Very early this morning, , and I went to IISc campus to do a bit of birding before the meeting we went to have. We spotted only the usual birds, the COUCAL, the WHITE-CHEEKED BARBET, the BULBULS,the INDIAN ROBIN, the ASIAN KOEL, the FLOWERPECKERS, the SCALY-BREASTED MUNIA (though Sanath said he saw a BLACK-HEADED MUNIA as well)the PURPLE SUNBIRDS, and the ROSE-RINGED PARAKEETS (apart from the usual CMPK...CROW,MYNAH, PARIAH KITE!) Didn't take any pictures of these, as I have already taken pictures of them, and also because the S3IS is NOT a birding camera...

But the S3IS macro came in really handy for documenting other marvels.

Here are two COTTON STAINER BUGS (thanks Noella!) mating, for some unknown reason, several of these pairs were found upon the dead bodies of other cotton stain bugs…

Here's a BUTTERLY (Blue Tiger, id Madhusmita Dutta) that I tried to snap, using 's technique of using the zoom in the aperture priority mode rather then use the macro facility: Here's a LARGE MILLIPEDE, so beautiful and shiny, crawling off a pile of...er...animal end-products... Here's the COTTON BOLL on a cotton plant, which has burst to release the cotton and the seeds for wind-dispersal... And this is the flower that we call the "POWDER PUFF" (you can see why!) that is from plant/ tree that belongs to the family Mimoseae... And here's a butterfly that my friend Madhu says is a Five Ring Butterfly...Thanks Madhu! </lj-cut> Let me close with two more of the Cotton Stainer Bug (id courtesty Karthik)... And here, the bug has caught an ant as prey: While we crane our necks into the sky, looking for the birds..there's such a lot happening under our feet! We also saw a STRIPED-NECK MONGOOSE briefly...we were told that there are few on campus, but that we were lucky to be able to sight one.