(July 29, 2019) From the science of its ecology to the emotions it evokes, the tiger has captured the attention of most of us. On World Tiger Day, an ode to the national animal.Pondering recently on the fate of our national animal, the tiger - beaten by mobs, shot down to avert human deaths and knocked down by vehicles - I revisited Ang Lee’s film of Life of Pi, as also a novel Tigers in Red Weather by Ruth Padel. What did they tell me on International Tiger Day?Yann Martel’s Richard Parker is one o...

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(July 19, 2019) Ashwini Ramesh shares notes from her interactions and learning from physicist-cum-naturalist Ramana Athreya, credited with the discovery of a rare and critically endangered bird.“..and this is Planet Earth” echoed David Attenborough. I sat transfixed as I watched the beautiful male bird-of-paradise perform its mating dance ritual. In my eighteen years of education, I had never been exposed to ecology – not like this.In India, Ecology was conflated with Environmental Sciences. S...

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(July 09, 2019) Written by Gajendra Singh S“For as the eyes of bats are to the blaze of day, so is the reason in our soul to the things which are by nature most evident of all”- Aristotle Naked-rumped tomb bat (Taphozous nudiventris) roostingThar Desert is one of the most arid environments on earth. This region of rolling sand hills and home of the Great Indian Bustard’s, experiences seasons of sweltering heat, with the temperature rising up to 50oC in the summer months and biting cold wi...

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(July 03, 2019) MEET OUR STAFF: Dr. Vidya AthreyaHer work on leopard ecology has helped bring a new dimension to understanding human-wildlife conflict.Setting up a camera trapA woman in a male-dominated field of large cat biology, Dr Vidya Athreya, is the only one of her kind to be featured in a popular Indian film on wildlife ecology. The Marathi film ‘Ajoba’ is the only one made in the country where a real wild leopard is the protagonist. Vidya pays the leopard “the most adaptable of all cat...

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