ATREE ACCC 4 Concise and Hurried Timeline

I returned back to ACCC December 23, after a quick stopover at home and Cuckoo… Thought my time here was over, but the Agasthyamalai Mountains still call me.

I didn’t know what project exactly I would be assigned to, but I had some good ideas that I could implement here regarding the moths and data.

The landscapes are still as beautiful, the way the light hits the office windows and the trees outside felt refreshing.

Every day after a day of work, the ride back home from the center is beautiful. Sometimes I choose to walk to witness the Sun also taking its leave for the day, between the Agasthyamalai and Ainthalai Podhigai Hills surrounded by the most uninterrupted view of the golden skies.

But this time, I was focused on contributing the most out of my time here.

December 26 - Bird Survey at the Lake in the early morning, then worked in the office, then returned to help in setting up a moth screen and looking for herps.

December 27, 28 (The weekend) - Headed to Kalakkad and then Thirukurungudi, stayed at the Thalayanai Forest Dept Quarters as their volunteer for the Synchronized Waterbirds Census.

December 29,30 - Went for a recce at night to the nearby paddyfields before they sprayed the pesticides to look at little arthropoddies. Had a nice moth screen. It was quite the darkness, surrounded by water everywhere. All we could do were walk single-file on the bunds and be sure of where you keep your foot otherwise you’d slip into some mud. After the night’s work was done, we went to the nearby river and ate some chapati. Ahh Did I miss this.

December 31 - A spotted dove had entered the Community Hall of December 28. We waited for it to get out on its own. But it had gotten noticeably slimmer so the team took a really long stick and attached a net to it. After 10-15 minutes of getting it tired, finally caught it, gave it some water and released it nearby.

(Spoiler Alert, it got stuck inside again after this) It was a funny sight to me too, we had Tamilnadu’s expert wildlife researchers having multiple publications and PhDs in a room, waving around sticks to scare a silly bird. 🤣

Oh and I should mention, we celebrated new year by going to look for snakes somewhere near Srivilliputhur with some of Tamil Nadu’s best known people on the subject. Got a lot of snakes, especially my first good look at a Saw-scaled Viper 🤩. The one that has the least potent venom in the Big 4. (Later I read that these tiny snakes were responsible for most snakebite deaths in the world 💀), and we were sitting around it and taking photos of it.

January 3 and 4 were spent at the Tamil Birders’ Meet 2026 at Tiruchengode.

January 5 I got my first look at the Common Sand Boa that had settled in a hole in front of the womens’ dorms. I called it Santosh, but most preferred Sandy.

January 7 I had the opportunity to meet Pranali and helped her out for the next few days. Many thoughts on this, will write in detail.

The next few days I took a leave for personal reasons.

January 21 was my first Moth Screening the ACCC campus.

Meanwhile, this whole time I am working on the Moth ID Tool that would help streamline and speed up Thalavaipandi’s workflow. So, I think he was more than happy when I wanted to tag along with him for the moth screenings.

January 23 and the next week was spent with me waking up early mornings, and doing the Tamiraparani Waterbird Count. Got my first good long look at the mighty Bar-headed Goose.

January 30 was spent me trying to contact everyone to get their eBird checklists for the Tamiraparani Waterbird Count. I did and the results shocked me since this was the second lowest count of any year. The biggest dip was in 2017 due to a massive drought.

January 31 had a unexpectedd very special guest coming to the Zero Point. A pair of Great Hornbills! The entire office went up to catch a glimpse of these two visitors. And they were happy to be curious and put on quite the display too!

February 1 I was back at Thirukurungudi for the Raptor Survey, this was done in Valliyoor and I had no idea what significant output would come from this. Yet, I did it and it was a fun time doing the survey with Ponnusamy, Ramkumar and the other Forest Department Officials.

From February 2 to 10 I was at office working intensively on compiling all the Tamiraparani Waterbird Count data and the Moth ID Tool. This was also the time I got to the part in The Story of Philosophy where I got to Voltaire’s part so if I didn’t want to kill myself, I needed to find something to do. And I was doing it with every breath, in a frenzy.

February 4 we went to investigate a dead cow near Zero Point, there were porcupine spines all over its face, and it had been torn apart by dogs and boars. But the one that had brought it down, and killed it, was a leopard. Me and Ganesh has setup a camera trap overnight and removed it at 7:30am in the morning. Around 8am, the leopard had come to the spot again, according to eyewitnesses. Unfortunately, no photos exist.

February 7 midnight, was a very special night for me and a special entry has already been made for this on February 8 itself.

From 11 to 13 I was at Radhapuram with Arjun Kannan PhD and Prashant MB helping out with the Harrier Watch. It was very exciting.

February 14 and 15 I was at Chinnamanjolai, don’t worry if you can’t find this on any map because the place has never been accessible to members of the general public. It was a grueling 7 hours trek on a evil slope. But the destination was heaven. I am making a video on this and will write a detailed entry on things that I found interesting very soon.

I am writing this article very concisely and quite hurriedly, since my exam dates have been announced and my mind won’t shut up being anxious about it, and it has been long due for another blog post.