The pe-monsoon showers had turned Kabini into a lush green paradise and the ambience looked splashed with extra saturation of colours wherever you looked. This is also the rutting time for the Chitals and squabbles amongst probable suitors. We saw a couple of Chital stags posturing and we knew that if we waited we could see them getting into a fight. We waited and that’s exactly what happened next.
When the sparring Chitals settled their fight, we headed onwards only to be stopped in our tracks by this gentle giant grazing along the side of the road. What he did next, surprised us – we had never seen an Asiatic Elephant go down on two legs to get a grasp of some tender grass.
One minute he was on his two legs and the next minute, he was back to standing on four legs as he headed off into the Kabini wilderness. We then turned our attention to another giant, this time a Malabar Giant Squirrel that hurriedly jumped from one tree trunk to another. We just caught a glimpse before he scuttled into the safety of the canopy.
