Ihtisham Kabir

Imagine a crocodile in a river that spots a dead buffalo floating on the water. Seeing a free meal it swims closer. The buffalo is a big animal, however, so where to start? The crocodile decides to eat the leg first.

Up before dawn, I take a quick cold shower to rouse me for a full day of bird photography and gather my binoculars, hat, boots and camera. Leaving the hotel my Australian birder friends and I drive north , leaving behind Katherine, a small town in the Northern Territories of Australia. After about fifteen minutes we stop and walk down a dirt road to a stream called Edith Creek.

When birding in a new country, what is banal to locals there can be thrilling to the visitor. In Bangladesh I have seen visitors marvel at our Purple Swamphens and Common Kingfishers. And so when I visited Kenya, the Superb Starling, which is very common there, delighted me. Its iridescent blue back, orange breast and white eyes that stared from its black head kept me spellbound.

We would have missed it but for the vultures. A large flock of them stood around at the far edge of the giant field that stretched to our right, catching our attention. The ground beyond the field was raised and covered with trees. Periodically a vulture flew over to the shade of the trees and lazily flapped its way back to the flock after a few seconds.

Masai Mara National Reserve of Kenya is one of the few places in the world where one can see a large variety of mammals – including Lions, Cheetahs, Elephants, Zebras and Giraffes - in their natural habitat. For anyone who loves nature and wildlife, it is a compelling attraction.

I first met her on Christmas Day a few years ago. In the late winter afternoon I was looking for birds in a large field in Purbachol. I found her perched on the very top of an Akond shrub. I couldn’t recognize her from a distance and, intrigued, came closer. Her underpart was cream coloured and she was brown on the top. Her wings had brown stripes and three dots near each shoulder. She was hardly larger than a sparrow. I photographed her, came closer and photographed her again.

My thoughts about good writing spring from writing non-fiction, where my goal is to communicate, inform, and perhaps persuade the reader. Writing is a craft. Like all crafts, you can improve your writing with practice. I hope the following words help you write better.

I saw it one winter morning when I was on my way to Kalenga forest. Resting on a slim bamboo that floated on a small pond of murky yellow water was a snake. It was soaking in the soft, warm winter sunshine and its bright yellow skin, offset by a black pattern, glistened like gold in the morning light.

Dubrovnik is a port in south-western Croatia, across the Adriatic Sea from Italy’s eastern coast. Endowed with a spectacular setting, it has become a magnet for tourists who come here to enjoy sailing and water sports in the deep blue Adriatic Sea, hiking in the spectacular mountains, and exploring the remarkable old town - still surrounded by a wall - which dates back to the 10th century.

In last week’s column, I mentioned The Decisive Moment, a photographic term for the moment when the subjects of a photograph in motion come together perfectly. The term is applied primarily to a street photograph, where such a moment is snatched from ongoing human activity. The subject(s) of the photograph are in motion, and in one particular instant, the photograph as framed by the viewfinder comes together in perfect geometry, preferably without the knowledge of the subjects. The photographer must click the shutter at this moment.

I was fortunate to have discovered the photographs of Kertesz early in my photographic life. They have inspired and nourished me for decades.

Majeda Haq, a star of Bangladesh birding and a development professional, left us on 6 June, 2019. Her untimely departure - in addition to the death of wildlife researcher Tania Khan in March - made 2019 a painful year for conservationists of our land.

It was two hours before sunset when I entered Hail Haor, though you couldn’t tell the time from the grey sky. The road had weaved through half a dozen villages before the land and the sky abruptly opened up all around me. Inside the Haor, the rice fields were glowing with soft green rice seedlings and the beels were brimming with monsoon water.

In recent years, while travelling abroad for bird photography, I have become an avian tourist. The idea is this. Suppose you are a devoted birder who wants to see the Yellow-headed Picathartes, a bizarre looking rare bird found in western Africa. You decide to fly to Ghana looking for it. But you will need a guide, someone who knows where to find the Picathartes. You will also need to rent a car, make bookings in hotels, etc. Before long you have planned an expedition and your friends join in.

I recently attended my daughter’s graduation from Cornell University. The important day - one of pride and happiness for our entire family - recognized her four years of hard work in two fields: Mathematics and Statistical Science. For me it had additional significance. That’s because me and my son also graduated from the same university.

The morning sky was ominously dark but the wind kept the rain to a thin drizzle. I was walking home after running in the park.

We take pictures every time we go on a trip. We take them as evidence that we have been to this place, perhaps with family, friends or a special person. We take them to remember beautiful views and unusual subjects. And we take them because inside us we are creative.

What satisfied people’s craving for sweet before sugar came along? Well, some people boiled the sap of maple and date to make syrup, but honey was the undisputed king of sweet. Honey bees were domesticated in ancient Egypt where beekeepers used clay jars for their bees to nest in. Beekeeping was also well known in Greek and Roman civilizations.

In 1996 I was working as a software engineer in Silicon Valley. Engineering was a wonderful profession, but photography was more fun and so captured my free time. Those days, the World Wide Web was in its infancy. Photographs were part of the Web from its beginning and photographers were starting to use it to reach a large audience.

I broke the big rule about going outdoors in summertime, which is to start early. Owing to unexpected traffic, it was almost ten when I reached Satchori National Park. The forest seemed enveloped by heat and humidity and I heard few bird calls.