Episodes of Lake Marathon 02: Karanji Lake

 Hi viewers, welcome to the second episode of Lake marathon! This time, I am here in Karanji Lake. This lake is a tourist spot and could be added to your bucket list when you are here in Mysore. So let me give the brief note on the Lake marathon in Karanji lake. 

Karanji lake is another biodiversity rich lakes of Mysore. It is one of the oldest, largest and popular lake of Mysore. When I visited I could see a large part of the lake being occupied by Eichhornia plants.  

Karanji Lake, Mysuru

Insecta:

As I walked through the park of Karanji, I could see many pretty butterflies flying across. Common tiger, pansy butterfly etc., were spotted. There is a butterfly garden inside the park and for some reason it was close when I had visited. Then my eyes fell on this cute little green damsel fly. 

Damsel fly 

A chocolate pansy was resting on the leaf with its wings fully spread. What a beautiful sight it was!

Junonia iphita (Chocolate pansy)

Wasp species 

This is the interesting phenomenon I have seen in the Karanji lake, an aggregation of red beetle juveniles were found in most of the tree trunks. Aggregation pheromone keeps the beetles intact. Later on I found such red beetle aggregations in Kukkarahali lake as well during the same season. 

Aggregation of red beetles 

Mammals: 

Near the banks of the lake, there are many rodents found, like mongoose, Asiatic palm squirrel, rats etc. There are plenty of bonnet macaques on the tree branches. I found a mongoose but it escaped before I could take a good snap of it. 

Mongoose

Diversity in bamboo trees: 

Lake region is lined by plenty of bamboo trees and each bamboo tree is rich in diversity. A couple of Asiatic palm squirrel. 

Asiatic palm squirrel 

The bamboo forest is so rich that, I could find at least one unique bird in every group trees. An oriental magpie robin was spotted here. 

Oriental Magpie Robin

This is another bird which I found in the bamboo forest, a common shrike. A very shy bird, for which I almost spent half an hour to get one pic, I couldn't get a good clarity pic in this case. 

Common shrike

This cute little blue bird was adding its beauty to the bamboo forest. Tickles blue fly catcher, another common bird species found in the bamboo forests of Karanji lake. 

Tickles blue fly catcher 

Other Avifauna: 

There are good number of Pond herons in the lake region, one such was captured which was wadding on the Eichhornia forest 

Pond heron 

Far in one of the lake island, amidst the trees, a single large grey heron was seen. 

Grey Heron 

A purple moorhen was found on the water side of the lake. 

Purple moorhen 

This was behind the avery park, a huge peacock was found and his eyes are captured quite bold and dark in the camera. There are many such peafowls found in the lake avery section. 

Peacock 

This was very close to the lake park, couple of spot billed ducks were spotted along with them some pond herons and purple moorhens were also found. 

Spot billed Duck 

Other than these birds, I found many black drongos, common crows, jungle crows, common mynas, black kite, paraiah kite etc. There are more aquatic and seasonal birds as well which one can experience while boating on the lake. There are instances were I have spotted a Marsh crocodile during my previous visits.  

Flora: 

Lake is very rich in floral diversity, the lake water is almost occupied by Eichhornia forest and this sometimes affects the stability of an ecosystem. There are palm trees, bamboo forests and other key species required for the birds to habituate. The garden area of the lake is very well maintained. 

Eichhornia 

Palm trees 

Garden area and walking path 

Eranthumum species 

Cactus species 

Malvaviscus 

Lichens 

Gloriosa superba

Tropical milkweed

Impatiens

Other invertebrates: 

There was a heap near the butterfly park and Avery section, which was loaded with bivalve shells. 

Bivalves of the lake 

Unio species (Bivalve)

Found this little feather along with bivalve shells.

A spider species was found on the garden plants. 

Spider species 

Avery: 

Karanji has the largest Walk through Avery in India. One can enjoy the birds walking along with you. There are many pea fowls, turtle doves, mute swans, albino peafowls in the avery section. 

A pair of Saurus crane is also kept in one of the cages. Saurus crane is the only crane to be found in India in wild. Saurus crane once it chooses a mate, it will never change in its lifetime. And hence there is a practice of blessing newly wed couples in Gujarath to live like Saurus cranes. 

Golden Pheasant 

Plum headed parakeets 

Love birds or budgerigar 

Silver pheasant 

White turtle dove

Peacock 

Albino peacock

A romantic peafowl couple posing for the camera! This is such a rare sight I have ever seen in the lake marathons. 

Peacock

Black mute swan is very quick in it's movements I found it difficult to capture it's still images. I had to capture videos of it. It's called mute swan because it makes no or very low calls or sounds even during mating calls. 

Black mute Swan

Peacock with not so much of feathers, probably a young one of its kind.