An evening at Rajbagh
Just as last tourist moved out of tiger reserve announcing end of maddening year end rush, I excused myself from mundane city life and was back at my workstation in wilderness. Fog played spoil sport for initial few days with almost less than 20 meters visibility till 9 in morning, this is cold wave of north India at it’s peak with temperatures dropping down till 2 degrees. Weather took a toll on sightings as well and it was hard to see even animals in park especially in morning.
A week into 2015 already and was getting restless for my first safari ( read first sighting) of the year. First family of park including father T28 were back at lakes & I was all geared up to exchange seasons greetings. As we headed toward Rajbagh, commotion towards platform indicated sighting already, it was T28 aka star male sitting on the edge of grass drinking water, first tiger aha so what if at distance in harsh light after all this is the first tiger of 2015.
Prey & predator eyeing each other
While all were busy trying to get a clear view of this handsome male who had by now settled himself under shade of tall grass, T19 the current queen showed up very close to our jeep & caught everyone by surprise. She was on the lookout for hunt, after all it is not easy to keep up to ever growing demands of her young ones. She manoeuvred her way out of the tall grass without even moving a blade only to have eye contact with a grazing spotted deer. They figured out each others presence, tigress knew there was no point in even trying so she decided to return back to her cubs who were waiting for her nearby.
She called for the cubs & to utter surprise they started appearing one by one from the same patch of grass where there were no signs of their presence till now. No movement of grass blades, no peacock calls nothing & here they are now rushing towards the mother. Mother decided to sit in open patch of grass and all the cubs settled close. As the family was relaxed and enjoying this bright sunny day on bank of Rajbagh, it was now turn of babies to steal the limelight from their mother and oblige waiting visitors including us. They surely were in a mood to, it was 2 hours of visual treat as they played with each other & occasionally mother. Have seen tiger cubs playing before as well on several occasions but this is surely the best so far. It only came to halt when mother decided to call it a day & summoned the cubs to follow her.
While i can go on & on describing this sighting, sharing some of the images from this sighting, hope you enjoy them.
