I went to Yala with 2 fellow photographers in the 3rd week of March 2021 on a day trip. We started around 2.15 am and parked our vehicle in Thissamaharama at the driver's place and by 5.50 were at the entrance though the gate was opened at 6,15 due to late sunrise these days. There was no hassle of buying the tickets as it was done online. It was a very fruitful and a satisfying trip altogether and the experience and the genuine effort made by the driver Kamesh made it all possible.
Orange breasted pigeon
Lost in thought....
Looking ahead : Blue tailed bee-eaters
Malabar pied hornbill in flight
This is HANS a well built male .We were en-route to see a bear on information received but as we took a sharp bend this one was seated like this may be 30 feet away but did not budge and went on continuing his routine for almost 10 minutes.
As the leopard went in ,our driver decided to leave it for the time being and go look for the bear and as anticipatedit was coming towards us and walked along the road for a while.
Again we went back after waiting for a few minutes HANS came back on to the road and walked quite oblivious to our presence,
This was another Leopard we saw but did not hangaround for long as it was quite far covered by shrub and also thought that it would not leave the rock for a while as it was a bit gloomy and a cool day.
A common red shank
A little stint
These three Jackals came to the open together,
Common Red shank with a black winged stilt
A brahmin kite cleaning up
A Jerdon's Bush lark
Luring a partner ......
Showing off...
Majestic look; A well built Sambar deer
Eurasian spoonbills with spot billed pelicans
A giant squirrel near the river where we went to have lunch
While having lunch we were looking around and saw this very illusive Rufes- woodpecker
Afeter all my previous visits this was the opportunity I got to photograph a Eurasian hoopoe well.
This white rumped- shama also entertained us well singing various songs for some time.
A large family and a natures balancing act as many will not survive ..
A female crested tree swift resting at last.
An elephant with the young
A Barred button quail
We were a;lso lucky to see this tusker
This was the 3rd Leopard we came across after making a very tactical decision again by the driver as we waited while the others went to check the surrounding areas and suddenly it appeared
brown shrike
This was an unusual pose..
The three musketeers,,
more elephants
Sri Lanka wood shrike
The 4th Leopard we saw just before making the return trip. The driver again saw this one far in a ticket and dont know how as it was quite covered...
Indian Pitta
