I have written about Alan Rabinowitz on & often. He continues to inspire me personally. I have been inspired after seeing a National Geographic documentary on Alan’s life, his cause & his mission to save the wild. Although he has taken a back seat following his health condition, he still leads the exploration group of the Wildlife Conservation Society.

Alan’s expeditions & his stories have brought the grim truth of survival. His fact finding missions led The New York Times call him the Indiana Jones of wildlife science!

In this book, Life in the Valley of Death: The Fight to Save Tigers in a Land of Guns, Gold, and Greed, Alan talks about the story of life & death, of frustration & the emergence of reason in a nondescript Hukaung Valley of Myanmar (Burma). This is a precious land in the eyes of Big Cat conservationists. This has one of the largest population of tigers outside India. But now the wild cats face extinction in the hands of poachers & gold prospectors.

The land strip is also known as the valley of death. Post the World War 2, the Hukaung Valley claimed the lives of thousands of war victims trying to escape the Japanese army. The land is ruled by a military dictatorship. Alan goes on to explain how the group of scientists have to battle not on a vicious government, but also the local military tribes, insurgence, poverty & the crude diplomats!

This is a must read for all conservationists & nature lovers. The review comments “In forests reviled as the valley of death, Rabinowitz finds new life for himself, for communities haunted by poverty and violence, and for the tigers he vowed to protect.”

The Joubert family has settled in Botswan to film and photograph the African Wildlife in it’s natural environment. Giving up a luxurious city life, they have been working for the National Geographic for over 15 years now. And they have produced some marvelous films over the time.

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Stalking the big cats on their jeep and following the faint sounds that could only be picked up by an expert, they have captured primitive hunts and predatory behaviors. Derreck mans the movie camera while Beverly works the sounds. And while she is not on her usual role, she captures the moments in her still camera.

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While each of these videos will show the passion and compassion of the film makers, it will also be an immense tutorial on various aspects of wildlife photography for all.

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I had been up to Trinidad in Northern California this past weekend. Traveling from San Jose took about 6 hours amidst the fog, rain and winds. Quite unusual to my usual travel bag, this time all I had was my Nikon D200. Most of my stuff were already packed for the upcoming big-drive! I had to stop at an en-route Ritz Camera to pick up a Lexar 2 GB Card.

While I shall write about this short trip to the Avenue of Giants, the one colorful stop we made close to Garberville on Highway 101 is a roadside shop of chainsaw woodwork. Names “Legend of the Big Foot”, this has small to large wood carvings and miniature birds and animals. If you are on the way, do stop by to see a big-foot replica too.

Legend of the Big Foot @ photoduniya.com

More writing and images from the trip will be uploaded on the travel section of photoduniya.com.

One of the most visited places is up north on Highway 101 where the huge Redwood forests make an entire climate and an ecosystem. Tucked away in a side from the main highway, the Avenue of Giants is about 25 miles starting in Phillipsville on Highway 101 about 6 miles north of Garberville.

Although my travel was unplanned and in the dead of winter with frequent rain and sleet, the Redwoods made the 12 hour up-and-down drive from San Francisco worth it.

Redwoods on Highway 101 @ photoduniya.com

More writing and images from the trip will be uploaded on the travel section of photoduniya.com.

Update: San Francisco Street Artists (0507-001) on Photoduniya.com

PO had joined the Dancing Medicine Men in San Francisco. The group, led by Josh and Ryan traveled from Chattanooga, Tennessee, and caught up with another guitar and vocal enthusiast. The group of three were playing late in the night at Powell where I met and photographed them.

PO playing the guitar @ photoduniya.com by Ranjay Mitra

The images were shot on hand held Nikon D200 with a fill flash and a wide angle lens. More images will be uploaded on Photoduniya.com.

Meet Houdini

By the time I reached him, it was time for lunch. The care taker had just put in a colorful bunch of fishes that would last him about a couple of weeks. Houdini loves fishes, and from what we could see, he loves fish food too. For he gulped all the food that the care taker had given for the fishes to eat. And then, he would take his time to chase the fishes around, till he could snap one into his mouth.

Houdini hunting

So what his Houdini doing when not eating or chasing fishes? He is “exploring” – all that he could from the confines of his 6 x 1 home. He is very curious and its easy to believe that he would scramble out of his tank very frequently. And for people who are equally interested in Houdini, he would take time to pose!

Houdini posing for pictures

Join the Regional Parks and help save other Houdinis that are still struggling for survival. For more information, write to photoduniya.com

But business and the lure of exploitation could not keep away from this treasure spot for long. The sky walk, built by Californian businessman David Jin, was envisioned in 1996 and finally open to the public in March – April 2007. Charging $25 per visitor, this is planned to be a strong attraction for tourists. David Jin would collect the money for 25 long years (averaging a low of 100 visitors a day, this could be as much as $ 60 million dollars).

While on one hand lies the question of the Hualapai tribe using their priveledges to rent the land for income (they will own the skywalk while David Jin keeps half the money for himself), on the other side, lies the technical ability of the structure to hold on safely for so long. The 70 feet walk, hanging 4000 feet over the Colorado River on the Grand Canyon, is built by steel and glass drilled 40 feet into the porous canyon walls.

Read the article on National Geographic here. The original article read “It’s the most iconic of American landscapes, yet the Grand Canyon still has the power to surprise.” As long as the bridge is the last of such surprises, its good news. And as long as another amusement park does not invest another few millions to create roller coasters, I guess, we are happy.

I recently saw one of the documentaries by Dr Alan Rabinowitz made by the National Geographic Society – titled In Search of the Jaguars. It details the life and the heroic work of Dr Alan from his early days growing up in Brooklyn, NY to the rest of his life spent in an undying effort to save the Jaguars in Central America.

Although the Jaguar project of Central America has taken up the most of Dr Alan’s better life, he is also known to discover the smallest deer species – the leaf deer and communicating with the Tarons – the Mongolian pygmies who faced  near extinction. The documentaries are published in his book “Beyond the Last Village“.

While you read and see his work, you get to realize what an immense source of strength this person had been throughout his life. Refusing to  give up at daunting challenges, he has fought over twenty five years of his life for the safety and preservation of some of the most fragile species and cultures of our planet.

Today, while his Jaguar project has gained some momentum and has interested similar minded conservationists, Dr Alan Rabinowitz  is facing a harsh reality. He has been diagonized with Leukemia. But not deterred by his physical challenges, Dr Alan Rabinowitz continue to lead the conservation initiatives till today.

You could read more about him on the web at Save the Jaguar. As a last note, the Wildlife Conservation Society runs completely from donations and some of their most critical projects are funded out of donations from people who want to save this planet.

Also called the Lange’s Metalmark after late William H Lange Jr., the UC Berkeley entomologist and UC Davis professor, who first identified this butterly in 1930, this grey metallic colored, spotted butterfly with a wingspan of about 1 to 1.5 inches, is fast becoming extinct! The Metalmark, from the Riodinidae family, is one of the first insects to be protected by the US Endangered Species Act since 1976. The peak count stood at 45 adults in mid 2006 from 232 in 2005 and a high of 2,342 in 1999.

In a similar situation, the Palos Verdes blue butterfly, a Southern California local species once thought to be extinct, was revived by habitat improvement and captive breeding. Similar approach is taken to save and revive the about to be extinct Metalmark. Once quite popular throughout the central and northern Californian region, the Metalmark is now only found in the Antioch Dunes National Park. The revival process is slow and tedious, made even more difficult by the facts that it’s breeding ground is shrinking every day and it can only produce one generation in a year.

The adults lay eggs at the base of buckwheat stems during late summer, during August & September. The eggs hatch into larvae during the rainy season and are known only to feed on the buckwheat. With wild fire burning down large areas of buckwheat every year, the larvae dies of starvation. For the ones who survive, mature from caterpillars into butterflies in mid to late summer. Such a long gestation and maturity period makes breeding in captivity of this species even more challenging.

At the time of writing this article, Feb 24 2007, I have only seen one Metalmark in the Don Edward Wildlife Refuge. I could not take its picture! I was patiently waiting to see it pair up with another one, but it fluttered all alone!

The approximate $250,000 grant from the Central Valley Project Conservation Program for the Metalmark’s revival is to be run at the San Diego Zoo’s Beckham Center for Conservation Research in Escondido.