Category: Mammals
Mammals
Mammals are warm-blooded vertebrate animals of a class that is distinguished by the possession of hair or fur, females that secrete milk for the nourishment of the young, and (typically) the birth of live young. There are more than 4,000 different species of mammals. The smallest is the hog-nosed bat, which weighs 0.05 ounces. The largest is the blue whale, which can be upto 100 feet long and weigh 150 tons.Some mammals are intelligent, with some possessing large brains, self-awareness and tool use. Mammals communicate and vocalize in several different ways.
Classification
There are 3 Subclasses within the class Mammalia: Prototheria or Monotremes, Metatheria or Marsupials and Eutheria or placental mammals. Within each Subclass are Orders, Families, Genera and numerous Species.The largest orders are the rodents, bats and Soricomorpha (shrews and allies). The next three biggest orders, depending on the biological classification scheme used, are the Primates (apes and monkeys), the Cetartiodactyla (whales and even-toed ungulates), and the Carnivora (cats, dogs, seals, and allies).
Now you see him; now you don’t! He may be barely a few weeks old, and look as cute as a button, but that’s only when you manage to spot him (please don’t tell us he was born ‘spotted’; we’ve only heard that one 13774 times). For, the young Fawn is a champion hide-n-seeker. Of […]
Tags: Indian wildlife, Kabini, Lifescapes, Orange County Resorts
Fawn, Kabini | Posted in Kabini, Mammals | 3 Comments »
It’s a cow… it’s a battle-tank… it’s Supercow! It has powers other cows don’t, and is from a hidden world beginning with ‘K’. Presenting the world’s largest, strongest specimen of wild cattle, the superhero of Kabini, the ‘Gaur’! Clad in all black, with white stockings and a black dewlap-cape hanging between his forelegs, and a […]
Tags: Indian wildlife, Kabini, Lifescapes, Orange County Resorts
Gaur, Kabini | Posted in Kabini, Mammals | 6 Comments »
Gone are the days of Sir Lancelot, Sir Galahad and other knights in shining armour. When you think of armour today, the mind can’t go beyond those mainstays of modern armies: Main Battle Tanks! Think WW2, and you think of Panzers steam-rolling Europe; names like Sherman, Patton, Tiger and Centurion roll off the tongue with […]
Tags: Indian wildlife, Kabini, Lifescapes, Orange County Resorts
Pangolin, Kabini | Posted in Kabini, Mammals | 5 Comments »
If we polled our fair women readers, chances are a high percentage will claim that men never grow up, and are metaphorically attached to their momma’s skirts. We men can take solace from the fact that we aren’t alone in this particular affliction. In Kabini, there exists a lad who’s the biggest baby of them […]
Tags: Indian wildlife, Kabini, Lifescapes, Orange County Resorts
Elephant Calf, Kabini | Posted in Kabini, Mammals | 12 Comments »
The Kabini Dam is often in the news, holding, as it does, the status of a gatekeeper of the economic fortunes of competing agrarian states. But, far below the swirling eddies of riverine politics, there is another, more pristine ecosystem at work. This is the world of miniature dams and tunnels, a world that exists […]
Tags: Indian wildlife, Kabini, Lifescapes, Orange County Resorts
Smooth-coated otter, Kabini | Posted in Kabini, Mammals | 2 Comments »
He’s small. He’s hyperactive. He’s highly agile. And he spends most of his day high up on a tree. It is these qualities that have given the Rusty Spotted Cat of Kabini the label of ‘Hummingbird of the Cat Family’. The smallest known wild cat in the world, this beautiful little bundle of energy is […]
Tags: Indian wildlife, Kabini, Lifescapes, Orange County Resorts
Rusty-spotted cat, Kabini | Posted in Kabini, Mammals | 4 Comments »
Bibliophiles and cinema buffs have long known ‘The Jackal’ as a furtive killer whose presence is felt only after he’s gone, leaving in his wake, a dead body or two (the real Jackal, though, doesn’t believe in leaving dead bodies behind, as we shall see). One doesn’t know if, Carlos the Jackal, the most famously […]
Tags: Coorg, Indian wildlife, Lifescapes, Orange County Resorts
Jackal, Coorg | Posted in Coorg, Mammals | 13 Comments »
It’s a bond that has endured over 5000 years, through epochal moments in history and eras of relative calm that lay between the seismic cultural faults that defined human civilization. In fact, Eric Scigliano, in his iconic tome on the ‘man-animal’ bond, has propounded the theory that elephants may have been ‘nursemaids’ to human evolution, […]
Tags: culture, Kabini, Lifescapes, Orange County Resorts
Man and Elephant, Kabini | Posted in Culture, Kabini, Mammals | 14 Comments »
Brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, cousins; you’ll find every branch of the Leopard family living, quite literally, on a branch…totally at home in a comfy tree-house in Kabini. But that isn’t the only reason why leopards tower above the rest in the big cat stakes. They are considered the most complete cats as they are adaptive […]
Tags: Indian wildlife, Kabini, Lifescapes, Orange County Resorts
Leopard, Kabini | Posted in Kabini, Mammals | 481 Comments »
Tigers must definitely have South Indian sensibilities. For, their favourite meal is the Sambar, a staple of every self-respecting South Indian kitchen. But while the original Sambar is a soupy lentil concoction, the dish featured here is a large serving of meat on the hoof. The Sambar, featured above, definitely boasts more Deer per Deer, […]
Tags: Indian wildlife, Kabini, Lifescapes, Orange County Resorts
Sambar Deer, Kabini | Posted in Kabini, Mammals | 6 Comments »
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A fortnightly photo-essay on Nature and Culture
