The spotted beauty

[Prajwal J Ullal]

Few weeks back had been to Sanjay Gandhi national park for some bird and macro photography, while I was strolling through a patch of the pathway I heard loud and unique call. After hearing it I tried spotting the source of the call, and also there was a couple who were trying to spot it, later the lady spotted it and helped out her husband as well as me in locating and spotting it, it turned out to be a couple of spotted owlets seated very high on one of the dried down trees. As it was too far off I couldnt get a good shot of the bird. Luckily this weekend while I was visiting a local lake/ garden area at Hubli, I heard the same call and out of no where I spotted over 4-5 owlets right on top of me on the tree. Though this time the lighting wasnt in my favour as the time was about 7p.m and it was generously dark. Somehow I tried to capture several frames, few with really high ISO and others using the camera flash. It was interesting to observe the behaviour of the birds, one of it even went into the hollow part of the tree and at some moment also tried to scare us away by making several movements or poses. Over all it was a great experience and delight to spot and get good frames of the birds.

EXIF:
Canon 550D
Canon 55-250 IS
F/5.6
Shutterspeed 1/200
ISO 200
Handheld, inbuilt flash used
Location: Unakal Lake, Hubli

[Mrudul Godbole]

Wow what a stare..!! The eyes kind of bore into you. Is this photographed with the flashlight on? Good details. Could you record the call? Thanks for sharing.

[Prajwal J Ullal]

This was just with the Camera flash and some surrounding street lights, couldnt get the sound as it was just for a moment, never gave the call later

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Lovely eyes. Good that you got a frontal view with the bird looking straight at the lens.

Cute fellows. How on earth can people hunt such sweet creatures!

[Roopak Gangadharan]

Good to know about your experience prajwal. To all those who take an intrest in natural history and behavior of the many species surrounding us, a walk in the woods will be much more engaging than those who go about making species lists. This turn of mind will ensure your love for nature is a continuously engaging, interesting and life long one and not just a college fling.... ..Calls are an important part of this learning process and it is always nice to relate the call to the source.

One suggestion, it is not a good idea to use a flash on nocturnal animals.. there are a lot of arguments for and against this principle. I personally believe it is not an ethical practice.

TFS
Roopak

[Sabyasachi Patra]

At least a flash momentararily blinds the bird. Since the eyes are dilated to allow more light so that it can see in the dark a sudden bright camera flash light is going to cause momentary blindness. It cannot immediately fly. It is also said that sudden flash causes permanent damage to the eye.

[Prajwal J Ullal]

Yeah, I realized about it after a while, shall see to it that I restrict the usage of flash in the future for these nightlife beauties

[Abhirup Dutta Gupta]

WONDERFUL shot...........