Green India Blog Posts

This weekend, we were spoiled by the weather, though apparently it is downhill all the way from here. The searing heat was broken first by a spectacular dust storm on Saturday and then by rain yesterday -  and a rainbow as well, a rarity in Delhi. ...

This really is one of those “only in India’ stories.   Obviously it would be better for a tiger to be in the wild, but given the realities of India’s shocking neglect of its wildlife, perhaps this fellow is better off in a zoo...

Literally, not metaphorically. Weaver birds (I think) have built their nest on the hanging basket which also was home to the bulbuls last summer. Funny, when there are several other baskets, and they all choose the same one. The watermarking has sort...

This may be a deeply unpopular thing to say, but there are times when I think the only consistently rationally thinking people in India sit on its Supreme Court benches. Whilst governments waste our time and money faffing around and worse, the honour...

Easter lilies, that is. It’s one of the joys of my Delhi Easter -  the flowering, bang on time, of all the beautiful Easter lilies, which go on brightening up my Easters, year after year. And it’s one of my no doubt more tedious Easter r...

I have been editing my photos from Kaziranga National Park in Assam today. Partly because they needed editing, but also because I have been writing a series of photo essays on the threats to wildlife for niticentral.com – the most recent photo...

I would love to start this beautiful sunny Monday morning with great Green India news, but it isn’t so, I am sorry to say. Rhino, tiger, leopard – hardly seems to matter to the poachers…...

It is all too easy to sit in my self-appointed editor’s chair and carp at all the things that can (and do) go wrong in a country the size of India. So, when truly wonderful news comes along -  what a pleasure to share it with you. Great news f...

Potentially great news.     Good that they are banning this stuff. Good, great, fantastic. Now just implement it. As you did the plastic bag ban… (And, hey, TOI, what’s with the It’s…) It is wonderful that the gover...

So there we were, daughter dearest, Yoda and your faithful blogger, out for an evening stroll through the forest at the polo club. Chat, chat, chat until we literally fell over what looked like a deep hole in the path with – yikes -  a snake.

Now I am conflicted here. Help me, if you will. To whom does wildlife belong ?  I had asked you the self-same question over 2 years ago (with nary a response…) – here’s the original post from May 2010. And the issue has arisen agai...

2 horrid stories in the papers this morning. A child mauled to death is beyond horrific.  Too awful for words. But you are not telling me this is the solution ? And this ?    Poor things. Gandhi-ji would be appalled : “The greatness of a n...

Now far be it from me to badmouth my dear little bulbul chicks, but I can’t help wondering if this last little fellow isn’t sort of playing to the gallery – ie his hyper parents -  and delaying the moment of truth, when he has to f...

How quickly baby birds grow up and fly the nest (literally).  The other 2 bulbul chicks have gone, and don’t appear to be returning to the parental home at all. There’s gratitude for you. The remaining chick is on the cusp of flying, eve...

My goodness me, but am I feeling exhausted, and a little bereft this evening. Bright and early this morning, I went to check on the chicks, to find 1 on the ground and 1 fluttering around, and the parents mildly hyserical.  We worked out that what I...

It’s not empty yet, thank God, but now that all 3 little baby bulbul chicks appear to have feathered wings…well, realistically, it won’t be long before I am empty-nested. I just went out to film this little clip for you, and all was...

  What a day ! The red vented bulbul parents have been beyond hyper today, squawking away at high pitch virtually non-stop.  I am used to their noise when I sneak out and take photos like this one, above, but today, they just didn’t let...

Definite progress. There are pukka looking feathers on one bulbul fledgling – the eldest one, logically – which were definitely not all there yesterday. Look. This was yesterday morning, and there is just the merest hint of brown feathers...

Those poor overworked bulbul parents, flying hither and thither all day long, foraging and fossicking, just to feed their hungry brood. Didn’t get dive-bombed today, but boy, do those little babas look hungry.  I love the way they subside grad...

Today has been a Bit of a Day what with a 10 hour power failure over the whole of the country…but out on the balcony, life goes on unabated. Except that the parents were decidedly antsy this morning when I tried to take photos, both of them div...