A female Asian Koel is drinking water from an open tap as her male companion looks on. This photo was taken long before the heat wave that is currently sweeping across India; however, that open tap is definitely acting like one now. Botanical Garden, Howrah, India

Tags:   Asian Koel Howrah

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First saw a Loggerhead Shrike eating a snake on a tree. After a while the bird flew away leaving the partially eaten snake impaled to the branch for later consumption. Then a short while later I saw a male American Kestrel flying overhead with a snake in its talon. As the snakes come out of winter hibernation, they are becoming easy prey to all sorts of raptors including a songbird like a Loggerhead Shrike - sometimes called a butcher bird. Mississauga, Ontario.

Tags:   Loggerhead Shrike American Kestrel Animal Snake

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On our way to India this time, my wife and I decided to spend a few days in Dubai, UAE. Dubai is well known for glitzy buildings, advanced technology integration, opulence and extravagance. However, there are pockets of places where old traditions and history are still alive. One such place is the famous spice market in Old Dubai. What a great aromatic experience it was. There are hundreds of stalls filled with traditional Arabic and South Asian spices. And by the way, besides sightseeing, I also managed to photograph 5 new birds near Dubai Marina.

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2024 Total Solar Eclipse. To avoid clouds over Toronto my wife and I drove 3 hours west to Chatham-Kent area. We were in a rural area with farms nearby and we could hear cows mooing during totality. All in all, a great experience, probably not to be repeated again in this lifetime. The moon approached from below and covered the Sun for slightly over two minutes, enough to get some decent photos of all of eclipse phases, including the diamond ring with solar prominence (top right corner), Corona, and Bailey's Beads (bottom left corner) - the whole enchilada. The orange hue of the Sun before and after totality is due to the lens filter used, the filter was removed during totality.

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Just got back to Canada after spending two months in India. While there I did a bit of birding around the places I stayed. One such place produced a group of Asian Woolly-necked Stork foraging for insects in agricultural fields at the outskirt of Stantiniketan, a UNESCO heritage site. It was an amazing sight staring at these giants at the edge of newly planted rice fields. On hindsight, we should've stayed one more week as the winter descended back as soon as we set foot in Toronto airport.

Tags:   Woolly-necked Stork Woolly-necked Stork

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