Posts Tagged ‘Sky island’
Sky Island Pathways
Sky Islands flier for potential sponsors. Photographs by Ian Lockwood, Design by Stephanie Cauvet and the KIS Marketing Team.
This November I will be exhibiting a body of work at the Piramal Gallery, a part of the National Centre for Performing Arts (NCPA) in Mumbai. The show is entitled Skyislands: An Endangered South Indian Landscape and is being produced in association with the Centre for Humanity & Environment (CEH) at Kodaikanal International School (KIS). In an age of colossal human impact and accelerating climate change, the exhibition highlights the concept of the Sky Islands in southern India with an overarching message of conservation. The initiative will raise funds for the CEH to address its mission of “offering innovative experiential programs and research opportunities for students, educators, organizations and agencies that lead to practical solutions for crucial human-environment issues.”
I last exhibited my photographs in Mumbai at the Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS) more than two decades ago. The Western Ghats Portrait and Panorama show in 2001 highlighted the landscapes and ecology of a mountain range that was often overshadowed by its taller northern neighbors. Thematically, the collection of hand-printed black & white images emphasized the role of the Western Ghats as a treasure trove of biodiversity and a vital player in water security for peninsular India. The 40+ images were printed in my darkroom in Dhaka after a period of learning and workshops with world-class fine-art printmakers. The negatives that were the source of the material were shot on medium format film. At the time, photographic material availability limited the size that I could print (a few 15”x15” or 8”x 20”, but mostly 10”x10” prints).
Now 22 years later I have fresh work to share in Mumbai. I have visited a broader swathe of the Western Ghats, explored Sri Lanka in-depth and focused on the higher elevation Sky Islands of the ranges. In the last few years, I have collaborated on several significant studies in the Palani Hills that have investigated the biogeography and change in land cover of the Sky Island habitats in the Western Ghats (see links below). Maps and satellite imagery help us understand the patterns and relationships of the landscape and I have been developing geospatial skills to better analyze changes in land cover and vegetation in the Western Ghats/Sri Lanka biodiversity hotspot. I continue to write articles and produce photo essays for Indian-based publications though most of my energy is devoted to maintaining my blogs. My last exhibition was The Hills of Murugan at Dakishna Chitra, in Chennai (2018).
The Sky Islands exhibition focuses on the unique but threatened ecosystems above 1,400 meters- the Sky Islands or Shola Sky Islands of the Western Ghats/Sri Lanka biodiversity hotspot (see my December 2020 blog post for a detailed review of the Sky Island concept in the Western Ghats context). With the advent of digital photography, photographic tools have changed completely- in how images are captured, in their printing and sharing. Thus, while staying focused on documenting the Western Ghats, my workflow is completely different than back in 2001. I still have a quantity of 120 negatives exposed after the BNHS show which I have been scanning and then printing digitally. The Sky Islands show will present fine art images printed on archival Hahnemühle paper and printed at larger sizes (20”x 20” and above) to emphasize detail and give viewers a richer sense of the landscape. As is usual in my exhibitions, there will be supporting information panels of annotated maps.
The exhibition is scheduled to open up on November 23rd and will be open to the public for the next 10 days. The Piramal Gallery is well known for promoting photography as art and is one of India’s premier galleries of photographic art. The goal is to engage with the conservation community, school groups and people interested in photography as art. The KIS alumni/parent community is a special group of people that we want to reach and we are planning a special showing and talk for them on Friday, November 24th. In the coming months I will be sharing much more information and hope that you can come to see the show in person!
REFERENCES
Arsumani, M. et al. “Not seeing the grass for the trees: Timber plantations and agriculture shrink tropical montane grassland by two-thirds over four decades in the Palani Hills, a Western Ghats Sky Island. PLOS One. January 2018. Web.
Dodge, Natt. “Monument in the Mountain”. Arizona Highways. Phoenix, Arizona: Arizona Highway Department. March 1943. (Wikipedia Link)(Sky Islands Alliance link)
Lockwood, Ian. “Palani Hills Sky Islands.” Ian Lockwood Blog. December 2020.Web.
Montanari, Shaena (& Prasenjeet Yadav). “Breathtaking Sky Islands Showcase Evolution In Action.” National Geographic. 11 August 2017. Web.
Shola Sky Islands. Web.
Vijayan, Robin, Anindya Sinha and Uma Ramakrishnan. “Ancient Geographical Gaps and Paleo-Climate Shape the Phylogeography of an Endemic Bird in the Sky Islands of Southern India.” PLoS ONE. October 2010. Web.
Vijayan, Robin. “Unexplored Areas: Sky Islands.” JLR Explore. February 2018. Web.
Palani Hills Sky Island Landcover Changes at the ATBC Asia Pacific
The opening ceremony of the ATBC meeting featured several cultural shows including this impressive fire dance.
Last September Sri Lanka hosted the Association for Tropical Biology & Conservation (ATBC) Asia Pacific chapter meeting at the MAS Athena center outside of Colombo. This was an important gathering, drawing scientists, conservationists and NGOS from across the country, South Asian region and globe to review different studies and approaches. The theme was “Bridging the elements of biodiversity conservation: Save, Study, Use.”
Earlier in 2019 I had met and interacted with Nimal and Savitri Gunatilleke, the distinguished Peradeniya University professors. They have been deeply involved with forest scientific studies and restoration efforts in Sinharaja and the rest of the island. We had enjoyed several conversations about similarities and differences in the Western Ghats/Sri Lanka biodiversity Hotspot. Nimal encouraged me to submit the findings of the grasslands group published in PLOS ONE. The idea of using satellite imagery to show the drama of land cover change in the WG/SL hotspot is a powerful tool for conservationists that is only just being realized (see the May 2018 blog post for details). After consulting with Robin Vijayan, Arasu and some of the other co-authors, I submitted a proposal and was invited to share the conclusions at ATBC in a poster display.
Poster designed by the author for the ATBC conference.
I was able to get PD time away from normal teaching duties that allowed me to attend the opening and first day of ATBC events. There were some fascinating presentations and interactive workshops. Maithripala Sirisena, the president of Sri Lanka at the time (and also the minister for Environment), was the chief guest. The main thrust of his talk was the remarkable legacy that Sri Lanka’s farmers have with producing abundant food surpluses without endangering the country’s wildlife (both historically and to some extent today). The keynote talk by Sejal Worah from WWF-India on adapting to rapid change to better protect biodiversity. Madhu Verma, from the Indian Institute of Forest Management, spoke of environmental economic and how putting environmental value on ecosystem services is a key step to more effective conservation. There were a whole series of shorter talks and workshops over the next three days. I went to interesting talks by Nimal (on restoration in fern lands) and later on presentations by representatives from ATREE the French Institute of Pondicherry. I enjoyed several excellent session on Wednesday morning. Anjali Watson& Andrew Kittle’s (Wilderness & Wildlife Conservation Trust) “cat talk” about their work with leopards in the Central Highlands was a highlight.
Cover from ATBC journal and copy of page 243.
FURTHER READING & REFERENCES
Arsumani, M. et al. “Not seeing the grass for the trees: Timber plantations and agriculture shrink tropical montane grassland by two-thirds over four decades in the Palani Hills, a Western Ghats Sky Island.” PLOS One. January 2018. Web.
Association for Tropical Biodiversity & Conservation (ATBC) Asia Pacific . Proceedings Book. Web.
Land cover changes. (* posts are in chronological order)
A Song of the Sholicola
Sholicola albiventris singing in Bombay Shola, Palani Hills. Photographed with a D-800 and 600 f/4 lens. (April 2018).
South India’s shola forests (and their companion grasslands mosaic habitat) continue to be a source of hydrological importance, a site for scientific investigation and a place for sheer wonder. The clumps of moist evergreen forest that were historically found in the folds and deep valleys of the highest ranges of the Western Ghats are recognized for hosting startling biodiversity. We know from various studies that the lofty highlands of the Western Ghats were isolated from lower areas by altitude and rugged geography for long periods of time. It is not surprising then that a host of species evolved unique to these “sky islands.”*
There are several notable species that are confined to sholas and whose populations are closely allied to healthy shola habitat. The White Bellied Blue Robin (Sholicola albiventris), formerly known as the White Bellied Shortwing (Myiomela albiventris), is a Western Ghats endemic bird species that perhaps best reflects the state of healthy sholas. I’ve been watching and listening to the bird for several decades and this short post highlights a few facets about Sholicola albiventris, provides some background reading and shares a portfolio of images that I have been working on for several years.
Sholicola albiventris tends to be a sulky bird that spends its time in dark thickets of the shola understory. It can be difficult to spot since it has dark features and is usually only active at dusk and dawn. Novice bird watchers would be forgiven for confusing it with the Nilgiri flycatcher (Eumyias albicaudatus) or White Belleid Blue Flycatcher (Cyornis pallidipes)-both which have overlapping habitats/ranges. The musical songs of the Sholicola albiventris, (mixed in with calls of laughing thrushes, scimitar babblers, barbets, jungle fowl and other birds) in the early mornings is a defining feature of sholas at certain times of the year. I have observed and listened to Sholicola albiventris singing incessantly in the sholas of the Palani Hills in the months before the monsoon. It is also found in adjoining gardens in settlement areas-as illustrated by some of the images in this post. According to scientists studying Sholicola albiventris, the Palani Hills individuals seem to call at times different than other populations (in the High Range and Anamalais). Could the onset of the monsoon and the fact that the Palani hills are in the rain shadow of the South West Monsoon play a role in this behavior?
When speaking of the White Bellied Blue Robin, it is impossible not to mention the long-term work of V.V. Robin. It is a happy coincidence that Robin bears the name of the bird that he has worked so hard to study and better understand. Robin is an evolutionary biologist with an in interest in biogeography and conservation initiatives, especially in the southern Western Ghats. He frequently collaborates with his wife Nandini Rajamani (see links below). I had the good fortune to bump into Robin in the Carin Hill shola (Nilgiri Hills) many years ago-he was collecting DNA specimens and I was trying to see what would later be renamed as the Nilgiri Blue Robin (Sholicola major). Robin is now an assistant professor at the Indian Institute of Science Education & Research (IISER) Tirupati. He was the key person that organized a disparate group, including this author, to map grasslands in the Palani Hills (see PLOS for our article). Robin’s work on the biogeography of the White Bellied Shortwing, using genetic data, led to a split in the original species into three different species. His list of publications, some of which are included below, illustrates his prodigious efforts.
Sholicola albiventris in a garden adjoining Bombay Shola (April 2017).Photographed with a D-800 and 600 f/4 lens. (April 2018).
Looking for Sholicola albiventris and other shola species in the heart of Bombay Shola.
*Sky Islands is a term first used in the south West United States and defined as “isolated mountains surrounded by radically different lowland environments.” The concept has appropriate relevance to the high Western Ghats (from approximately 1,500-1,800 to 2,695m) and has been used in popular, as well as scientific publications. I was first introduced to the concept by V.V. Robin through conversations and his website. The INTACH book on the Palani Hills utilized the term and our friend Prasenjeet has incorporated it into his August 2017 National Geographic article and photo essay.
REFERENCES & FURTHER READING
Arsumani, M. et al. “Not seeing the grass for the trees: Timber plantations and agriculture shrink tropical montane grassland by two-thirds over four decades in the Palani Hills, a Western Ghats Sky Island.” PLOS One. January 2018. Web.
Grimmett, Richard Carol Inskipp and Tim Inskipp. Birds of the Indian Subcontinent, Second Edition. London: Helms Field Guide/Oxford University Press, 2011. Print.
Montanari, Shaena (& Prasenjeet Yadav). “Breathtaking Sky Islands Showcase Evolution In Action.” National Geographic. 11 August 2017. Web.
Rasmussen, Pamela C. and John Anderson. Birds of South Asia: The Ripley Guide. Volumes 1 &2, Second Edition. Washington DC: Smithsonian, 2012. Print.
Robin, V.V. and R. Nandini. “Shola habitats on sky islands: status of research on montane forests and grasslands in southern India.” Current Science. December 2012. Print & Web.
Robin, V.V. Anindya Sinha and Uma Ramakrishnan. “Ancient Geographical Gaps and Paleo-Climate Shape the Phylogeography of an Endemic Bird in the Sky Islands of Southern India.” PLOS One. October 2010. Web.
Robin VV et al. “Two new genera of songbirds represent endemic radiations from the Shola Sky Islands of the Western Ghats, India.” BMC Evolutionary Biology. January 2017. Web.
2017 Taxonomy update for Indian birds. E-Bird. 24 August 2017. Web.
