We recently visited two research foundations during our travels in the Western Ghats of India, SACON and MSSRF CAbC. SACON is the Salim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural History and MSSRF CAbC is the MS Swaminathan Community Agrobiodiversity Centre. Salim Ali was known as the father of Indian Ornithology. He took steps before his death to establish a national ...
Chris Paradise
Sightings in Bandipur Tiger Reserve
Here's a partial list of all the animal life we spotted on two 3-hour jeep safaris in Bandipur Tiger Reserve, with a few comments. BTR is open savannah/dry deciduous forest habitat in the Western Ghats, just north of Ooty and south/southwest of Mysore. Altitude is about 1,000 m. This list is from a late afternoon and early morning safari. Mammals: Elephants - multiple ...
Andaman Islands: Environment and Conservation
We spent the first two days of our Andaman Islands trip working and learning with ANET (Andaman Nicobar Environment Team). The days were long, beginning early in the morning and ending well after a late dinner, plus a long drive back to our hotel. Which didn't have wifi or any other internet. In fact, the entire island was without cellular data (we could make phone calls but ...
Preservation of monuments and biodiversity
When we recently toured Golconda Fort I observed a diversity of species amid the immensity of the fort. Some individual species were very abundant. There was a robust yellow-bodied dragonfly that was swarming; I didn't get a chance to for a close-up picture or identification, but they were quite abundant (you might be able to see one or two flying in the picture below). Yet, at ...
Construction boom in India
We did some significant driving these last five days, leaving Chennai to venture to Pondicherry and then to Mahabalipuram. Pondicherry is the capital of Puducherry, an old French colony, now a "union territory" of India. A union territory is a not like a state, in the sense that states have their own elected government, but rather the UTs are administered by the central ...
Flood management in Chennai: The story of Pallikaranai Marsh
Earlier this week we were visited by Dr. L. Venkatachalam, environmental economist at Madras Institute of Development Studies. He will be presenting to us a couple more times in the next few weeks, but this past week he spoke about how urbanization in the city of Chennai was in large part responsible for the heavy flooding experienced in December of 2015. Flooding of streets in ...
Arrived in India
After two long flights to India, through Heathrow, we have arrived in India, safe and sound, if a bit tired. On day one, the wonderful staff and faculty at Madras Christian College, our first hosts, have fed us and kept us busy despite our desire to sleep through the day. Three great meals, a couple of meetings, work on getting our communications up and running (mobile phones, ...
Final preparations
Our program is shaping up quite nicely, although inflation in India has been pretty steep, increasing the costs of our program. One of the highlights for me will be returning to the Andaman Islands, and this time we will work closely with the Andaman and Nicobar Environmental Team (ANET). They have prepared an intensive two-day program for us that includes social, cultural, and ...
