The pond at Padmanabhapuram palace
On one of my gallivanting trips in the peninsula, I was wandering the lenght of Padmanabhapuram Palace in TamilNadu-Karala border and came across a small pond trapped between the palace walls on three sides and lush greenery on the fourth. Its clear waters, spread of lush and tender grass around it, its beautiful setup at the edge of a coconut grove and views of Travancore Hills far away in the east together pulled me towards the pond. Walking around the pond, I found a balcony that opened straight above its waters, and spent a long time indulging in the placid atmosphere.
Standing on the balcony, I could see deep into the pond’s clear and transparent-greenish water. It was live with fish of many sizes and variety. There were big black ones with half a feet long plump body that swam lazily in a corner. And a smaller kind stayed together and moved in a school of few hundreds, staying close to the surface. A Little Cormorant dominated the tank, policing the place from end to end in a nonchalant manner and occasionally diving in and coming out with something in his beak.
When the cormorant dived, I could still see him inside the water. His legs moved back and forth quickly and his neck straightened like a spear to aid swift motion. I could see all that he did when he dived in – the fish that he chased, the ones he managed to catch and the ones he had to let go. He made a quick dive to replenish himself just after I arrived, surfaced immediately, flapped his wings and flew into a rock surface where he settled down comfortably.
He seemed to be planning a long hour of leisure on the rock and in no hurry to get back to the water. He knew that the fish in the pond are going nowhere, and he can consume them one by one at his own pace. He perched comfortably on the rock and spread his wings wide open to let them dry in the sun. Cormorants lack oil secreting that help most waterbirds to keep their wings dry. They have to resort to conventional way to dry them – by getting out of the water and spreading them in the sun. After a good session of swimming, they take a clumsy flight to the bank by flapping their dripping wings, spread them wide open for some time for drying in the sun before flying away.
Life must be good if you are a cormorant in these parts. He kept his own leisurely schedule perched on the rock and seemed to have nothing to bother about. I stood still in the balcony watching him, hoping that he gets back to water soon to work on the remaining fish in the pond, filling himself up by making good use of a time when he is having all the pond for himself. But he was relaxed and took it easy, preening his wet wings and inspecting the pond that he seemed to own.
He must have spent a good fifteen minutes making fashion statements in preening and drying his wings. Just when I was getting impatient and looking forward to some action from him, he jumped into water and started scanning the pond for lunch. I was excited and looked forward to some underwater fish chase and fast action sequences. But to my disappointment, he headed straight to the area covered with weeds and disappeared under them.
He would spend a lot of time under water each time he went into weeds, leaving me in anticipation and keeping me guessing about where is he going to resurface next. He always came out with something tiny in his mouth and would swallow it contentedly after coming back up. What he had in his beak was too small for me to see with bare eyes, but whatever it was, he seemed to be finding a lot of it under the weeds, as he made frequent dives and never came back empty.
This went on for a long time; he had an appetite that wasn’t going to be satiated easily. He continued his routine, relishing in his find under the weeds. There definitely seemed to be an endless supply of food somewhere down there. Besides what he was eating, he did not even bother to look at the school of small fish that moved around the pond in a slothful manner. For such good supply of food, it was surprising that he had no competition and had the entire pond all for himself. It must be a lavish life, being a cormorant.
I did not have to wait for a long to figure why he donned the whole pond by himself. In a few minutes, another one of his fellow beings flew in, perched on the roof of the palace and surveyed the pond to check if it is habitable for him. He seemed to like the place; after lingering for a moment on the roof, he decided to fly into the pond. What happened next was something I wasn’t ready for. He dived into water, but was met mid air by the our old fellow who was unwilling to share his abode. The fight and the pandemonium that ensued next hardly lasted a second. It was a swift encounter as the birds quacked and collided with each other, trying to push each other with their beaks. The intruder retreated immediately, leaving the pond with its rightful owner and allowing peace to prevail. The mystery of his dominance was thus resolved.
Another fifteen minutes of order remained as our old cormorant continued to have good time diving down the weeds and taking mouthfuls. Exploring for more, he swam into a bunch of weeds right below my balcony, giving me closer and clear views of his shining dark back. This time when he dived, I could see a little of what was happening among the weeds. He disturbed a school of very tiny, barely visible fish that haunted the weeds and picked them one by one at each dive. Another mystery was resolved.
There wasn’t a moment of dullness at the pond. Soon he had enough of the tiny fish and scoured the pond for more, stumbling on the school of fish swimming tardily in the opposite corner. There was a sudden infusion of life in the pond. The school sprung into action and swam away quickly, chased by the fast moving cormorant. It split into two groups in the pandemonium and the action that ensued lasted no more than a second or two. The cormorant got closer to the less lucky of the two groups and pounced on them. Next moment it was all over. Our bird was back on the surface floating easily as he always did, a trophy of victory locked in his beak. After all that fast drama, once again peace prevailed in the tank and life continued as usual: the school had regrouped, cormorant returned to its usual uneventful dives. It looked as if nothing had happened in the last minute.
The amount of complexity packed by nature in such a small region amazes me. The tiny fish probably depend on the weeds to survive, and the bigger fish are likely to survive on the smaller ones. The cormorant gobbles up the fish and population of all life is kept in control. The water itself is recycled and replenished to support all this life by vaporization and precipitation. And the complexity is carefully planned to ensure that the system never breaks. The cormorant keeps rivals at bay, ensuring sustenance of aquatic population. And yet it seems so simple and beautiful to someone seeing it from outside the system.