Did an overnight trip to the Bhadra property of JLR which I had wanted to see for a very long time. So when was going to be the "photography-guide" for a group of people who are members of the Pixetra Club , and Karthik, too, would be there at the time, I decided to join up and join in. For me, it was a learning experience on both wildlife and photography fronts. Will be making a Metroblogs post about it....

But meanwhile…it was not a wildlife trip per se (though of course, on safari we sighted ELEPHANTS, SPOTTED DEER, BARKING DEER, MONGOOSE, and –as usual— the recent pugmarks of a young male tiger…when am I ever going to get beyond the scat and pugmarks and see an actual South Indian tiger, I wonder?) so we were concentrating more on the photography this time.

The property itself proved a great source of excellent subjects, and here are two photos of “Life Under Foot” as I like to call my macro photos…one, because a lot of these subjects can be found just underfoot, if we only look down and about with attention…and two, because the subjects are generally much less than a foot in their dimensions!

Here’s the fruit pod of the Passion Flower plant:

I loved the delicate tracery of the lacy cage that holds the seed safe within itself.

And as we walked along, my friend Sadvi, who works as a naturalist at the Bhadra property, spied this little green beauty. And just to make things interesting, along came an ant…

We all know the story of the Ant and the Grasshopper, but of course, just to be contrary, real life has only the story of the Ant and the Preying Mantis!

The ant actually did go up to the Preying Mantis and pulled one of its legs, and the Mantis reacted by taking its legs out of harm’s way…but DIDN’T prey on the ant! A very Gandhi Preying Mantis, this one…indeed, one can quite call it the PrAying Mantis, it was so non-violent!

Then it quite deliberately turned its back on us and mooned us, I think…here’s the view of the behind of a Mantis!That’s Amogh clicking away in the background with his really awesome macro lens…watch out for the pics on his blog.

It was a very enjoyable trip, I must say!