strands with fruits dangling at the end. Wisely enough, the tree has never been used as an avenue tree though a trial plantation in Al Qaeda territory is in order. The fruits, which are up to 25 cm in diameter and take a year to mature, crash to the ground with an explosive sound and crack open to reveal a foul smelling pulp. 


In its native habitat peccaries (New World relatives of pigs) eat the fruits and help spread the seeds. I am not sure if Indian pigs have developed a taste for the fruit yet. The flowers are extremely attractive and aromatic. The petals are scarlet on the inside, with a white base, and yellow outside. There are two sets of stamens. The first, which is infertile, is on the curved hood and are a lovely pink with yellow heads. The hood itself is white and tinged with pink on the exterior. The fertile stamens form a ring at the center of the flower just below the curved hood. These are shorter and have yellow heads. The flower has no nectar and uses the pollen in the infertile exposed stamens to attract bees. In trying to get at the pollen, which the bees use as food, they have to work their way between the two sets of stamens, inadvertently brushing the fertile stamens in the ring.
The large petals, tapered at the apex with the prominent stigma at the center, have been imagined as a representation of multiple cobra hoods around a Shiv lingam. This has earned the tree several Shiva-associated appellations - Shiv Kamal, Kailaspati, Nagalingam, Nagalinga Pushpa, Mallikarjuna, etc. – and lots of survival aid in the form of propagation near Shiva temples. In the native Amazon (where it's called Castanha de macaco, monkey nut) it is a favorite of shamans and is believed to provide protection against the ill-disposed spirits of the netherworld.

The bark of a young tree at the Jardin Botanique in Pondicherry showed dull red granulations along the length and some knobby growth. However, in the mature tree at Bangalore's Cubbon Park the knobs were absent while the granulations, though present, were less conspicuous.
Handsome specimens of this tree can be found in most Botanical Gardens. I saw my first at the Jijamata Udyan in Mumbai (formerly Victoria Garden). There are nice Cannon Ball Trees in Cubbon Park (some pictures here are from this tree), Lalbagh and Jardin Botanique in Pondicherry where I shot this tree extensively. 


Do pay it a visit. I am sure you will love it. But remember the invincible Gauls and stay away from remaining under it. Text and pictures by Sahastrarashmi


If you love flowering trees, you should not miss these other 'encounters':


Darling Buds of May


The Copper Pod


Indian Laburnum - the Vishu Tree

Wordless Wednesday - Weaving the Trap

Photo: Sahastrarashmi
Taken at Agumbe

Encounter: Chestnut-tailed Minla

Perhaps I had a karmic debt to pay the Chestnut-tailed Minla 


Battered by my first ascent of the Garhwal Himalaya, I was listening to the lament of my creaking knees en route to Kunol from Wan when Sahastra, whose knees had served him well, and Jennifer, who imbibed superpowers from yoga, decided to adventurously explore the forest in search of white-throated laughingthrushes. While I beat about the bush aimlessly, they returned triumphant. There is nothing more psychologically demolishing than being physically downbeat as your birding compadres tick away lifers. But then, I was too numbed to even bleed to Jennifer's unkind cut. 

“Did you see that?” she asked, pointing to a blur of colour in a bush that disappeared instantly. 

I shook my head. Did anyone here care about my knees? 

“It used to be called the Bar-throated Siva,” she explained as we continued walking. “Such an apt name it was. Now they've gone and renamed it.” 

Did I care? Oh, my knees! 

“What do they call it now?” asked Sahastra, whose recent sighting of the laughingthrushes had placed him in a higher league and sharpened his curiosity in the natural world. 

“Chestnut-tailed Minla,” said Jennifer, and ranted, “And no one even notices the colour of the tail.” 

Somewhere in my pain-fogged brain that name triggered a flicker of memory. But nothing came of it except a sore spot at having missed another lifer. Sahastra and Jennifer exchanged notes on the renaming and reclassification of birds, a discussion that culminated with them dousing Pam Rasmussen with buckets of vitriol. I returned to listening to the creaking of my knees. 

On my next trip to Garhwal in 2009, Sahastra and I rounded the bend beyond the hamlet of Chopta and were gazing upon the layered vista of valleys that unfolded before us from the serpentine road to Gopeshwar. Far above us, wreathed in mist, the spires of Tungnath peeped out into the sky. 

We had almost been soaked by a sudden thunderstorm the previous evening and wanted to return to our lodgings before another similar predicament befell us. Suddenly, we were stopped dead in our tracks by an enormous mixed hunting party of grey-hooded warblers, black-throated, spot-winged and green-backed tits, along with variegated laughingthrushes. Among them, one oddball bird stood out. It was nothing like any I'd ever seen. Its throat was barred, it was colourful overall and I noticed nothing of the tail except that it was long. Sahastra, too, had trouble thumbing through his mental log to identify it instantly. 

“This is that guy,” he said helpfully, “the one you missed.” 

That hit a raw nerve instantly. “I know,” I hissed, overcome by elation. A birder doesn't forget a missed encounter easily. He goes back and pores over the page listing his forgone quarry and memorises its image until it shimmers in his mind's eye with envy and desire. 

Perhaps it was the law of attraction, but the Chestnut-tailed Minla (Minla strigula) and I had finally met at the feet of Siva. What ironic coincidence!

Note: This picture was taken by Sandy on his trip with Sahastra. I couldn't join them then. Clearly, the Minla had no karmic accounts to settle with them and revealed itself happily.

Encounter: Crimson Sunbird

A chance meeting with this charming sunbird kept our spirits high through the unpredictable Himalayan weather


In September 2010, on our way to the shrine of Madhyamaheshwar, we spent a night at the beautifully situated GMVN guest house at Ukhimath. It had been a year of catastrophic rains – an extremely heavy and extended monsoon had wreaked havoc on the roads and the landslides continued to pile up as more rain was forecast.


As we stood contemplating the ominous news that we had just received -- a part of the road leading to the starting point of our trek at the village of Uniana had been washed off -- we picked up a sunbird-like call from a bottle-brush tree beside the bungalow. 

Could it be the Green-tailed Sunbird? I had seen it at Chopta (2,900m) but this (at 1,130 m) seemed a tad low for either the Green-tailed or the Fire-tailed Sunbird. But it was also high for the ubiquitous Purple Sunbird that is so common in the plains. As we stepped out to scan the tree, we spied the unmistakable scarlet breast that glowed as if on fire in the rays of the morning sun. It was the Crimson Sunbird (Aethopyga siparaja).

Though this sunbird is fairly common (it is found in the Western Himalayas, Sahyadris, and a race occurs in the Nicobar Islands), this was my first sighting. The bird was quite restless and kept flitting from the bottle brush tree to a large dense-canopied tree nearby. It made these sorties while vocalizing all the time. 

The bird has a crimson patch on the mantle and a yellow spot just above the rump but from the view that we had, the scarlet breast and throat merged into a rather drab grey-olive belly. The tail is greenish and much longer than that of the Small Sunbird or Crimson-backed sunbird (Nectarinia minima) which also has a much less curved beak. The Crimson Sunbird is supposed to have a preference for red flowers which may have been the reason for its multiple sorties to the bottlebrush, a plant introduced from Australia. It’s also a favorite of the Purple Sunbird (Nectarinia asiatica).

Pretty soon the staff of the guest house got interested and took turns gazing at the beauty – which was present at Ukhimath year-round but which they had probably never looked at so closely. Beaming with pride at our joy of a lifer, they said: “Uttarakhand mein aapko bahut sundar pakshi dikhenge” (you will see very beautiful birds in Uttarakhand). We knew they were right and in the days ahead their lighthearted quip kept our hopes high as we we negotiated blocked roads, incessant rains and imminent landslides to bird persistently in the Himalaya.

The Crimson Sunbird is the unofficial national bird of Singapore.

Dads we love wildly

On Father's Day, we raise a toast to the best animal dads, but our top contender isn't a bird!


It might be just another Hallmark card red-letter day, but Father's Day means a lot to us Ogres. And not just because we hold our own dads in great esteem. While motherlove dominates the wild world, there are a few notable exceptions among animal fathers who shine bright. Here's our pick of the Top 6. You're free to argue or disagree, but do leave a comment if you'd like to split hairs, or have a bone or feather to pick.

1. Seahorse
If this were a gallop poll, those delicate little fish known as seahorses would have breasted the ribbon without challenge. When it's time to make more little seahorses (or sea-foals, should we say?), dad-to-be and mom-to-be the male waltz intimately for about eight hours before the female lays about a thousand eggs in the male's brood pouch. The male fertilizes the eggs by releasing his sperm into the surrounding water and then releases the hormone prolactin (which, in mammals, induces the production of milk). The eggs hatch inside the pouch and the young swim away, and with that the seahorses' parental responsibility comes to an end. 


Seahorses are threatened by over-fishing and collecting for ornamental aquariums. The biggest threat comes from Chinese epicureans who believe that eating seahorses (often on a skewer or in soups) has aphrodisiac properties.




2. Greater Painted Snipe
Polyandrous female Greater Painted Snipes are the epitome of women's lib. Brightly coloured and aggressive, they court drab, dowdy males. Once they're through with the formalities, they lay their eggs and move off to repeat the show with another male. The males incubate and hatch the eggs, teach the chicks to forage and then shoo them off to lives of their own. Once the nest is empty and the breeding season is back on the calendar, it's time for papa Painted Snipe to come into his own all over again.






3. Indian Eagle Owl
Look into the deep amber eyes of the Indian Eagle Owl. Does he look like he has a chip on his shoulder? Not surprising, for he's not exactly your lovey-dovey kind of papa but the strong, silent, responsible type with exemplary family values. A tad conservative, but a swell guy in the final analysis.


The male Eagle Owl has his act cut out: He goes about aggressively defining his territory in the best real estate he can find, then attracts a suitable mate and provides for her as she incubates their eggs. Once the eggs hatch, he steps up the hunt, cleaning up every furball in the vicinity to nourish his hungry, greedy and fast-growing little ones. He also joins his mate in teaching the fluffy, gauche young things to fend for themselves. And when it's all done, it's time to repeat it all over again!






4. Ostrich
When the male ostrich fights off competitors to cobble together a harem of five to six females, he is taking on an enormous responsibility that few of us would envy. Once done with the amorous preliminaries, the females get down to business. The male does the dirty work, scraping a pit in the ground that can be up to two feet wide and ten feet wide. In this large communal nest, the pregnant females lay their eggs. The hens incubate the eggs during the day when their drab plumage blends perfectly with the sand. In the dangerous dark of the night, the dark-coloured male takes over. Hunched over the nest in the dark, he is almost impossible to see. Once the eggs hatch, he teaches the chicks to feed and defends them against predators. A kick from his powerful legs, tipped with two sharp claws, has been known to kill lions. This guy is a macho dad all the way.




4. Weaverbird
Apart from the usual stuff, stability and security are two traits that females of the species have always sought in males. Real estate and housing are huge concerns among some birds, the male weaverbird's badge of courage is his ability to build a nest that can win his lady's approval. When the first rains arrive, he singles out the best blades of grass and weaves his nest while the strands are still moist. As they dry they stiffen into the shapes he has envisioned. 


The female, true to character, is a picky customer, and she will reject outright a nest that doesn't appeal to her aesthetic tastes. Perhaps she also inspects the nest for stability, protection from predators and weather, and she ends up rejecting many half-built nests. But Bob the Builder persists until he has built the heart-stopper of nests. And then, mama and papa raise their brood in the comfort of the nest that won the Good Housekeeping Award for Birds.




5. Hornbill
Male hornbills of nearly all species bear an enormous burden. Mostly, he and his chosen mate pair for life. When they are ready to start a family, they single out a good-sized hollow in an old forest tree. 


The female enters the hollow, sheds most of her feathers (possibly to line the nest), and the male imprisons her inside by sealing the opening with mud. He then leaves the mother-to-be and her eggs to forage. He makes several trips a day, clattering his bill and making the hills reverberate with his honking call. Once the eggs hatch and the young are ready to fledge, the male unseals the nest. 


In the event that he is killed during the nesting period, both the female and his brood will starve to death. Just imagine the anxieties faced by single-income families.




Photos: Wikimedia Commons (Seahorse, Greater Painted Snipe and Ostrich). Pictures of Indian Eagle Owl and Weaverbird by Sandeep Somasekharan and Malabar Pied Hornbill  by Arun Menon.


Text by Beej


Read more about:


Indian Eagle Owls
Weaverbirds
Malabar Pied Hornbills