The courtship dance of the national bird of India, the Peacock also known as the Indian Peafowl, is one of the most beautiful experiences that one can have in the Indian forests. We have been witness to the Peacock dance a few times and based on our experience, the Nagarhole national park and the Bandipur national park are one of the best places to observe and photograph this in India.
Bandipur National Park is also well known for its Tiger sightings, thanks to the fact that it has the highest density of Tigers in South Indian Parks.
Like most of our earlier sightings, we spotted this Peacock on the edge of the lantana during the morning safari in the Bandipur national park. Instinctively we knew that if we waited for a bit we would be treated to a Peacock courtship dance. The dexterity of the Peacock in using its long, beautiful and colorful tail train in its courtship dance is a sight that is difficult to describe in words. Given that this dance lasts only a few minutes, there is little time to interchange lens. Hence, we used the D300/300mm f2.8 lens with 2xTC for closeup images and we got full frame compositions of the Peacock with the D700/70-200mm f2.8.
