Serin is the quintessential passerine, forever restive, much like the human these days… musing on a fire-fronted serin, Markha🏔️, Ladakh 🇮🇳
Serin on a sultry afternoon…
Tag: ladakh
Redstarts and a family frenzy
Musing on the breeding season frenzies of black redstarts, flycatchers that migrate to high-altitude Himalaya 🏔️, Markha Valley, Ladakh 🇮🇳
Marmots and their dreamy domain…
One could say marmots live on hope, embarking on their long hibernations… musing on a long-tailed marmot, Markha valley, Ladakh 🇮🇳
Chukar and its pining…
Musing on a Chukar partridge (Alectoris chukar), Markha valley, Ladakh, India
Pikas and their peekaboo
Pikas bring a sense of activity to the higher climes, weaving a string of momentariness around rocks brooding in geological time… perpetually restive in their disposition as they scurry, stop and shirk, manicuring the meadows with their hurried nibbles, carving abodes beneath taluses… humbled by the mountain, yet humbling it as well… musing on a long-eared pika, Markha valley, Ladakh, India
Agamas and their constant scuttles…
Agamas either creep or scamper, not just literally but also in the canvas on one’s vision… appearing in one corner of the eye and then scampering to the other as if being playful… penning this on a winter morning, one can empathize with their never ending quest for sunshine, the fate of all poikilotherms… you’ll …
Kang Yatse 1 – Icy domes and dusty roads
There’s stasis on the face of it as one looks at the panorama from a mountaintop on a clear morning… all the snow-covered peaks and glaciers spewing out of their cold slopes brooding deep till the sun warms them up into frothing rivers down below… somewhere between the transition of ice into water, the elements …
Ice stupa and its summer farewell
Ice stupa, a progeny of the climate crisis… perhaps nothing is as adaptive as traditional wisdom when it comes to making the most of limited natural resources, but then this cul-de-sac called the Anthropocene comes about, leaving communities flummoxed, and livelihoods in peril… ‘Tis always enlightening to see subsistence farming in Ladakh, mushrooms of green …
Chortens and their chores…
Chortens are one of those religious structures that are universally revered, a harbinger of constructive contemplation – one that leads towards inner peace through reminiscent journeys – these trapezoids stacked over one another and topped with a crown are but Buddha posing himself they say… a structural representation of different stages of his mortal journey… …
On blues of the blue sheep…
Quite literally, the blue sheep lives on the edge… marvel many a folk at the sheer nonchalance of the caprid in the face of vertical walls… yet ‘tis a rather ironic quest for safety, for even the most exceptional climbing skills or large herd numbers fail to get them out of that twitchy demeanour – …