The vast grassy areas, shady trees and water hazard created for the golf courses and the Seletar reservoir itself has provided ideal conditions for the Asian monitor lizards to live. That’s where I met a fair share of them, either basking around or lazily taking an early morning walk on the golf links. My fascination for these creatures prompted me to look for them in Sungei Buloh, about which I wrote earlier. We were sharing the same space, the monitors and us, but I did not for a minute think that I’d have the privilege of a close encounter.
It so happened that one day I spotted a baby monitor lizard just outside my office, on the grassy area, probably foraging for food. The lizard was fairly small and I had to go up close, really slow so as to not upset the creature, to be absolutely sure that what I was seeing was a monitor lizard and not something else. It was obviously a baby and I then stopped to look around and make sure mama wasn’t around to bite me in the backside while I stalked her baby. My colleagues kept a watch as well, how nice of them, they'd have run away if they'd spotted mama for sure.
Many days went by and the baby monitor still stayed around the same area and we never saw the mother, if at all she was around. We decided that she was going to be our mascot(I think she’s a female because she’s so cute). She did not seem to be perturbed by being so close to humans and she endeared herself to us even more by her proximity. I decided that she be named Molly. I just took the first half of Monitor and first part of Lizard resulting in MO-LI, a little corruption of that word resulted in ‘Molly’ a perfectly girly name at that.
One day, we were returning from lunch and found her inexplicable stuck behind our air conditioning compressor. Whacking myself on the back of my head for not having my camera handy, I had to quickly dig out the mobile phone to take some pictures of Molly from up-close. The phone provided poor quality pictures but something is better than nothing. I had done a bit of research on the net about the way molly lives and their general behavior. When approached at close quarters by other species that seem like predators to them, the monitors are known to puff their head, puff their necks (like a sack hanging from the throat) and emit a hissing sound. They are also known to use their long whip like tail to lash out. Well, that’s what molly did to me when I got too close to her from under the aircon compressor. She did all of the above and then turned her backside and whipped me so hard that I had her tail indentation on my fingers for a while! It felt like a leather whip to be exact. My close encounter left me completely thrilled and elated.
The puffed up throat!I’d never been whipped by an animal before, not unless you count the swipe a leopard took and the ‘Mrs’ joyfully (another animal aficionado) took pictures of that, with the paw midair and me with a silly grin dodging it! Since that animal wasn’t a wild one and the swipe had not connected to any part of me, I guess I can’t count that one as close encounters of the third kind (sorry Spielberg). But let’s not get sidetracked here. Molly left a deep impression on me (literally) and my respect for all species other than our own was reinforced.
MollyMolly was the inspiration for me to go and look for more of them in Sungei Buloh. I saw Molly yesterday, she’s grown a bit more and she was lazily walking on the grass. When we stopped the car to see her, she stopped in her tracks to look back at us before sauntering away. I hope she hangs around here for a long time, becomes 7 feet long and continues to be our mascot.
10 comments:
I think, Mr. Anup Murty sir, that we share a common interest. I love all kinds of animals too, and yes, reptiles and birds have fascinated me too. It is wonderful that Molly allows you to go so close up to her to take a photograph. I have a funny feeling that animals in India are more scared of humans than they are elsewhere. Hmm...I have always failed in animal photography, especially bird photography. If you can read Kannada, there is a wonderful book called Parisaradha Kathe, written by Purnachandra tejaswi, where there is a chapter about monitor lizards. It's pretty interesting. When you do come to INdia, I request you to buy it. I wonder how you photograph these creatures. WOn't they run away? I've always been curious.
Hi Lakshmi, animal photography is indeed difficult because they don't like to pose! I can't claim to be a good photographer, just been lucky with respect to Molly. She did not oblige easily though, lashing her tail and hissing at me. Seletar area has some pretty interesting birds as well, with a camera in hand and with some time (hopefully), I should be able to capture some good photos.
The photos I took at Sungei Buloh happened because of the number of monitors there and they were happy to laze around for anyone to take photos. One needs loads of patience to be able to sit in one spot to take that one good picture in real world wirldlife photography. Hats off to those that can!
I used to read and write Kannada and I am sure I still can except that I have lost touch with the reading part of it andm ay be a bit slow. Sounds good, thanks for your tip, I will get that book Parisaradha Kathe next time I am in India.
I also have a suggestion. How about a blog about singapore bird life? I heard that there are some exotic birds over there, and I've seen only a few. Being a bird watcher, I am interested in learning more abt them.
Good suggestion! I just got back from Macao and HongKong and have some things to say about that in my blog. I also have written up a few events in Singapore that need publishing. Now, I have two projects that may take time, one is about heritage buildings in Singapore and then your suggestion about a blog on birds here. Incidentally, not many know but there are bird spotting guided tours here. Some of the exotic birds are spotted around residential areas too! One of our pilots lives close to the Bukit Timah nature reserve and he has been fortunate enough to have wild pied hornbills land on his apartment balcony (from the reserve or maybe flew in from neighboring Malaysia, who knows!) and he took some photos of this huge bird on his balcony from his mobile phone! I am very fond of pied hornbills and generally hornbills of all kinds. In Mysore I used to delight in watching the common hornbill that sometimes comes close to town.
Ah, yes...Hornbills! I love them. I've seen only a few around...not many here. I once saw a Indian hornbill near a peepal tree. It must be just superb to have hornbills land on the balcony! Me, I've been trying to bird watch for some time, but the thing is, one does not get much oppurtunities, living in a concrete jungle.
The one that landed on my friends balcony is a pied hornbill, not the common one I have seen near semi-urban areas in India. The pied hornbil is the huge yellow beak fellow and looks grand! Best thing about Singapore as you know, urban areas are surrounded with so much greenery and trees that provide habitat for plenty of birds.
I read a report recently about some exotic (non native) birds that had been released by people who had brought them in and the population of these birds had also increased. Singapore also regard crows as an import and non-native!
I saw a cockatoo (Australian native) near Seletar which I thought was quite funny because I knew tihs one is not a local bird, until I read this newspaper article later that mentioned the Australian cockatoo also being an illegal immigrant into Singapore!
Do Birds also have to take immigration clearance :))
Ha Ha! Instead of border patrol agents, we'd then need to have bird patrol agents!
An update on monitors, it seems like we have inadvertantly located a monitor "nest" because just yesterday we saw another baby monitor in the vicinity of our office at Seletar. It is around the same area where we found our Molly first. Our Molly has moved to the now vacant golf course area nearby. The golf course was closed last week as a part of the new Aerospace technology hub that is coming up and mentioned in my previous blogs.
"Monitors on Golf Course" - But nobody playing - What are the "Monitrors" up to? (-Imaginary newspaper article headline)
They are up to no good, these monitors, goofing off in the sun near the water hazards of the golf course! Now they don't have to run away from goofy looking characters wearing funny pattern pants, golf hat on head, swinging clubs and sending balls flying off in many direction! For those of us non-monitors who walk along the path that skirts the fairways (short cut to the office), we don't have to watch for wayward shots and balls hitting us from behind. That can be painful. The golfer in me misses all the action, though. But, the golf course is now closed in order to develop the area into an aerospace technology park. As I mentioned earlier, this golf course is right alongside the airport area and the only runway at Seletar.
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