A new life in the garden!

A Tit was in the garden yesterday, from where it moved to the courtyard and started gathering strands of hair from different places in the kennel and around ! The large mouthful of hair seemed to be for  making its nest. The way it moved about and strategically gathered the collection before it flew away to a tree close by and disappeared into the foliage gave me a strong indication that it was a pair in courtship. 

It was while looking around to spot the other pair, I noticed it perched in the neem tree, from which it had a good view of its pair gathering the material from the courtyard. 

The Tits are small and often confine themselves to small trees and bushes. It was therefore a special sight to have one of them close in sight, while gathering the materials for the nest. 

How delightful it is to watch the early stages of the family formation of birds ! 

I remember watching Bulbuls and Parakeets preparing their nest in our garden. Whenever I watch birds as a pair, I trace their flight location and movements to look for nesting activity !

I look forward to see more activities of this pair in the garden in the coming few days. I remember a birder mentioning that small birds hide their nest for fear of being attacked by big birds. So the nest might be hidden. 

A new life is about to emerge!

The plants and birds bring new life, which is why a garden is a sign of life and living! 

The flower below was the first one in this season from a rose bush planted a few months ago. 

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

A surprise - beginning from 2012 !

A friend reminded me yesterday that he was following this photo blog series, since 2 July 2012, when I first posted a reflection in this blog spot. 

I was surprised to be reminded of this experience. That gave me an opportunity to go back to have a glance of what was the main focus on my the reflections in the blog posts. 

4563 blog posts from 2 July 2012 !

I feel that it was more than a coincidence when a pond Heron visited us in the garden at dusk yesterday. Its stroll in the lawn for about half an hour gave me an opportunity to take about five hundred photos, the largest number of photos I took of any one bird so far, since 1997! 

It was because of the most interesting way it moved about in the lawn looking for its feed and finding insects in the grass. It moved slowly and purposefully and approached the insects cautiously and circumspectly. It missed a few as the insects moved away but caught some by intelligent traps. 

This pond Heron seems to be familiar with our lawn, because it moved about with ease. The marshy fields below our cottage, beside the stream used to be the places where the water birds were regularly found. Now that the wet land is being used for a rubber plant nursery, the Herons come to our garden during the day, looking for shade and feed. 

Looking back over the last 13 years, since Anna and I located in our cottage after completing our time in Pondicherry Institute of Medical Sciences, what stands out is the way we have been finding our way forward. 

It was in June of 2012 Anna gifted me with this blogspot to start blogging. It gradually became a routine over the years to reflect and share experiences and insights. 

In one sense, our story was also like that of this pond Heron, feeling displaced and looking for a new place, having lost its usual habitat. 

Since we arrived here, we took time to feel connected with the local terrain. Now we feel connected with this place geographically, socially, relationally and  occupationally. 

The Heron finds its daily feed even when displaced with no wet land close by. 

I was fascinated by its diligent and alert presence in the lawn that any cue of movement in the grass drew the heron towards that site, with slow motion movements and steady pace to avoid any signal to its prey. Even when it trapped its prey, the movement of the neck and opening the bills were slow to avoid being noticed. It was at its best with its slow and measured movements. 

It was this message, that enthused me to take as many photos as possible, to observe the steps in the different movements of a Heron while catching its prey ! It was in no hurry! When the prey was faster to escape, the Heron moved in another direction for its prey. I did not see it chasing a prey that escaped. 

What lesson to remember!

To so live that the pace is slow and steady with full attentiveness and readiness, anchored in hope!

It was alone but not impaired functionally by loneliness. It was on a dry land and needed tricks suited to catch insects in dry a place unlike the process it would follow in wet land to find its feed. It adapted with good outcome. Had it not been for the dusk setting in, it would have stayed on longer, having better outcome of trapping the prey with practice. Its adaptation to feed on insects in the dry land was one of its strengths!

Life is such an experience in adaptation to opportunities, challenges and stresses!

The post-retirement season is one phase in life when this gets tested ! Anna and I feel grateful of having been carried in this journey to adapt to retirement and geographical relocation!

M.C.Mathew (text and photo)

 

The visible and the less visible!

I did not miss sighting the Cormorant and a greater Coucal in our garden yesterday. They by their largeness and presence in prominent spots caught my attention. 

It was following that I turned my attention to the rose bushes in front of me. It was when I downloaded the photos, I noticed the web of a spider in two rose bushes above, with the spider not in sight.  

This was a lesson in advanced self education!

There is a conditioning effect by habit, which brings to visual attention that which we are familiar  with and are looking for! I look for birds and see them!

I do not usually look for spider or the web. So I miss seeing them. 

I took time to view the above rose flowers under different editing conditions to explore if I could find any trace of web in any of the above flowers. But I could not!

I found a trace of a web strand at the five 'O clock position in the flower below, which I copied under two editing stages to hight light the strand of the web, but could not succeed enough, except for a faint trace of it in the five to eleven 'O clock positions, at the bottom of the flower. 

This revised my thinking and challenged the authenticity of the first impressions I carry with me!

This brought an awareness to dwell on !

I missed seeing the strand of the web in both instances, in the third and the fourth photos as well as in the last two photos. Therefore I missed seeing the spider which might have been underneath the flowers or leaves. 

I tend to see what I look for ! Just because I do not think about some other sights, it does not mean that they do not exist, but miss them as 'what the mind does not think about is not looked for'!

I realise that education of the mind to go beyond the regular impressions or familiar habits is what is needed to stay objective and open!

That brought a truth to reckon with- my impressions would need revisions!

If just a few photos told me this story of some missed observations, how much more I miss in real life because I am not comprehensive in seeing, listening or perceiving!

This is the foundation about the revision of life. 

Because we are used to  overlook or under view, we  live with reduced or restricted  awareness of truth !

Let me make a confession!

The two photos of cashew nuts above, each with three, one spread out and the other in a cluster in appeared differently. What was in a cluster was three and the other was two and one! But the reality was that each photo had three cashew nuts.

This bias to interpret in one way is a perception bias!

I realised this even more intensely when I reviewed the photos taken during the week. When I looked at them to search for anything more than what I took the phots for, I was surprised to see somethings which I did not observe earlier while editing !

I realise how facts would receive a new colour of depth, when seeing, hearing, and perceiving become comprehensive!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

The fruiting season of the Cashew tree !

Both Cashew fruit  trees in our garden are now in different stages of fruit bearing. The one near the gate, not in the picture, is full of blossoms. The one next to the lawn, whose pictures are above, shows the different stages of the fruit bearing. 

Anna found that the pulp of the fruit can be used to make juice. We have it on most days of the week. 

The tree offers a colourful look from tender leaves to flowering stages including the ripening fruit. 

The fruits from the tender stage to the ripened stage have a history of about two months. The ants who come to feed on nectar from the flowers feed on the nut when it is tender. Few of the nuts get damaged by that. 

Every fruit bearing tree in our garden gets manured twice a year a year.  The summer months bring one delight. The Rambutan trees, custard apple trees, cashew trees, lime trees, and Chikoo trees are now in the fruiting stages. 

The flowers are few; visiting birds are fewer; but the sight of fruits brings an ornamental look to the garden. 

It is common for children who visit our garden to look at the nutmeg fruits and think of them as Chikoo fruits, as they have a similar look, although different in colour. 

I noticed that even a Barbet came to the nutmeg tree (the last photo) instead of the Chikoo tree, while looking for fruits. 

A squirrel will not miss its destination each morning at day break!

The garden invites me to be even more observant!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

The garden of life!

 

The collection of photos above from our garden taken recently gives three patterns- flowers alone, flowers with buds and Buds alone ! That is the distribution I notice in the garden most of the time. The dew of the night and the webs on some flowers made by the spiders are only faintly visible.

Apart from the above, there are flowers in the early stage of bloom and flowers with the petals having fallen off and a flower with damaged petals due to insects. 

I realised as I saw these photos that while a garden is a safe place for flowers to bloom, it is also a place where we can notice the flowers at the end stage of their blooming or flowers prematurely damaged.  

I have recently heard a few stories of homes carrying a similar story. Many experience the security of their home and relationships within the family. But there are exceptions when children or adults feel unsafe  due to hostile attitude in the family relationships. 

The safety of a home and warmth of relationships contribute to childhood formation and the parenting canopy.

The journey of a family is towards the formation of children into adulthood and parents becoming shades of shelter and protection for children to grow into their full stature. 

Both these functions seem to be threatened amidst the changing value system!

Children endure the hardships and parents feel lonely because the family ties are loose, fragile and tentative!

Each morning when I return after the walk in the garden, what stays with me is this message of 'tending the garden of life'- families where children and parents grow together. 

It is in families we welcome birth and bid farewell to those whose time have come to move on! 

The life in the family is formative to face the joys and travails of life!

The flowers above, in whatever state they are, remind me of the joy of living and  abundance of gratefulness we are privileged to share in our families!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)